Desert Wadi Part One

Hello There! I wanted to add a desert wadi to my desert terrain and have been planning how I would do this for a while.

I made the base and sides in the same way as the modular terrain, here. I was able to use many styrene off cuts from the rubbish bag, that I had kept., 'just in case'!

I had drawn out the sides of the wadi on the plywood base and filled the sides out with the styrene off cuts.

At first I was planning  to score the face of the rocks, like here. But I had a large amount of Woodland Scenics plaster rock faces made and a large bag of plaster left over from another craft project.

I cast a number of rocks and then started to fit the most suitable parts in place. There would be some overhang, where the rocks would be taller than the styrene but I can make the height difference up later.

I included a slope on one side to aid access to the bottom of the Wadi and have plans to add a few more sections to this scenery later.

I made it all fit together and then will glue up in the next part.

Mediterranean Church Part One

Hello there! Along with the other scenic items I am working on, I have taken out of storage the Shellhole Scenics Mediterranean church that I bought during the 1990's!

As you can see it is massive. That is a 20mm figure on it.

It comes complete with a separate tower which I shall keep with the church.

There are some small damages which have accumulated over the years as it has endured a number of house moves, as have I.

The main building lifts off and has a subfloor in the base and a separate pulpit and second floor. I do not normally keep lift off roofs as they can easily get damaged and putting figures inside model building can 'give the game away' so I keep such figures off the table until revealed of spotted.

Also, unavoidable with such a large resin casting, the sides have bulged out a bit. I hope to take this into consideration while upgrading this building.

The separate tower is in three parts and again had a lift off roof. It also has interior detail.

I was planning to keep the tower in one piece and on the same base as the church.

Like the church it has to have the windows hollowed out.

As the top of the walls bowed out past the edges of the cast roof, I cut a sheet of platicard to the correct size and added a bead of quarter round around the edge to hold the roof in place when it is glued to the roof section.

Here is a better view of this work and the detail on the walls.

I had drawn an ellipse on a sheet of 4mm thick plywood and cut it out using a scroll saw. This would be the base for this large model.

I had some small walls which could be put around the base.

They were originally straight sections but I bent them to shape by holding them in just boiled water and bending to shape. When I had them how I wanted I dipped them in cold water to hold their shape.

This gave me a surrounding wall but it was a little short in height so I used each section of wall as a profile and cut out plywood sheet packing to cut out with the scroll saw again.

Well that is the end of this part. Next the surrounding wall has to be fixed in place and will look into the difficulties of fitting the roof squarely and adding some more detail.

Aegean/Mediterranean Harbour Scenery Part One

Hello There! Along with the modular terrain and the Walled Vineyard I have also started a harbour for the above.

This can be used for the Aegean and 20mm figures and also Napoleonics in 28mm.

This is based on the Wargames Illustrated Feature, 'Operation Nostalgia' which was in issue 74 in November 1993.

This is the basic shape. After drawing a plan of the proposed design I measured out a 600mm x 600mm scenic tile.

I had drawn out the layout of the harbour and used some timber I had stored in the garage, 'in case I ever needed it'! I cut it to size, using a cross cut saw,

 

I then made sure the surface of the floor of the harbour was all the same height by using some thin off cuts of styrofoam glued in place using non solvent gripfill.

The tool on the left of t he picture is a Stanley Surform. It is a hand held plane which is perfect for moulding styrofoam. It makes a big mess but is easily hoovered up. It enables you to mould the styrofoam and be more precise with your meausrements.

The block and brick work for the harbour walls and floor are from a railway model supplier called Slaters Plasticard. They supply many different scales and size if brick and block work.

I found it difficult to keep the steel rule in place while cutting the sheet to size so devised a system to hold the ruler in place which I had hands free to cut the sheet accurately.

I used a quick release clamp to held one end of the ruler in place while cutting and was able to keep my fingers out of the way while cutting.

I planned to represent a number of large timber logs to fit next to the wall as retaining and a way to protect the wall against careless fishing boat captains who could hit the wall while mooring. I also wanted a length of timber along the corner of the wall and floor of the harbour.

Both of these would be made from plasticard, scored with a suede brush and then marked with a wood grain with a sharp No 11 scalpel blade.The plastic strip is the start of this.

Also the foam and plywood sandwich is the start of the boundary wall of the harbour. This will be covered in air drying clay later.

On the left hand side is masking tape holding the Slaters plasticard on to the sides of the harbour walls.

This is the end of part one and in the next part I hope to complete the plasticard cladding and add a couple of extra features.

Modular Terrain Part One

Hello there! With the completion of the cabin and the transfer of most of my 'stuff' to it, I now have the space to progress some projects.

The first project will be the start of the modular terrain that I have started many times over the years and has produced desert terrain and the start of some for North West Europe, which will double for my ACW games.

Like the other projects I will be starting at the same time, but will all be related, I will not wait until completion then publish them on the blog, but do them in linked parts

I had already decided that the overall dimensions would be based on 600mm x 600mm squares. To house river sections and smaller features I would also make a number of 600mm x 300mm and 300mm x 300mm tiles.

The plywood sheets are 3.6mm thick and can be cut using a Stanley knife. Now this is obviously fraught with danger so I devised a system where a couple of quick release clamps held a premeasured sheet on to a cutting board, in this case an old sheet of 12mm thick plywood, and also held a 600mm long steel rule in place so I could score a line in the plywood using the steel rule as a profile. It also meant that I would shed any blood for this project if the blade slipped or jammed.

