A Scout Titan, yeah, me too... ;)

[Fireball]

So i finally started working on this thing. Had to buy some more plasticard, but it looks like my purchase of something like 15€ seems to be enough material for the complete warhound. Well, that's a tiny bit cheaper than a Forgeworld one (though the FW one won't require that much time to build and looks way more gorgeous, but, meh... ).


the plan:




some small changes, that i want to do:


i prefer the look of the Jackal Class, so that's what the head shall look like in the end. Hmm, let's see if it works...



started with the main body and integrated a grill from an old radio speaker to represent some kind of exhaust. Of course i totally forgot about the raised back part when making the grill, so in the end, i had to shorten the raised back part a good lot.


Shoulders and wings attached, finally that whole thing is getting solid and i don't need to fear breaking it apart with just a sharp look

I clearly knew why i didn't wanted to start with the feet. It's just too frustrating:

That's half an evening worth of work. And it's just the feet. Nothing for the legs yet...

in the lower right corner you can see an example for the final camo pattern. I'm still not sure how to paint that guy in the end, but that was what came to my mind this morning. An older thought was to use the same colour scheme like for this little mech here:

Scrub Locust repainted

dunno, have to brainstorm a bit more. Still a lot of time before the painting starts...



that's how it looks like when you put some glue to this gazillion pieces shown above. One foot is almost finished, the other one still misses two toes. I want to make the right foot set behind the left one and therefore a bit lifted. That changes the angles of the side toes, so i have to wait for the other parts to settle before i can try to attach them.

Well, that's the current progress. Not too bad at all, hopefully i can keep up the pace so that this thing will be finished by the end of august. Next step will be adding some tubes to the toes and then building up the legs.

[Fireball]

Did some progress on the Warhound, though i've been a bit busy with real life in the last weeks (had to marry my wife and such things...). So the progress is just some baby-steps. But i finally decided which direction this monster will lead in the end, i guess you can see it from the pics. There aren't THAT much chapters out there bearing a book with a sword driven through it...



i tried to do some letters with green stuff and a needle. Well, it's not as good as i wanted it to be, but i think you still can read what's written there.



The next days I'll complete the construction of the legs and will start detailing them. The construction of the head is to follow and after that is done, I'll put some details to the main body. Which will leave the weapons to be done. I want two double-barrelled turbolasers, but currently i don't have anything with the correct diameters for the barrels parts. Maybe i have to visit my webshop to get those...

[TheHauptmann]

I'm liking it so far, except for the crater he's based on. It looks too small for him, so he's kind of got his feet splayed inward and it just looks off.

[Fireball]

well, at first i had the legs spread across the biggest crater of the set, the double-crater one. But then I realized that if i actually wanted to play with the titan (which my intention is), this would be too big on the table. There's no use if the titan's base blocks a quarter of the table ...
so after a little re-thinking (and regretting that i already cutted some spaces into the double crater to make the feet fit better...) i lokked for the other craters and took one of the smallest. It will still make a firm base, but is small enough to make it well playable.
Of course the inspiration for a pre-manufactured base came from this georgeous looking reaver titan at the 'What's new today?' topic at the GW website:

July 29th

a reaver deserves such a big base, but i think my tiny warhound will get along with his crater

[Fireball]

finished the head:

[Fireball]

a little progress here:

i connected the head to the main body:



and started building the chest:



Parts of the connection between chest & legs:



here's a quick mock-up of the whole thing:



After taking the pictures i inserted the connectors into the tubes at the legs. Next on will be a firm connection between chest and legs and then more detailing is about to start. Already put some details to the main body, but it needs some Green Stuff treatment. And some bitz attached to it... and some minor plasticard things... and so on & on.
Anyways, i'll try to do the deatiling before i start with the weapons. One of the reasons is that i still haven't found tubes with the correct diameters for the turbolasers.

[radegast6]

wow. look interesting.. keep going man

[fire1098]

That picture/link comes up through my browser with a whole ton a virus warnings. The build is looking great. Where do you get your plasticard? Hard for me to find in large supplies locally.

