My Newest Tool

This photo was taken with the wrong light settings - but as it is not meant to show off my meagre painting skills, it is of no dire consequences.

I recently bought the Citadel Assembly Handle, as I am to embark on a fairly extensive project, rebasing plastic Riders of Rohan with their idiotic singular-point-of-contact horses, and I expect to have to apply support to the horses while the glue sets. If this turns out to work nicely for that purpose, I may actually purchase a some more of the handles, so that I can have more than one horse glued in a setting.

The above Skeleton snapped off the plastic base while I was cutting away some of it (the base), and as Poly Cement does not dry very quickly, I felt it was time to get some use out of the handle - and it seems to do the job very nicely!

As you can see, I have not put the clamps to use, as that paticular mini is mostly painted, and I do not want to damage the paint, if it can be avoided, but the arms provide sufficient support to hold a man-sized 28mm mini in place.

I wonder how well the strength of the arms will hold up to metal and/or resin horses, but that time that worry.

Cork Holder - Blatant Theft of a Good Idea!

I made this today - a piece of extra sturdy card, twenty thumb-tacks, and som Loc-Tite Power Glue gel.

I stole the idea from Hammers at the Lead Adventure Forum, as I use corks as painting handles, and when painting batches, I always need more space to hold the minis I am not holding and painting.

Not any more, thanks to this invention, which should let me place up to twenty minis on handles safely upright by sticking the cork handles onto the thumbtacks.

Gripping Beast: The Last Bits

The Gripping Beast order I received some days ago included some livestock (manx), and some rural tools that i am going to use for some of the plastic Dark Age Warriors to make additional peasants to be slaughtered by raiders.

On top of that, I ordered a bad of 'long' wire spears (100mm) which I have sevferal uses for (banners and standards, of course, but also pikes to replace the broken pikes of Uruk-Hai pikemen).









That is now all the loot from that shipment, and as you can see, I have plenty to do for the next couple of months.

I am going to attend a private mini-convention in Esbjerg July 1st-3rd, am going to bring some Blood Eagle fun to the fray, and hop to be able to bring at least the Vikings warband along with some Lord of the Rings warbands.

Ultrasonic Cleaner, Part 2

The final result of my paint-stripping venture can be seen here:

I left the minis in the soap, and re-started the ultrasonic cleaner a lot of times whenever I noticed it had stopped, then left the whole thing over night, and the last paint came off easily.

I don't think the rest of the week will see much progress (I had planned to get some work done on my Pulp project, but stuff got in the way), as Lea turns 9 this Saturday, and I have to tidy up the living room for having some family and close friends over on the day, and the girls from Lea's school class on Sunday (unfortunately, the garage attic is still too cold for having events in)-

Ultrasonic Cleaner

I got this for DKK 239,- in 'Harald Nyborg' in Odense, and had to try it out for paint-stripping right away!

The two ancient skeletons I started painting with Humbrol Enamels more than 20 years ago (the scythe-wielding ones) were submitted to this first attempt.

I first tried using white spirit as cleansing liquid, but it didn't really hav much effect on the enamel paint.

Then, I tried using liquid 'brown soap' (a kind of soap apparently unbeknownst to non-Danes), and after 3 'treatments' of 480 seconds, each followed by a scrubbing with my brass brush, the middle figurine looked like you can see below.

The helmeted skeleton as shown below was treated 4 times, and as you can see it also still had some paint residue in some creases.

My next step in this process is to leave the minis in the soap for a couple of days, before using the ultrasonic feature again (to allow the soap softening up the remaining paint a bit more)






This is much more effective than leaving minis in a jar with brown soap for months and months, and I shall be using the ultrasonic cleaner for all paint-stripping operations from now on.


Next time I shall try leaving the subject in the soap 24 hours before appying the ultrasonics, as I think the ultrasonics might have an easier time loosening the paint if it has been softened up a bit in advance.

Who knows, maybe I'll even get some of all those old Space Marines I have had in soap for ages (I am not going to play any later version of Warhammer 40.000, but I might use them for other Sci-Fi and/or Post Apocalyptic settings)

If you find yourself stripping minis often, I would recommend getting one of these. I haven't tried stripping acrylic paints, but I assume that the process is much faster, as 'brown soap' dissolves acrylics easier than enamels.