I have used the thinnest and most easily obtainable timber for the surround of the modular tiles. In this case 19mm x 50mm PSE timber. This was cut to the desired length using a cross cut saw and then I cut a 45 degree angle at both ends.

The picture above shows how I held the sides in place with quick release clamps and used solvent free gripfill to glue it together. I also had an engineers square to make sure it was all square.

If it set in the wrong position I used a carpenters plane to square the sides and make sure the 600mm x 600mm dimensions remained.

The styrofoam was glued in place using expanding urethane foam. I recommend wearing some gloves while doing this bit. Do not use too much expanding foam and stay with the job once the styrofoam is in place as it may continue expanding and rise up

Here are the tools I was using to shape the styrofoam board. The item with the red handle in a Stanley Surform. This has been invaluable in getting the shapes of hills and to make things fit without having to get the knives out again. Also the kitchen bread knife is also very useful.

The expanding foam which has set and hardened and managed to creep out round the edges of the styrofoam can be cut off and shaped with the surform.

Once the shaping has been done then the worst of the holes can be filled in with water proof tile adhesive. This does not have to be mixed and is a consistent thickness and texture. I prefer to do this separately because the thicker the next layer of tile adhesive is applied the longer it takes to set.

So in part two we will have the layering on the surface and application of texture.

Walled Vineyard, Part One

Hello there! I found a long forgotten purchase in a box in the loft. It was some bagged walls and opening suitable for the Mediterranean or Spain. These came from Hovels and were obviously an impulse buy!

On closer examination I found that all the pieces did not quite line up properly. I had enough for a square walled enclosure.

I decided to fix them to a base board so it could be a drop on item.

I fixed the gate in place first and then could join the separate section together in a more eye pleasing manner. The joins were filled in with milliputt and glued to the base using gripfill. 

On section was very far out of alignment so I had to place milliputt under the wall section and start to make up the difference with more filler.

Here it is all assembled. I left this overnight to set thoroughly so I can start to paint next

Cemetery Completed

Hello There! This is my latest completed painting work. It is a Total Battles Scenics cemetery. It is in 10mm 'scale'

The model came with separate grave markers which were intended to be fixed with a butt joint onto the base. This was obviously not going to withstand much handling on the wargames table. The only solution I could think of was to add some milliputt mounds in front of the head stones so that they had a little more area to adhere to the base. I realise that graves are allowed to settle over a number of months before a head stone is put in place but a little artistic licence was called for over accuracy.

The finish on the grey paving slabs was an unintentional effect as I painted then and then did a wash of thinned acrylic black paint. they came out like this and I felt that it was realistic so kept it. 

I picked out the block work with a brush and used some off white weathering powders for the mortar. This was held in place with fixative.

The ground was painted in Vallejo 921 English Uniform, dry brushed in 819, Iraqui sand. Then used thinned down PVA to glue some fine Woodland Scenics flock. I added some small tuft.

I varnished this after the paint was dry but before I added the flock. This is because I have found that the spray varnish I use tends to accumulate on the tufts and form bubbles.

 

MAFVA Show 2025

Hello There! I decided to get out of the house for a while and the MAFVA show was about an hours drive away.

I have not been to this show since it was at the Duxford Military Vehicle display and coincided with the book fair.

I was very pleased and surprised to find a much bigger show than I was expecting. Spread across a large sports area and other rooms, including an upstairs area with a bring and buy sale. 

The first club who had their models on display, had a very wide range of desert vehicles which was a good presentation of some lesser known or seen axis vehicles.

The diorama back ground was from a matchbox kit. I like the way the desert round was represented.

This was a partially scratch built and the source vehicle was the matchbox Krupp Protz.

I have a coupe of 'Diana' in my DAK forces. The pictures I have seen include a number on the chassis next to the driver and a small elephant motif on the rear fender

An Sdkfz 254. This was present in the desert and used as a scout car.

An addition to the wide range of German ambulances. I did not see what make or mark this was.

I was told that this is an SHQ model. I have not seen this in their catalogue and it is a large model. I wonder if it is still available from the Grubby tanks list, or where the SHQ range will go when Andy Grubb retires next year?

The fascines on this model appeared to be made of individual lengths of bass broom bristles. The figure was an AB miniature.

Another AVRE made from a combination of an Airfix and Matchbox kit.

There were some lovely Desert Air Force aircraft. The Airfix Kittyhawk was one of the first model kits I ever made.

I would love to learn how to use an airbrush to this level and create a mottled camouflage pattern.

I liked the idea of having a background story to some of the models that were on display. This was a great idea from the Brampton club.

This was a very different idea to use the Airfix tank transporter for!

Here was another combination of desert vehicles, this time using 28mm figures.

I also have a Deacon in 20mm which requires decals and a crew. This photo was to remind me!

This was a very detailed figure and was a change from the normal selection of models that were on display.

Almost hidden away in a side room was a further group of model clubs displays. As I have a proposed project for the Aegean conflict in 1943 I liked seeing this selection of vessels.

The aircraft on the back was so small and well detailed!

And finally a further selection of desert vehicles.

Overall this was a great surprise to see a wide range of suppliers that you do not normally see at wargames shows. Also they were very helpful. I was expecting a much smaller show as I was comparing it to the Duxford show. It was a pleasant surprise! Well worth a visit next year!