Renegade Knight Household WIP: Knight Despoiler

[Sgt. Blank]

Made some progress on the legs today:

 

Inserted a pin and some sprue to the foot. As with most parts of the Knight kit, it's hollow and I'm nervous about the weight of the upper section, so I thought it might help secure the pin.

 

 

Here's the shin of the right leg on - the armor and thigh are only blue tact'ed at the moment. To change the angle, I had to cut the ball joint and struts; the front was then lengthened and the back was shortened. Still need to Green stuff the ball joint.

 

 

 

Comments and crits welcome - thanks for looking

[ElDuderino]

I like how this knight is turning out, the extra armor plates will give it a distinct silhouette! Pretty impressive work on the repose too, I kinda regret cutting corners myself now:)

[Sgt. Blank]

I like how this knight is turning out, the extra armor plates will give it a distinct silhouette! Pretty impressive work on the repose too, I kinda regret cutting corners myself now:)

 

Thanks ElDuderino, as much as I have a plan, that's what I'm aiming for -  we'll see how it looks in the end. 

 

As far as the repose, I think the critical parts will be linking the two legs up through the hip and ensuring the rebuilt joints can hold the torso. I'm planning a ' Captain Morgan' style pose with and hoping to keep the weight over the hips. Pewter isn't especially heavy but I'm nervous about the weight.

 

And, for whatever it's worth, your Knight came out amazing - fair warning, though, regret about not doing as much as possible on the first one kind of led to the 2nd Knight in my case. 

 

More work on the legs (insert ZZ Top joke here) - very rough test only; the only parts connected are still the right foot and right ankle, everything else is held with poster tack.

 

 

 

I realize the pictures from this weekend didn't really show the right ankle, either. It's sort of visible here - combination of brass rods, plasticard tubing and green stuff to accomodate the new pose. it's only half finished and needs two more of the side hydraulics cut/extended to fit - all four are needed on the left as well. 

 

It may be worth mentioning, the left leg is a bit hyper extended here - the greave won't fit if it's assembled at this angle, so that will be corrected in the assembled version.

 

Lastly, I've been toying with ideas for heads and, since this is primarily a ranged Knight, I've been thinking of something with a larger sensor array instead of the standard face plate.

 

 

Venomcrawler head, less some spikes, with spare Armiger optics attached. 

 

Thanks for looking - please let me know if you have any suggestions or critiques

 

Currently, my plan is to build the lower half up to the ball joint for the hips. I figure as long as I can get things approximately square, the ball joint will let me fudge the difference.

Edited January 28, 2020 by Sgt. Blank

[Kolgrim DeathHowl]

Looking good so far!!

[Lexington]

I’ve had the launchers from an old 2nd Ed Whirlwind sitting around for ages with no real idea what to do with them. Now I have an idea to steal. ;)

 

Seriously excellent job.

[Mechanist]

Nice additions and the head will be super creepy with all those eyes.

The work on the legs is looking good to. 

[ElDuderino]

Man that head looks awesome! Super creepy. Can't tell what the parts are, always a good sign.

 

And thanks for the kind words:) I really need to finish that thing one of these days.

[Sgt. Blank]

Looking good so far!!

Thanks Kolgrim!

 

I’ve had the launchers from an old 2nd Ed Whirlwind sitting around for ages with no real idea what to do with them. Now I have an idea to steal. ;)

Seriously excellent job.

Thanks for the kind words, please steal and improve on that idea. It's a neat part that I got cheap but had a tough time usung. As was suggested earlier by Duskraider, you could definitely get away with one set of missiles per knight, it's bigger than the official bit.

 

Nice additions and the head will be super creepy with all those eyes.

The work on the legs is looking good to.

 

Thanks, glad you like the head so far. Frankly I'm a bit surprised how well the legs are going.

 

Man that head looks awesome! Super creepy. Can't tell what the parts are, always a good sign.

And thanks for the kind words:) I really need to finish that thing one of these days.

It's a cut down venomcrawler head with extra lens from spare armiger face plates.I think creepy is good in this case, thanks!

Edited February 1, 2020 by Sgt. Blank

[Sgt. Blank]

I realized the other day that I'm taking a kit with hundreds of parts and making more parts out of it.. 

 

At any rate, started assembly on the legs but realized that based on the position of the housing, rear piston on the left leg would miss the socket completely, so more destruction was in order

 

 

I cut the whole thing free *very* carefully with a jeweler's saw to minimize the material loss. This allowed me to pivot the connecting end away from the leg a bit to correct issue I'd created by reposing the leg.

 

With that done, I greenstuffed the gaps in the feet, assembled the legs, shortened the right leg side pistons, lengthened the left leg side pistons, and

 

 I'm back to where I would've been if I hadn't cut the legs apart.

