PHM's Conversion Monkey Corner - Hobby and Themeing Help

[PowerHungryMonkey]

Hello all!

 

Some of you may know me from my plogs in the WIP forum. Some from MANY moons ago on here and other forums too. I've been in the Hobby for more than 20 years and have loved every minute of it.

 

My aim here is to offer hobby and themeing advice to any that might need it. Come at me with any questions you have regarding conversions (whether that be for individual model, units or whole armies), Army Lore and Themes, good and reputable Bitz and 3rd Party sites and general hobby advice like using Green Stuff, working with Plasticard, Pinning etc.

 

My brain is always ticking over with conversion ideas and I may as well put it to good use and help the community that has helped me so much over the years.

 

For a look at what I do, check out my plogs Ferrum Aeternum and Monkey Business.

 

I'm here to help and share my juicy brain meats with you all.

 

Cheers,

PHM

[Fajita Fan]

I’ve built very little terrain but I bought a couple of big boxes of Adeptus Titanicus terrain and I’m using clipboard material (mdf) as bases for buildings. What kind of glue do you recommend for gluing plastic to mdf? Gorilla Glue? Superglue? Elmer’s white glue?

[PowerHungryMonkey]

Hi Fajita,

 

I've used MDF for display bases a few times. What I've found works well is to give the MDF a few coats of really watered down PVA (I guess that would be the White Glue you mentioned), like milk consistancy. Give it a coat, let it soak in and dry then give it another and wait to dry again. This will make the MDF non-pourus and allow you to use normal GW superglue to fix the terrain down.

 

I'd also recommend this technique when using sand or gravel for basing. Once you've glues the gravel/sand/rocks to your base and let them dry, give them a nice heavy coat of watered down PVA, again milk consistancy, this will seal the sand etc to the base and stop it braking off.

 

Hope that helped and let me know how it goes. Any further questions feel free to ask.

 

Cheers,

PHM

[Fajita Fan]

I’ve used watered down glue to seal flock or cork sheet on bases but I’ve never tried your trick of using it to seal mdf. You’re using superglue to bond plastic terrain afterwards? I haven’t worked on this scale with superglue before and didn’t want it to turn brittle. Would recommend thin or thick superglue?

 

This thread is a good idea.

[PowerHungryMonkey]

I always use thin superglue for everything. Personal preference more than anything else. I’m a chronic converter and frequently find myself going back to old armies and cannibalising bitz so using liquid superglue makes it the easiest to brake apart at a later date.

 

In your case I’d still say thin as I find the thicker one can blob a bit. I’ve never had an issue with the GW glue being brittle.

 

Good luck with it all and really glad I could help.

 

PHM

[Fajita Fan]

*looks around for a line forming*

 

So I’ve done plastic conversions for years but I’ve never gotten comfortable with green stuff. What are your thoughts on green stuff securing plastic bonds?  I’m reposing some AT scale knights and plan to use green stuff to repose the leg joints, is it worth drilling some plastic pins in there or can I just glob it in there and expect it to hold? AT knights are really light but do you find green stuff holds plastic to plastic well enough?

 

[Naryn]

I would probably pin & superglue regardless, green stuff doesn't have a ton of hold on its own. 

[PowerHungryMonkey]

Hi again Fajita,

 

I agree with Naryn, best bet is to pin and glue. This would be best for two reasons: one, the pin with hold the model togther better and avoid any brakes from knocking the model or squishing accidently when packing. Also I've never really found GS is good at adhereing to anyhting, even the spot you reayy want it to, I cetainly wouldnt be using it as an adhesive. The second reason to pin is that it gives you something to sculpt the GS around, that way you can shape it with a firm interior and not have it squish out one side of the leg while you apply preasure to the other as your're sculpting.

 

As an alternative to using GS at all, have you ever tried plasticard? It comes in a heap of shapes and sizes. You can get it as sheets of varying thicknesses but for your purpose take a look at some rod or tube. Again, it comes in heaps of thicknesses/gauges and you can just stick that in place of one of the leg struts without hvaing to do any sculpting. Take a look at my log of random projects here and look at the large-scale Techmarine conversion. I've used plasticard extensively for the bionic limbs and detailing. Anyhting white on the model is pasticard.

 

Hope that's of help.

 

PHM

 

BTW, really like the use of Ruststalker heads on the Knights, they fit really

[Magos Takatus]

 

BTW, really like the use of Ruststalker heads on the Knights, they fit really

Yeah, it's a really nice conversion. It really reminds me of the sadly discontinued Forge World heads.

[Fajita Fan]

Thanks!

 

I’ve used plastic rod but at that tiny hip joint scale I was hoping to use little balls of green stuff to make new ball joints so it’s less noticeable. I use really small diameter (.8 or .9mm) rod to pin plastic joints or gun barrels extensions so I can cover that in green stuff. It’s amazing how long I’ve done this without using green stuff. 

