W.I.P the Storehouse update 2

A very quick update tonight 

Over the last couple of days I have manage to finish all the clading and  I have given it a  couple of coats of paint.
Still need to give it a proper paint job , but first there are the doors and windows to finish plus the staircase on the side. Then work can start on the thatch roof

Terry

W.I.P the Storehouse update 1

Yesterday I Managed to spend a good bit of the day in the work room working on the storehouse, I started cladding the foamcore with linka only to run out of the pieces I needed.
I calculated that I had enough pieces cast to clad the storehouse, but I forgot to take into account the pieces I had used on the cookhouse and the experimental piece. So I had to switch to casting new pieces of linka.
 In between casting more linka pieces I.E while waiting to de mould newly cast pieces.  I managed to do the floorboards. As this was originally a storeroom before the Rev Witt turned it into a meeting room, I have made the floorboards a little rough as I imagine floorboards would be in a  provincial storeroom of the period.
Even though I had to stop to cast a load of new linka pieces I still managed to clad about 70% of the storehouse. Unfortunately though I will now have to wait a full day for the new pieces to dry enough for me to be able to use them.
After the cladding is finished I will then go around the building filling all the gaps where the linka pieces have not  butted up to one another fully, and then finish off the rest of the windows and doors.
 After that there is the outside staircase to be made and then of course I have the roof to make a start on.

The  Progress so far

just both sides of  the right side end wall 

and inner walls of the open storage area left to clad,

arial view. 

The amount of  floor space is beter seen from the  arial view, The proportions of the floorspace are larger than the real building. I have done this to allow for the larger bases that the figures have. This way two or more figures can be in the one room without there bases touching, important for close combat with some rules.

Hopefully the building will not look to large on the table

 
Terry

W.I.P the Storehouse

 I have not been able to spend much time on the project so far this week, but this evening I did pop into the workroom and made a start on the first of the main buildings for the Rorkes drift game.

Just the basic foamcore structure so far, I borrowed some silicone glue substitute  from my parents who make cards, and who recommend this glue for card craft as this was the ideal situation to give it a try on foamcore and see how it performed.
The glue is called Pin flair glue gel and it seems to be doing a good job. I have put it aside overnight to dry fully but the structure seamed quite solid after an hour when I went back to check that nothing had slipped out of place.

Tomorrow I will start the slow and painstaking part of the build, the cladding of the foamcore with the Linka sections; this may take a few days to do.

I will post an update in a few days

UPDATE 25th Feb : As I had to edit the post to insert the name of the glue I will take the opportunity to post a quick  update.  The glue has fully dried now and the bond is very good indeed I have removed all the pins that I used to hold it all in place while the glue dried, and there is no movement or loose joints. I will definitely look at buying a tube of this glue to see if it has other applications within  model making.

Terry

Collapsed Bell Tents for the Rorke's Drift game.

Collapsed Bell Tents , originally uploaded by MrTeld.

To complement the Rendra tents I posted a few weeks ago http://zuluwarminiature.blogspot.com/2011/02/renedra-bell-tents.html
I have  made four collapsed bell tents to be used in place of the four rendra tents for marking the position of the abandoned camp at Rorke,s Drift.
The tents will initially be used in the Hollywood version of the game as if memory serves me right the tents were just collapsed in the film.
With regard to the historical battle I am still trying to determine if the camp was fully struck or if the bell tents were just collapsed before starting work on the more vital barricades. Initially the plan was to strike the camp in preparation of abandoning the drift;

“I received a message from Lieutenant Bromhead, commanding the Company 24th Regiment at the Camp near the Commissariat Stores, asking me to come up at once.
I gave the order to inspan, strike tents, put all stores, &c., into the wagon, and at once rode up to the Commissariat Store and found that a note had been received from the 3rd Column to state that the enemy were advancing in force against our post, which we were to strengthen and hold at all costs. ”
John. R. M. Chard,
Lieut R.E.

Given time it would have taken to ride up to the Store and back I am inclined to side towards the collapsing of the tents only.In time I plan to use them as markers in other Zulu war or Sudan games to replace the camp tents should the camp be over run. To that end I’m sure in time they will be of use in a Isandlwana game in the future

When I finally get around to buying another four of the rendra tents think I shall make another four of the collapsed bell tents to go with them.
Terry

Garden Walls, Meelie Bag defences, and Kraal’s

Garden Walls, Meelie Bag defences, and Kraal’s

Progress with the scenic’s required for the Rorkes drift are progressing at a steady pace the larger part of the time seems to be taken up with research to try and be as accurate as I can be given the limitations of gaming and limited modelling  abilities.  I started with the plan of doing all the smaller stuff first so as I have something finished and to spur me on with the project. To that end most of the smaller stuff is now finished although I am thinking at this time of re modelling the meelie bag walls as the ends of the casts just don’t fit together right without sanding down the edges.

