Wild West River board

I've got this piece nicely in hand now. I realised that constantly slapping glue and sand just above a carpet was asking for trouble, so I have moved the board up to the attic, where I shall work on it henceforth. I got the second rise to the bridge built up, and made sure it approximately fits the bridge. I'm not securing the bridge until later for a few reasons. I want to make sure I can paint the bridge from every direction, and I want to get it nicely settled into the board. I'm still toying with the idea of making it removable. Who knows? Maybe some reckless cowpokes with nitroglycerine will decide to blow it to kingdom come! The sand has been secured, and I'll probably do a bit more work on this tomorrow. For now here's where things stand. The tiny wee figure stood in the middle of the river is that GW Cadian officer who turns up from time to time in these photos to give a sense of scale. Yup, that's a 2' by 4' board, all right!

Gaming Board: Part 4 and Wild West river board

It's getting grander! As I said before leaving for Wales, my intention with the gaming board I have already constructed (which is a foot and a half long and wide) is to add to it with three boards of the same size, yielding a playing area of 3' by 3'. I don't intend to play any crazily huge games, so that will prove to be much more than I need, I'm certain. So on Wednesday night I trundled downstairs to cut up huge bits of plastic while watching Lewis. Our rabbit, Spot, has a thing for trying to dig up rugs and carpet, mistaking them for grass, doubtless. I told him off and wryly remarked that some day I'd teach him to stop it. A minute later he came over to see what I was doing, and knocked over my glass, soaking the floor. I presume that in rabbit-speak this means, "Some day I'll teach you to stop leaving full glasses where I can knock them down!"

Having mopped up all that stuff, I kept cutting plasticard. I was really pleased to find out that the large piece of 2mm thick plasticard I had ordered was not 48" long but a little over 54", thus perfectly providing the three large bits I wanted. So now I have the three large pieces and can start building them up. I'm going to be in Scotland for several days for another wedding, so I won't be able to do any work until Tuesday night at the earliest. I doubt I'll be back until about 10pm that night! As well as this plastic cutting, I have applied the first coat of sand to the Wild West river board. It is slowly coming together.

Auf wiedersehen, folks!

In a few hours I'm heading off to Wales. My good friend Mark is getting married to his fiancée, Marie, on Sunday, and I'm the Best Man. Needless to say, I have been worrying myself silly trying to write a speech that's not going to send everyone to sleep. The last time I gave a Best Man's speech I got heckled by a little boy for being too dull. Anyway, I'll be back here on Monday night, I think, but not for long. I have another wedding to go to in Scotland that Thursday. I don't have to write anything for that one, praise be! I should be back from that the following Tuesday, and it is then that I intend to get back into the Wild West (see below) and make a few more gaming boards for Space Hunt. I have had a Wild West river crossing board on my bedroom floor (or chair or bed or desk) for weeks now, and I want to get it finished and up into the attic! I also finally want to get that hotel done and dusted. Until next Tuesday or so, when I shall have some wedding shots for you, I wish you all a lovely week and weekend!

Big Board: River, Bridge and Hill

Today the temperature fell, so instead of sawing in the garden, I have begun work on a long-considered project: a Wild West river board. I made the bridge for this ages ago, but only acquired the 2' by 4' chipboard the other day. I marked out where I wanted the river to go first, and decided it would be an imposing 6" across. I wanted to have the bridge toward one end and on the other side a small ford, with line of sight between the two blocked by a flat-topped hill. So I grabbed the hot glue gun and some bits of polystyrene, and set to work. Having completed that initial task, I dug out some old elasticated bandage and some tissue paper, and secured them to the polystyrene with some diluted PVA glue. I wanted to make it appear that there was a viable way to the summit, and I think I've succeeded. I shall almost certainly add some more bits and carve others away, but I shall leave that until the glue has dried. For the time being, here are two photos. The first after the initial building and the second following the mummification of the polystyrene lumps. The softening of the corners that the mummification effects makes the hill look a lot nicer than when it's just bare polystyrene and wood.

Back to the West: more Wild West terrain

Yonks ago I left a water tower unfinished as I lacked PVA glue, and I left a bridge unfinished because I needed a base for it. Well, one of those situations has been rectified. I thought I had a base for the bridge, but it turns out I have made it such a towering thing that I need to get it its own 2' by 4' board. That's the only way to resolve the way it towers over the scenery, as the pictures below show. The water tower is nicely done now. The circular core is a piece of plastic drainpipe, which has been wrapped round with balsa planks. The metal bands are plasticard studded with plasticard rivets.

The black (-ish) tarpaulin over the lot is why I needed the PVA. It's made from tissue paper imperganted with diluted PVA. After everything was dry, I undercoated the whole piece in yellow, then set about staining the different planks and faux-planks in an assortment of colours. I painted the tarpaulin black, then drybrushed a cream housepaint over it all. I then applied a coat of black, then of GW Boltgun metal to the plasticard bands, and dotted the rivets - and applied scratches - with Mithril Silver. I hope to get the bridge done inside of a month. Really, I need to get some more polystyrene, too. We'll see.

Water towers and a bridge

Want to know how to make a water-tower, kids? Well, gather round! First, grab yourself some large round thing. I've used a bit of plastic drainpipe. I cut two to a height of 3". Then you need something to coat it in. So I got a spot of balsa wood, and cut it into 3" long planks that are 10mm across. Talk about a confusion of measurements! Then I glued them carefully in place with liquid superglue. I seem to have got better result with this stuff than with gel superglue. There's probably an excellent reason. Anyway, see pictures 1 and 2 below for the aftermath.

One of these water-towers will sit on my hotel, and the other will be one for the town. I'm going to watch Tremors again soon, as there's a good looking water-tower in that film. I have a pretty fair notion of how I want this thing to go together, though, so I've done the basic work. Knowing me, I'll find out I need to tear a hole in it to fit in some essential part! :-D Anyway, I got a piece of balsa about 4" by 4", and scribed it on either side so it looked like it had 10mm wide planks. Then I measured 15mm in along each side and marked a point to put a pin through. I made a schoolboy error here. The thing to do with pins is to glue first, then put them in later. I did it the wrong way round, and paid the price in blood, as picture 3 shows! Also in that picture, you can see the kind of pins I used, a short poster pin. I removed the plastic ball by cutting a line with a knife, then gently rocking it back and forth with a pair of pliers. Don't be rough or you'll twist it.

But just the legs on their own are a bit rickety, so if you take a look at real water towers, you'll see the legs linked together for strength. So I set out to do this, first gluing lengths of balsa between the legs, then gently hammering in these pins. See pictures 4 and 5. There's no point having a water tower unless you can get up to the thing and snipe from it - or get shot off it. In the real world, there may even be folks who want to repair it or somesuch, but a vantage point is as good a reason for a ladder as any. So after securing the legs, with Z-frames on two sides, I added a ladder. See pictures 5, 6 and 7. There are a few more details to add to this beasty, but she's well on her way to completion.

As well as this, I started a bit of work on a bridge. I have the idea sketched out, and you can get an idea of her size from pictures 8 and 9. I went a bit overboard on this one, and hammered a pin through every fake plank at four different points. The end bits, which are now sticking out, will be cut back, and a ramp added at either end. She might sit on a specially made river base, and then again, she might stand apart. I haven't made any river terrain yet, but I've long intended to! This might be just the impetus I need. Until next time, dear reader!