Medieval crane 2

Another 1/72nd scale crane, this time from Fredericus-rex. Quick and easy to build, a very nice little machine.
Direct link to the crane at Fredericus-rex HERE

What build advice can I offer? Basically, the most difficult part of the build is putting the two halves of the "mousewheel" together, but if you stick to the instructions and take your time it´s easy.
Both sides of the "mousewheel"come as two pieces which have to be glued together. While  they are drying  put them  between two Sheets of plastic and put a weight on top to stop them warping.
The only bit I changed was to make a new hook from wire. The original broke when I added the load.

For anyone who wants to know, it Looks fine alongside 28mm bods.

and a pic of a 28mm bod alongside the Roman crane ...

Viking Champion...

...Sven Slawrta and friends. At the battle of Stamford Bridge it that it´s said that one viking Held up the english Forces, killing 40 on the Bridge.  I have to have a bod to represent such a warrior.

Most of the conversions are simple weapon changes, like the following 4, axes instead of spears or a bow.....

....or very simple ones like  putting the arrow on the correct side of the bow stave.

The most complicated was  Sven. Lining the head, Body (from the caesar orcs set)  and legs up was a real pain.

6´8" in his knitted socks,

The entire Viking force to date;

A Clip from the film,  1066 - The Battle of Middle Earth, The fight on Stamford Bridge with the Viking working his way through endless challengers.
 "Stop pushing at the back, stop pushing at the back!!, for god´s sake, st..............."

Death on the Dorset Ridgeway: a Viking Murder Mystery
Interesting bit of archeology about the mass excecution of 50 plus vikings HERE

Red Sky in the Morning (2)

Another 9 conversions using Accurates 100yrs war sets. Sir Hugh Jarse and Sir R. Sliker are off somewhere causing Trouble.

The 7 Standing conversions

Arm and head swops

More arm swops and the bod in the middle has had a simple weapon swop.

Another simple generic kniggit conversion , head turned in the other direction.

  Battlefield  "scatter"

The whole band of Marauders together.

So far, both sets have been quite usefull for conversions, a total of 20 infantry conversions (so far) from a total 24 available in both sets.(16 for the english and 8 for the French) All together, without the cavalry bods,  they make a decent little army.

 

With one day to go the voting on the Neopolitan Challenge Over at Anne´s Blog is Close......so if you haven´t already,  get along and vote RED!!!!!  :-D

The captchas. I´ve found out that you don´t have to bother typing the numbers in, just the letters, which asks the question..why do they even bother with the numbers? Why bother with captchas at all? Since swopping to comment Moderation I still get spam but  they don´t have the Chance of posting on old Posts without my knowing it and deleting them.

 

The Neapolitan Painting Challenge started!

My entry to the Neopolitan "Comp" ...Miss B.Hayve
Three painters, three sculpts, three idealized beauties in the form of a Redhead, a Blonde and a Brunette.
So, get over to Anne´s Blog and vote!!!!!

A blonde bombshell by Anne O´Leary

                                     A brunette Amazon by Marzio from Fog´s Soldiers Blog

With different Backgrounds, lighting and camera Settings.

The helmet. I added a Gold "glitter" effect to the "eyes" but it doesn´t Show up in pics!!!

At least the eyes are a bit easier to paint in 28mm.
Reaper Miniatures;60072: Chivane, Red Mantis Assassin

The Background (Top pics, kindly suggested by Anne) is from Corvus miniatures and can be found, along with four other colour schemes HERE

Accurate 100yrs war conversions

4 more conversions, two for Hugh Jarse´s marauders and two generic kniggits using bits and pieces from both of Accurate´s 100yrs war sets, the English Men-At-Arms and the Knights Of France

The easy conversions, Basic top half swops;

Legs from bod on the left, Body from the bod on the right

Same as above.

The slightly more complicated conversions;


Body from the bod on the left, arms from the bod on the right

Body from bod on the left, sword arm and shield arm from the two on the left.

Don´t Forget!!!! The Neopolitan challenge is coming on the 7th ...a Redhead, blonde and brunettee fight it out over at Anne´s blog.

Ancient Roman Crane

1/72nd scale (what else? :-) ) from Fredericus-rex, purveyors of very fine 1/72nd scale buildings and machinery (war and civil) Direct link to the crane HERE
A nice looking machine although you do Need a bit of modelling skill (and Patience) to put it together.

A couple of Detail pics.

Now to some tips.
1. The thread that Comes with the kit. It´s a wee bit white so needs colouring a bit.   To do this, I put the string in some hot water, added an old teabag and a teaspoon of ground coffee. Leave for a couple of hours and then dry out. One thing,  there isn´t really enough to cover the whole of the "rigging" especially when tying knots, if  you, like me , use up a couple more cm´s than necessary.
2. The thread does tend to "fray" (can be seen in the pics) This can be reduced with a bit of olive oil on finger and thumb, then pull along the thread.
3. The kit doesn´t come with a base. I´ve made one (9 x 13cm´s)  from an old Cigar box.
4. Use Pins instead of the wire provided to build the pulley blocks for the hook. Make the holes slightly larger by pushing the pin through into a cork. This may seem like a bit more work but it saves a lot of fiddling with bendy wire.
5. The arms on the winding gear. Bin them, they are way too thin. I used  0.8 copper wire.
6. The dowels to attach the wheel and the winding gear have a very tight fit, which means they aren#t likely to turn when fitted. This doesn´t make much difference as I found it  best to wind the thread on when they are in thier final positions. Anyway, if they turned, it would take any tension out of the thread and it would hang down.

Attaching the pulleys with a loop  of thread so they hang down. To do this without loosing your temper and basing the thing off the wall do this, use a thin Paintbrush handle. Lay it along the beam and tie the thread around both it and the beam. A Paintbrush is good, it being tapered makes it easier to remove. The same technique for the pulleys on the stakes.

 

"Rigging" the hook pulley System. This is shown in the instructions as being done without attaching the main pulley onto the top of the crane or attaching the hook to the small pulley. I considered this but realised it would be way too fiddly to  do this in the order suggested, so I did it in "reverse" order.
There´s enough space to pin (I didn´t use the wire provided) the pulleys to the Piece of Balsa (provided for the Task).
One Suggestion, tape the Piece of Balsa down to stop it sliding about or use a larger "pinnable " surface like a cork mat.
Also after attaching the thread,  and as it dries, keep it under Tension by again taping it down.

.

Bodstonian Trappers

It´s been a Long time since I´ve done anything for Bodstonia,
Still..they aren´t going anywhere...I hope :-D
Another couple of additions , some trappers. using bods from the Atlantic Davy Crocket set.
A Little bit of an Info write up HERE 

The one Standing and firing is a conversion, Bottom half from the "3er" Group, top half from the kneeling bod.
The "bayoneting one is from the "3er" Group.

On the 10th of October the cröburn 1813 book becomes available!!!!! Pre-orders  are possible on thier new site History: die Welt in Miniaturen (The world in miniature)
Also available is a  DVD´s covering both Cröbern and Möckern and soon,  other great stuff, like the buildings etc.

And as a reminder, Anne´s  (O´leary´s Miniatures) and Pats (It´s Rhyme Time) giveaway is tomorrow. If it doesn´t Show up on your blog roll, it´s best just to look as Anne´s blog doesn´t seem to update on the blog rolls.