 

Even better, I managed to get the hips installed

 

 

All together, I think I've put twelve pins into the legs so far.  The ones you can see here will get covered over with greenstuff once the glue is fully dry, but aside from that and a bit of clean up I noticed while editing the photos above, the legs are basically finished. Admittedly, this stuff should be a bit tough to see on the finished model, but it seemed necessary to do to get the pose I was after.

 

I think next steps will involve green stuff on the hip joints, followed by pinning the feet to the base. It may be overkill but I'm nervous what the combination of adding weight above the center of gravity will do in combination with changing how the weight transfers to the base and the only thing I can think to do it help with this is pinning it firmly down.

 

Thanks for looking - comments and critiques are welcome - particularly if you see something that may prevent me from wrecking this project.

[Mechanist]

Legs are looking cracking mate.

Repositioning the piston is dedication to getting it right.

I just cheated on mine and went with warped corruption so seeing it done properly is really cool.

Definitely going to copy that in the future.

[Sagentus]

awesome work so far, really liking where this is going!! ... i do wish GW would have thought about the legs more and give us them in parts to make it easier for reposing 

[Sgt. Blank]

Legs are looking cracking mate.

Repositioning the piston is dedication to getting it right.

I just cheated on mine and went with warped corruption so seeing it done properly is really cool.

Definitely going to copy that in the future.

 

Thanks Mechanist -I'm not sure I can claim it's 'right' but it's the best I could come up with. I wouldn't call your project cheating - all the sculpting you've done inspired some of the work you see spread across the projects in this thread - honestly, with all the curing and layers required, it's definitely not cutting corners to sculpt.

 

 

awesome work so far, really liking where this is going!! ... i do wish GW would have thought about the legs more and give us them in parts to make it easier for reposing 

 

Thanks! I appreciate the feedback - I'm trying to keep plugging away on this and not think about the time it's taking me to make progress and just enjoy the process. 

 

As far as the design, I agree but the general tread in terms of what they're producing is going the opposite direction. I'm not sure what GW's marketing data suggests but I guess is that they're trying to reduce the barriers to entry. I'll admit, up until I connected the hips last week, I wasn't sure this was all going to work out and fixing the pose for the legs definitely takes that risk off the table. That said, I can't imagine it would take a lot of work from a design standpoint to just mirror the legs so there's a left leg forward and right leg forward option - maybe just split the production run in two or offer it as a direct sales sort of thing, I dunno.

 

Speaking of 'progress' - I took some of the other components off sprue this week, that matched up with the amount of brainpower I had left from work and life. I was able to dry fit the thorax (?) and test whether the legs would hold the heavier carapace:

 

 

Listing a bit to starboard but definitely a success without any glue holding it together at the waist or pins or glue holding it to the base. Plus, it actually is starting to look like a Knight finally.

 

I added a pin to the waist to improve stability:

 

 

I then filled the gaps on the leg/hip joints. I had put this off since I thought it would be fiddly but I think it came out okay.

 

 

Thanks for looking - any comments or critiques are welcome!

[Kolgrim DeathHowl]

Looking good so far, keep it up!!

[Sgt. Blank]

Thanks Kolgrim!

 

More modest progress this week.

 

I attached the head and filled in the lower half of the neck with bits from the Venomcrawler

 

 

I'm happy with the scale, it juts out a bit further than the standard set up but not much.

 

I also got back to work on the main guns:

 

 

Going to add bayonets since no self-respecting worshiper of the Blood God doesn't have a melee weapon. 

 

I also finished the last of the hydraulics and wires for the legs, finally; the hydraulics and wiring for the groin region. As with everything else, nothing fit any more due to the re-post, so it had to be altered. As with everything else, this proved time consuming for a relatively unnoticeable result. I will say, in case anyone is considering a similar project, I was able to solve one side of the wiring by simply reversing the ends. The other required cutting and bending but was easier than I expected in the end.

 

Here's a decent shot showing overall progress:

 

Next steps:

small but tedious amount of green stuff details for the shoulders and gun shields

sorting out the chest and groin armor

 

I'd appreciate any comments or feedback since this is finally getting close to wrapping up. In particular, I'm trying to decide if it needs anything more on the top carapace or if this is a good level of detail

Thanks for looking!

Edited February 17, 2020 by Sgt. Blank

[PeteySödes]

I think it looks great! To me it seems like any more on top would be distracting. You’ve got the middle racks and the face as a nice golden triangle and it gives you plenty of room for the nice paintjob!

[Sgt. Blank]

I think it looks great! To me it seems like any more on top would be distracting. You’ve got the middle racks and the face as a nice golden triangle and it gives you plenty of room for the nice paintjob!

 

A belated thanks! I've decided to leave well-enough alone and save the other ideas for the next Knight.

 

Hadn't really intended to go so long without updating but it's been a busy stretch and most of the work in the past two weeks has been small spots of green stuff. I generally have my best results with green stuff when I go incrementally and don't try to do too many sections at once. This limits the amount of self-sabotage.

