Chaos Marines DIY - Obliterator-class Robots

[Warsmith Aznable]

Obliterator-class Robot

I am not a fan of GW's Obliterator model, and the fluff for them doesn't fit with my DIY warband, the Iron Hounds. My solution is this: Jarl Bolverk, the Chaos Lord in charge of the Iron Hounds, has a relationship with Legio Nefandus, a faction of the Dark Mechanicus operating near his planetary holdings. Legio Nefandus provides the Jarl with combat support in return for ongoing favors, and this is in the form of a maniple of corrupted Cataphract robots and the resources necessary to maintain them.

The following is a paraphrase of the corrupted STC used to create these powerful battle robots.

-What You Need-

1. A spare plastic Terminator
2. 1/4" square plastic tubing
3. A head from a Defiler kit
4. Two leg guards from a Dreadnought kit
5. A bits box full of heavy weapons to choose from

I got some old Loyalist plastic Terminators from a friend. I used them until I could afford the current Chaos Space Marine Terminator set. Once I had my permanent Terminators built I had these guys just sitting around. I was lucky that I had Terminators to experiment on, and with this tutorial you can make Oblitertor-class robots without having to blindly cut apart an expensive miniature if you don't just happen to have some extra like I did.

But here is my starting point:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/start-about-here.jpg

I pulled apart the torso and got ready to cut the head off:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/cutting-up-the-torso.jpg

The front of the torso should be reduced to a base to attach the modified Defiler head to. It should look close to this:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/about-like-this.jpg

The body put back together should look look like this:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/the-prepared-body.jpg

Mounting the modified Defiler head assembly is not going to be an exact thing. A lot will depend on how exactly you cut the head up, so leave extra on the torso so you can cut and file the plastic down to where it all more or less fits. It's a bit more fiddly than the other tutorial I did, so results are bound to vary more.

Because of my aversion to daemons in my army, I have leftover Defiler heads. My Defilers are big robots driven by Berserkers, so have cupolas from Rhinos instead of heads. That's why I have a few of these hanging around. Most of the base is going to come off. The back should be eye-balled by the converter according to match it up to the torso in a satisfactory way. I cut the back fairly flat and close to the central support structure of the head. The front part is slightly rounded to match up with the front of the Terminator torso. I use those round post things at the edges in between my dotted likes as an end point, and round off around those with a file:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/defiler-head-before-2.jpg

Cutting the head down and shaving the torso to match them together is the most time consuming part of this process. Even more so when you break the only blade you have on your jeweler's saw like I did... But this is where you should be when you're ready to put the head on the torso:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/the-converted-head.jpg

If this has frustrated you to the point of throwing things up until this point, don't worry, it's about to get easy and interesting. Take your square plastic tubing and Dreadnought leg guards and measure the tubing against the guards. This is how we get the shoulders/weapon mounts:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/cutting-weapon-mounts.jpg

The pair of them should look like this:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/sizing-the-shoulder-parts.jpg

It's important that the square tubing and the spot on the torso where they attach to be flat. I didn't need to do much prep work to the shoulders of the Terminator torso, but you might depending on what you have to work with. For the square tubing I used a file on both ends, turning it over so I filed it from all four directions. Then I mounted them. Then I thought they were too low, pulled them off, and remounted them. They should be high enough that whatever weapons you put on later have good clearance below, and that the shoulder guards make it look hulking (and also obscure any imperfections in the mating of the Defiler head to the Terminator torso):
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/attach-weapon-mounts.jpg

And now we put on the Dreadnought leg guards. I put what would be the outside edges on the back, so that it covers more of the tubing. There's less to look at from the rear, so I figured it needed more coverage back there. In the front there will be weapons and whatnot to draw the eye:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/attach-shoulder-guards.jpg

This is where each robot you make can be different and interesting! I use three Obliterators, and I am trying not to repeat a weapon between any of them. This should represent that they can have all sorts of good heavy weapons to choose from. I glued mine on, but they could be magnetized just as easily. When you're friends with a Magos from the Dark Mechanicus the sky is the limit:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/put-weapons-on.jpg

Here is a close-up of one of the robots:
http://i78.photobucket.com/albums/j91/montismo/oblit-robot-wip-002.jpg

I've got two of these going so far, out of a planned three. They are still a WIP for me, techincally, but the fundamental base process is figured out and presented here. There are lots of different things one could do to finish out one of these. Mine are going to cover the open ends of the tubing with some plasticard and Tomb Kings skull bits. I've got some guitar string that I'm going to glue to the square tubing underneath the shoulder guards to add tech-y bits. Anything in your bits box that strikes your fancy can festoon these things once you've got the basic robot done.

I used older Terminator models, so they are smaller than current versions. It's exaggerated by the camera angles, but these models could use bigger legs. It is my belief that if this construction method were used on current Terminator models the proportions would be more even. As it is for me, I'm building a $70 unit out of scraps from my bits box and hand-me-down models, so I'm happy with them, short legs and all.

And that's that! I hope somebody finds this useful or interesting!

[Brother Melice]

love the conversion, great tut!!!!!

[Warsmith Aznable]

Thanks! Hopefully I will be adding the fully finished and painted pictures to the end of the tutorial within the next couple of weeks.