Making Studs

[Ntin]

Hiya, looking for some advice on my first conversion project. I have an old Dreadnought from my Deathwing army that I have paint stripped to repurpose into my Carcharodons Chapter as a Venerable Dreadnought. The plan is to convert into a Venerable Dreadnought is to add the studs like the MK 5 armor on the plating and maybe some thin plastic strips to make bands around the edges. Does anyone have any good tips on making the studs? I am thinking of rolling up some green stuff balls but I am afraid they might be ununiformed.

[OptiMAT]

Are you planning on using the banner in that kit? If not, you could slice up the banner's pole.

[Gurth]

From your post, I take it that with "studs" you mean rivets?

 

Among armour modellers, probably the most common way of making rivet heads is with a punch and die set. Whether you want to go to the expense of buying one just for a single model is up to you, of course, but there are also other techniques. One of the cheapest ones is to slice up plastic rod (or, as suggested, something like a banner pole from a 40K model, a spear or lance shaft, etc.) but it's not easy to get the rivet heads to uniform thickness that way.

[winterdyne]

I think he means the traditional round half-sphere studs found on Mk 5 PA.

 

Get a water filter (Brita). Crack it open. Inside is a mix of tiny round ceramic beads and some sort of carbon. Dump the mix in a tub, and pick out a number of the beads. Those are what you want. They'll be a variety of sizes, so you'll need to check them against each other. I find laying them all out in a row to be the fastest method as you're after consistency, not a particular size as they're all tiny.

 

Edit:

You'll need to drill pits for them to sit in if you want them half-sunk. Glue with thin (not thick!) superglue. Cover any gap with a liquid surfacing putty (liquid greenstuff is actually the best / most convenient IMHO, but until that came out I was using Vallejo Plastic putty or watered-to-a-paste milliput).

 

I strongly advise marking out with a pencil first. Inconsistently spaced studs will look really obvious, precision is important here.

[Redfinger]

I think he means the traditional round half-sphere studs found on Mk 5 PA.

 

Get a water filter (Brita). Crack it open. Inside is a mix of tiny round ceramic beads and some sort of carbon. Dump the mix in a tub, and pick out a number of the beads. Those are what you want. They'll be a variety of sizes, so you'll need to check them against each other. I find laying them all out in a row to be the fastest method as you're after consistency, not a particular size as they're all tiny.

 

Edit:

You'll need to drill pits for them to sit in if you want them half-sunk. Glue with thin (not thick!) superglue. Cover any gap with a liquid surfacing putty (liquid greenstuff is actually the best / most convenient IMHO, but until that came out I was using Vallejo Plastic putty or watered-to-a-paste milliput).

 

I strongly advise marking out with a pencil first. Inconsistently spaced studs will look really obvious, precision is important here.

 

 

Those will be too small in the brita filter, they would be better for normal sized marines. FOr your dreadnought you will need something larger.

 

 

On my Contemptor I used 2.5mm loose stainless steel ball bearings, you can get them in all different sizes from vbx.com, and they are very cheap.

 

Basically you by a drill bit that matches the diameter of the ball bearing, drill to the correct depth, set some super glue in the hole, and place the bearing.

 

Ashton

[crazychib]

Here's the tutorial. I found really helpful.

[Ntin]

Great, thanks for the replies =)

[Spear of Achilles]

There's a tutorial i think at eater of worlds that shows how:

 

http://eatersofworlds.blogspot.com/2009/07...r-tutorial.html