Some primers may require the minis to be left in your paint-stripping solution a bit longer (like the enamels), but I think the combination of ultrasonics and a dissolving (not corrosive, mind you, at it will damage the container) solution of some kind should prove effective.



Skeleton Warriors for GoB - WIP 2

I chose one of the previously re-based standard bearers for the unit, and got the first round of filler slabbed onto the bases.

After that, I removed mold lines and mold tabs from 11 GBP shields to use with the unit, removed some mold lines from the standard bearer, and fitted one of the shields to his left hand.

As the standard bearer is naked plastic, I might as well prime him with the shield already glued in place - the other shields will get white primer before I attach them to the warriors; that way I do not have to prime the already painted models.

They will all receive a Devlan Mud wash when all the non-bone parts have been coloured in, to tie them in with the other skeletal elements of the army (and because I like the look it gives).

Skeleton Warriors for GoB - WIP 1

As I wrote yesterday, I want a unit of Skeleton Warriors for my Lords of Undeath GoB army, so I dug out some old skellies and Applied my Dremel to relieve them of their square slottas.

All the warriors with green and/or sand on the left-overs of their old bases, plus the black primed spearman, were done this afternoon.

I am going to use spare round shields from the GBP Dark Age Warriors box for these. Making one point of sling-armed levies should leave at least 12 shields for this purpose.



Getting Ready for Decals!

Got Micro Set and Micro Sol (and a flat brush for applying the latter) from Frontline Hobby here in Denmark today.

I may try it out on a couple of DreadBall players one of the next days - if I can find the time to do so in between the outdoor chores.

No matter what, I should now be set to get good results when fiddling around with decals, which has always put me off for fear of botching the job...

Cutting the Wood!

I was able to commandeer this monstrosity in order to get some of my cheap firewood cut to useable lengths, so no big investment this time.

Only catch was that I had to fetch and bring myself, and assemble the gizmo, as it is quite new, and has been sitting in its box in the shed of one of my soon-to-be gaming pals (he has been in the process of getting married, siring a son, and moving the last many months).

I wanted to take a pic of the pile of wood I cut already, but the camera batteries died just after this picture was taken, and I really did not want to go out in the wet snowfall once more after replacing them, just to take a picture of a pile of firewood. Call me lazy, but that was just not going to happen then.

I think, today I went through just about 1/4 of the wood I need to cut; it should not take too long to get the rest done - except for that we are going to visit my in-laws this weekend to help them tidy up their garden after the storm/gale that hit Denmark last weekend (some dead trees and bushes need to get cut up, for which I am bringing my chainsaw, and my trailer to bring home some of the wood), which means a pause from the domestic chores.

I Need to Expand my Toolbox...

I have to cut all this wood down to a size that fits in my new stoves.

Yesterday, I spent about one hour sawing - by hand - one basket's worth of firewood, and my right shoulder is thoroughly busted today.

I shall see if I can borrow a powered saw from one of my acquaintances - otherwise I shall have to spend in the vicinity of DKK 4000. So much for saving money by buying cheap firewood...

Well, at least one third of the wood could be used right away.

Holder for WIP Minis.

Some days ago I got fed up with not really knowing what to do with a mini attached to a cork handle for painting, when not actually working on it.

Something had to be done about it!!

The solution: A paddle drill bit, and a piece of a wooden batten.

As you can see, the cork fits into the hole - and I drilled two holes to accomodate more than one 'premium' paintjob at a time (I do not put rank-and-file models on handles, only those deserving extra attention), and the space between the holes is sufficient for a cavalry model to be placed at.

This leaves more workspace on the paint(t) station, and saves me the trouble of finding space for a mini on a handle to lie on its side.

Kaizen!

The piece in the front of the pic is a paint pot holder - when a pot is placed in the hole before opening, it will never tip over and spill its contents all over your workspace, and possibly near-finished minis!

Proxxon Thermocutter!

Got me a little helper today. I think it will prove invaluable for making styrofoam terrain pieces.

A Short Brush-up

Stumbled on these in th ehardware/builders store earlier today:

I think they are carbon, brass, and steel, but it doesn't show on the package. I'm looking forward to trying out the brass brush for cleaning up restic minis!

I also got me a new razor saw; my old one lost some teeth when I stupidly used it on a too hard material.