Trench terrain

Managed to get a terrain project nearly finished! This was a prototype trench section, I intend to do more to fit the length of a six foot table. Using principles from my favorite terrain building book, the now sadly out of print How to build wargames terrain by GW, I attempted to use bits of domestic waste for the build.

The starting point was hard board packing from a furniture box. I then used polystyrene packing glued to that base to form a rough outline of the trench. These were then cut back at a slight angle. Sections of corrugated sheet Slaters plastikard were glued in to form the revetment. Plastikard angle sections were then glued on top to restrain the sheets. The polystyrene was then covered in polyfilla. The front facing side of the trench had Renedra sandbags glued in to form a parapet. Using card robbed from a cornflakes packet, I cut them it into thin strips and glued it into the bottom of the trench to simulate duck boards. The model was then coated in sand gravel mix and PVA to fix it. Painted and inked in acrylic paints.

Very happy how the trench turned out, this can be used for WW1, WW2 and possibly Cold War Warsaw Pact trenches. Now to build five more sections and some gun pits!

The Hills are alive with the sound of swearing...

As a break from the ever tedious painting of  Napoleonic Prussians, I took the drastic step of updating a number of terrain pieces as well as a ramble through some nostalgia.

This motley collection comprised of scavenged 'prop painted' plastic GW hills from Ebay, some polystyrene GW hills and a cliff slope that I built when I was a student at Nottingham Trent uni. The cliff slope was built from mainly cardboard, masking tape and cork bark that was built circa 2000 when as a student I invested most of my loan into Wargames Foundry's factory shop outlet in Nottingham! With limited funds, salvaging waste to build terrain was an inexpensive way cover a battlefield. Some of the inspiration came from GW's amazing book; Wargames Terrain. The cork was bought from the now defunct PoP Enterprises of Nottingham and their now sadly departed wily owner, Fraser.

All the hills had their rock formations undercoated in raw umber and were dry brushed up in GW snakebite leather, light browns and finished with GW bleached bone to give the rock a limestone outcrop appearance to match my castle stonework and basing.

The plastic hills were flocked in Javis static grass. All the hills were detailed with static grass and Woodland Scenics clump foliage.

Whilst updating these hills, I was reminded of Army navigation lessons where we would learn the shape of a re-entrant, saddle, spur, convex and concave slope. Not that I ever heard a soldier describe a hill in real life in those terms!

 GW Plastic Hill

GW Plastic Hill

Hand lovingly hand bodged cardboard and cork slope and cliff. 28mm Perry Prussian Mounted Officer for scale.

GW plastic hill

 What was a rather dreary rock outcrop until painted up. GW Polystyrene Hill set.

Wespe 1/48 Bailey Bridge

Having amassed a sizable collection of WW2 late war British Army, I am now seeking to model the supporting engineering and logistic support element of the army not just the usual teeth arms. The most iconic of the British Army's engineering kit next to Hobarts Funnies, was the Bailey Panel bridge system. To my knowledge no 1/56 or 28mm scale Bailey bridge models exist, so a search on Ebay threw out the 1/48 scale Wespe Stok Foundation plastic kit.

Box art.

 The kit comes with four of these frames with the panels, braces, bearings and pads. The panels are quite flimsy and need care when cutting out.

 Seven of these brown plastic deck panels also come with the kit. 

Assembly of the panels with the cross girders. This is a fiddly process and actually feels like assembling a real bailey bridge! 

 The assembled kit. 

The assembled kit with the bridge crossing a gap. The Churchill Tank is by Madbob Miniatures and is of resin. The bridge actually behaves structurally like a real bridge with flexure at mid span and some torsional buckling when overloaded! For wargaming, the bearings will be on scenic base to raise it over my terrain river sections. 

My sole gripe with the kit is that the deck panels when laid out along the length do not reach the end. Some modelling will be required here.