 

What gauge guitar wire (at least I assume that’s what it is) on your dreadnought arm joints? I need some flexible wires for fuel feeds on my Cerastus flamers I had to make. 

 

[Lord Raven 19]

Where would you buy chipboard (UK plz) at 2mm thickness? I have an Amazon link but wondering for price comparisons. Alternatively, do you have any ideas for what I could substitute for it for the uses of the Wyloch's Armoury YouTube channel.

[PowerHungryMonkey]

 

Thanks!

 

I’ve used plastic rod but at that tiny hip joint scale I was hoping to use little balls of green stuff to make new ball joints so it’s less noticeable. I use really small diameter (.8 or .9mm) rod to pin plastic joints or gun barrels extensions so I can cover that in green stuff. It’s amazing how long I’ve done this without using green stuff. 

 

What gauge guitar wire (at least I assume that’s what it is) on your dreadnought arm joints? I need some flexible wires for fuel feeds on my Cerastus flamers I had to make. 

 

 

 

 

 

Hi Fajita,

 

I really couldn't tell you what type og guitar wire I used on those guys. I just got a heap of broken string from a mate that plays and used what fit best. You may be able to do the same or go to a music store and ask for some broken strings, you may get lucky. If you do use guitar wire then get yourself some good wire cutters. The core of the strings is really tough when you go to the larger gauge and it'll totally wreck your hobby cutters if you use them.

 

As alternative may I recommend the two products below:

 

Flexible Resin Cables from Zinge Industries

 

Green Stuff Tentacle Tool from Green Stuff World

 

Both allow you a lot more flexibility and posability with cables and wires than you'll ever get from guitar wire. If you're not fussed about a textured cable then brake open any kind of old hardware item (old computer, kitchen tools, etc) and ransack the wires from there. Really good for cables and wires. Or go to an electronics shop and buy a bag, they should be super cheap.

 

Where would you buy chipboard (UK plz) at 2mm thickness? I have an Amazon link but wondering for price comparisons. Alternatively, do you have any ideas for what I could substitute for it for the uses of the Wyloch's Armoury YouTube channel.

 

Hi Lord Raven,

 

First off, I'm afraid I'm based in Australia and have no idea where you would get 2mm MDF or Chipboard from in the UK, sorry. Best bet would be art supply stores, hobby stores and maybe some big, chain hardware stores.

 

You could try using plasticard for building tho. The sheet size would be much smaller than MDF but you get a much larger range of thicknesses. Also instead of having to cut through the whole piece you can simply score-and-snap the plasticard. I hope that helps.

 

If you're willing to buy scenery than check out this company, Miniature Scenery, they do a large range of Necromunda and other styles of scenery that's all laser-cut from MDF.

 

Sorry I couldn't be of more help with this one.Let me know if there's anyhting else I can help with tho.

 

Cheers,

PHM

[Fajita Fan]

Thanks. I’ve got some heavy duty cutters after messing up an expensive set cutting paper clips as pins.

[Lord Raven 19]

No worries, I'll probably use the Amazon link then.

[Dracos]

I've got 10 Aggressors converted already inspired by St.Lazarus, but your Ambot project has me wanting to revisit a number of Centurion conversions. There is a conversion out there that gives the Centurion a more true scale look i like and your Ambot ideas are a great possibility also. Thanks for rekindling my fire for Centurions. I just need them looking like they belong in a Primaris army and the Men of Iron concept is a contender

[PowerHungryMonkey]

Hi Dracos,

 

Thanks for the kind words. I was going down the Centurion path with my Ambots originally but was really strugling to fit all the weapons on them. In size-wise they come out slightly smaller than the Centurions because of the hunch-back but the biggest problem I found was finding a place for the hurricane bolters. I think maybe if I'd have been happy to go with the frag assault launchers I could have made it work but with the new Bolter Discipline rule why the heck would you NOT take hurricane bolters!?

 

You could probably space them out a bit at the waist and shoulders to give them a bit more size but the legs are pretty stubby. There'd be a lot of work to lengthen the Ambot legs if you were going to go down that route.

 

Alternative options that I was toying with were some of the FW Mechanicum units like the Castellax and Domitar Battle Automata. Also Perturabo's Iron Circle are nice big robots (they're basiaclly re-fitted Domitars tho). All these guys are really big tho so you may have a size issue with them. Take a look at see tho. You may be able to up-scale the Ambots by using legs from Castellax. A good resource for FW bitz I use is Egg Head Miniatures.

 

Hope that's a help. Good luck with robots.

PHM

[PowerHungryMonkey]

*** miss post***

 

***ignore***

[Lord Raven 19]

How would you toughen up card(board) to be used a building material for ruin terrain?