Friday 24 June 2016

Gorkamorka kommishun - gettin' hot

Progress is happening at the usual steady pace. That's putting it in a positive way, as what I actually mean is that it's too slow. I've kind of managed to negate the part where I run out of ideas for a particular model and get stuck by jumping between different vehicles, but I'm afraid there's not much I can do against the blistering summer heat that's setting in just now. Temperatures reaching 30 degrees Celsius, with 35 prognosed for this weekend. It's not much cooler in my room, making it rather hard to find the will to do anything else than slowly decomposing on the bed with a book or something. Regardless, I've started on the last buggy and actually managed to get a decent chunk of it done. Mostly due to it being almost purely a kitbash. Eh.


That being said, I'm pretty happy with how it's turned out so far. On the other hand, now I find that it makes the trakk buggy look kinda meh in comparison, but it might be just me. Similar to the two trukks, this is the speedy counterpart to the heavy ruggedness of the trakk version.

The initial part of figuring out the axle placement was a bit of a pain. I was using the leftover frame that had a pair of leaf springs trimmed off to use on the trukk, but couldn't figure out for the life of me how to make it nice, low and level. Then I remembered one of my very first inspirations, before I even began tinkering with models. Conversion Fanboy's hot rod trukks.


Turned out it was as simple as gluing the front axle to the front of the frame rather than it's designated spot. Once that was figured out, I cut the rearmost part of the frame off at an angle, attached the rear axle upside down and figured out locations for the engine, driver, gunner and the radiator (I really wanted to use that last one for the classic hot rod look)


With that stuff figured out, I went about some optional armour. The rear part was made out of trukk side and cab panels, while the lower wall of the flatbed served as a base for the reinforced ram. The driver uses biker legs, which were magnetised to sit in place and standard trukk driver arms, along with the instrument panel which will be mounted to fit. The gunner will also be based on the standard trukk gunner.


As seen in the opening photo and here, the exhaust system is a mix of trukk parts and leftovers from the big trakk, arranged in a somewhat haphazard manner to emphasise the somewhat speedy wedge shape. The reinforced ram was given some extra bits and the skull totem from the warbike kit.


The chassis as seen from below. The reinforced ram is magnetised with a set of two 3mm magnets in the back and two 2mm ones to keep the front from dropping. It kept submitting to gravity still, until I realised I glued one of the small magnets the wrong way round. Rear armour is held on with two sets of 3mm magnets. Driver, similar to others has a 3mm magnet on the vehicle and 2mm on the mini.


At this point, since all four vehicles are basically finished, as far as their main shape and placement of all the crucial features goes, are done, I decided to start on the weapons and equipment. Going with the gunners first, since they will be interchangeable between all four. The way I figured it out, each vehicle will have a mount, with each weapon type being attached on magnets. As seen in the picture, the gunner has a magnet on his foot, holding him to the vehicle and a small one in his hand, keeping him in proper alignment with the mount. Once all of the latter are done, I'll start on the weapons themselves, so that everything fits together and looks well.

That is all for this post. Thank you for reading and see you next time!

2 comments:

  1. Some of the best ork vehicles I've ever seen Mike. Pleasure to see these updates!

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  2. Mike, what is it about Orks that brings out the conversion monster in hobbyists?! These are amazing work and I would like to feature them in the Golden D6. It's an online hobby magazine and this is precisely what I want my readers to see. If you're interested, please email submissions@spruegrey.com

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