Anyways on with the progress report.

One of the first things that you know you are going to need lots of for Rorke’s drift are Meelie bags. There are a few suppliers that you can get them from, But as usual I decided to make them myself , partly to maybe save a bit of money , but mainly because I like to build the scenic’s myself when ever I can. 

 Sculpy Meelie bags

The first test pieces were made out of Sculpy and came out really nice, but it was obvious that for the amount of meelie barricades needed making each piece by hand with sculpy was impractical as well as very expensive. So the next piece of meelie bag wall I made I used as a master for a latex mould.

 Sculpy Master and Mould

I used hurculite plaster for the meelie bags and so far I’ve had no breakages. The only problem is that I forgot to ensure that the edges were square. They are not and so I have to square off each piece I cast. I’m now considering making a new master and mould.

 Cast meelie bag walls

The Garden walls and walls for the Kraal were again made from a master and cast in plaster. The master for the walls did not fare as well as the sculpy meelie bag wall master.

It was a piece of wood with gravel pieces glued on with contact adhesive.

 Garden Wall Castings

 A lot of the gravel came away while de moulding the master. But I at least have a good mould, and this one at least has square edges thanks to the piece of wood.

Stone Kraal

 

The rough stone Kraal was made by simply super gluing large decretive stone gravel pieces to the base board and painting. 

 Rough stone kraal

So next up is to remodel the meelie bag wall and cast them, make up the biscuit box wall , again I made a master for this and tried casting them but I did not check the undercut between the boxes and the mould is unusable, So I will just scratch build them, and to make a start on building the hospital and storehouse.

All for now Terry

Cookhouse ,Latrine and Privy

I couple of months a go I made a couple of the small buildings in the rorkes drift compound. They were made initially as a small scale experiment to ascertain the suitability of some of the materials and assembly techniques to use on the main buildings.

The first building I made was the cookhouse this was made from hurculite plaster with Linka moulds and is a sealed unit. This building came out alright and will properly make it onto the table for the game. I really like linka for buildings as after purchasing the moulds the wall pieces are relatively cheap to make and being made of plaster are easy to cut, sand down etc.

  It was clear while making this building that linka on its own would not be strong enough for the large buildings, or for that matter small building with removable roofs for placing figures into. So after a bit of thinking another building was attempted to deal with the problems highlighted with the first building, the second experiment involved foamcore walls with linka cladding.

This building has been left with out flooring or roof for some time just to see how the walls themselves stand up to wear and tear and after a few months of kicking around the outhouse / workroom and then being given to my son for his Fallout game the result is in, The build is strong enough for the building of the storehouse and Hospital.

Another small building that was attempted to try out the teddy bear fur ”Thatch" technique was a latrine. My thinking was that the drift being a staging post for the column plus it being used prier to the columns arrival as a Church there was a good chance that a latrine may have been built.

But it seems I was wrong, although I have not found any accounts as to the size and build of the WC at the drift most plans and diagrams show a small privy, so yesterday I made a Privy

.

So with all the small buildings having been made I can now start work on the main buildings.
 all for now Terry


P.S
The plan for the next post is the making of the Meelie bag wall, the garden wall and the small and large kraal,s

Rorkes Drift Wagons

zulu war wagons, originally uploaded by MrTeld.

I finely finished varnishing the wagons for the Rorke, s Drift game this morning, the green looks a little bright in the pictures due to the flash on the camera, the colour looks much better in natural light, but you will just have to take my word for that.

I went with the traditional Boer red and green colour scheme for the Boer wagons. For the general service wagon I went with vallajo military green. Having only found pictures of  general service wagons in this ww1 Green colour scheme and having found no data in my books  as to the colour of the British army livery during this period I went with what I could find.

Some of the pictures of  the Boer and general sevice wagons that I used for colour reference can be found at the following links :

 Boer Wagon
http://skilder.arkpark.info/album.htm

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fmgbain/3122673091/

http://www.dreamstime.com/stock-photo-boer-wagon-in-kruger-park-image9794330

 General Service Wagon

http://s110605900.websitehome.co.uk/landwar/lww1-10.htm