 

At any rate, here's where it stands now. Most of the work has been on the gun shields.

 

 

Assembly is basically finished. Just need to add some rivets to the trim, which is sadly not a very riveting task but should help. This isn't isn't a final pose - most of the non-structural elements are still loose and held on with poster tack only, which is creating some gaps and wonky fits that won't remain once it's glued together in the final configuration.

 

A couple other angles:

 

 

 

Not quire sure when I'll get to painting this thing - the weather has been either cold or wet a lot recently and I'm waiting for good conditions to prime. I may move on to the next model for the household, which will probably unseat this one as the tallest model in my collection.

 

As always, thanks for looking - comments or critiques very welcome and always appreciated.

[Custom Hero]

That monstrosity is wickedly awesome! Love the old school whirlwind parts!

[Mechanist]

that's come together really nicely and it'll be even better as you get it painted. fingers crossed for a milder spell it's gone back to frosty days round here so even spraying in the garage is out of the question. 

[Sgt. Blank]

That monstrosity is wickedly awesome! Love the old school whirlwind parts!

Thanks! That idea is definitely what shaped the overall model, although it didn't really come together until I added the defiled armor. Frankly, I'm glad found a use for the bits.

 

that's come together really nicely and it'll be even better as you get it painted. fingers crossed for a milder spell it's gone back to frosty days round here so even spraying in the garage is out of the question.

 

Thanks! I'm looking forward to seeing it painted but not so badly that I want to rush it. Worse comes to worse, I'll paint it for ETL

[Sgt. Blank]

I hope everyone is in good health and good spirits despite the challenging times.

 

Its been a while since I added anything here and I should be posting painted images of the Despoiler Knight...but I haven't been working on that. 

 

Instead, I started a new project:

 

 

 

This is obviously in an early stage so far, but it's going to be a Cerastus Acheron, which fills out the Khornate checklist all by itself (Kill! Maim! Burn!)

 

I've only completed the first couple steps for torso and leg assembly and the torso isn't in it's final position yet but the carapace and head kind of give a sense of where I'm headed with this model. 

 

Any comments or suggestions are welcome - I haven't really made any decisions about the rest of the model yet, except that I want it to tie with the rest of my collection.

 

Thanks for looking!

[KrautScientist]

Love your Despoiler Knight: It's a testament to the quality of your conversion that it's really able to hold its own vis-à-vis the new, "official" model!

 

And the first touches on the new model really, really work for me: Those tusks are a brilliant touch that really sells that faceplate (not a favourite of mine, normally). Keep up the fantastic work! :)

[CMDR_Welles]

Awesome use of the old Whirlwind launchers. 

[Sgt. Blank]

Love your Despoiler Knight: It's a testament to the quality of your conversion that it's really able to hold its own vis-à-vis the new, "official" model!

 

And the first touches on the new model really, really work for me: Those tusks are a brilliant touch that really sells that faceplate (not a favourite of mine, normally). Keep up the fantastic work!

 

Thanks K-Sci! Frankly, between the new model and all the high-quality conversions kicking around, it pushed me to try things I probably wouldn't have otherwise attempted. I'm pretty pleased with the result and really appreciate the feedback.

 

As for the Acheron - thanks! My general feeling is that, regardless of what I do, the face is going to be the focal point and personality of the model, so I try to do something interesting there. I didn't see the head as an issue per say but wanted to make it clearly corrupted and, since it's a solid chunk of resin, it made sense to me to add some detail instead of trying to reconfigure it. Ironically, I think it looks quite a bit like the Heresy World Eater helms so I thought it made sense that it would be corrupted similar to the way Chaos Marines have.

 

 

Awesome use of the old Whirlwind launchers. 

 

Thanks! I'd love to say it was planned, but honestly, I'd had the part for years and it was in search of a purpose. 

[Sgt. Blank]

Well, it's been a while - a lot longer than I'd intended - I've finally made some headway worth sharing on the Acheron:

 

 

 

 

More or less finished, I think, except for a couple of the supports for the chainsword arm, the fuel line for the flame cannon, and the exhaust.

 

The greaves, the groin armor, shoulders, and top carapace are still loose and I'll probably paint them separately. Based on the design of the kit, I built and attached the arms because they have to be built to fit other some of the components (fuel hose, hydraulics) 

 

I'd appreciate any feedback or comments, probably going to prime this in the next couple days.

 

Thanks for looking!

[ElDuderino]

Dude! That looks amazing, super cool. Are the icons pressmolds or sculpted on? They look vaugely familiar.

 

Can't wait to see it painted:)

 

Edit: I quite like how it's not super busy, alot of chaos knights are a bit cluttered, but not this one

Edited June 8, 2020 by ElDuderino