~C

[Fireball]

to speak the truth, i have the same issue when trying to show my own posts here. Since yesterday evening, dunno what's going on there. I guess you're using chrome, just like i do...

That plasticard is supplied either by a local hobby shop or via internet. Here in Germany architekturbedarf.de would be the online source #1 i guess. But i think other countries have these online shops as well, just try to find a supplier for architects. The real nice architectural models are made of polystyrol. Also you will find a lot of different tubes with a wide variety of diameters in these shops. One of the easiest way to re-make any guns.

Back on topic:
'Hidden plain in sight' might describe my current situation best. The first pic of the last post might clarify that. My desk has a lot of pens, markers and pencils and the like and whenever a special type of pen got exhausted, i kept the hull of it to use it for any 40k-purposes. Of course i kept them in a box (right next to the macharius parts... doh! another project yet to finish...) to my left, but when i went through this box in search for some bitz, i found the pen hulls. Finally i had something for my titan's weapons. No pics yet as i haven't done anything (on the hobby) this weekend. Will keep you updated.

[Inq. F.P. Hatchett]

This thing is stunning! That head is perfect, man. I didn't think a Templatehound could ever look like this beasty!
This thing is a fine example of what I was talking about on my gorehound thread... this is something I could never, ever do! Mad props, here, here!

[Fireball]

Some more progress...


inner side of the upper leg. You can see the multiple 'layers' of tubes that will form a firm connection to the waist


the whole thing viewed from the outside. Currently all the joints are still open, i'll have to close them very soon. Another thing that can be seen in these two pics is the pins that i made to connect all the parts of the legs. Super-glue is a nice thing, but super-glue plus pins makes sure the construction won't fall apart that easy.


the waist with the tubes that will slide into the inner side of the upper legs.


one of the pens that were 'hidden plain in sight'. After a little cutting, sanding and putting some super-glue to it:


The basic shape for the lasercannons. Still a wee bit too slender, but meh, i'll go with it. Was the cheapest alternative and as long as no-one sits an original Forgeworld one right next to my Warhound, it'll be ok i guess


current state of the project. All parts put together and i filled several (but not all) gaps with green stuff after i made some more letters with green stuff.

Next thing will be adding some pistons going from the waist to the legs, then some more gap filling with green stuff. I'll add some plates to the sides of the leg joints and then will complete the weapons. Today i found two magnets that i will put into the upper arms. This means i can put a metal plate into the lower arms and won't need more magnets there. A bit cheaper than buying magnets for every arm that i might be building once.

[Fireball]

some progress:



'Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in their halls of stone, [...]
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne
and me has eight that i have to apply...'

(sorry to Tolkien, but i couldn't resist )

well, it's 9 in the pic as one of them was too thick for my taste, i applied them to the waist:



of course that position was wishful thinking, two minutes later i had to alter these positions and spread them further from the middle. dang it!




the inner parts of the pistons. Hey, i used tubes with 5 different diameters for them...



now with all pistons applied. They cover up the last remaining visible traces of the pins that hold the legs parts together.




The armor plate. I used some parts from the venerable dreadnought for this, though right now i'm thinking that i could have made it even wider spread (i would have had another part, but it looked to wide in the beginning. Now it's a bit too slender for my taste, but it will have to do).



all parts in place.

After taking these pics i closed the joints, but of course, after glueing 6 of the 8 parts, my super-glue was used up
I also had another greenstuff session, leaving all gaps closed now. Some attention has been paid to the feet since and i'm starting with the weapons now. Currently it's looking like close to finish (buildingwise, do not remind me of the painting... uhhh)

[Inq. F.P. Hatchett]

Hi there!
I'm just wondering if you're finding weight a problem? Or the hips? Or the knees? Or maybe all of it!! How are you stabilizing the weight of the body?
I'm finding I must use a bunch of green stuff inside the plastic frames of the legs to keep them solid enough not to split apart when weight presses down on them.
I noticed the crossed brass rods. What do you have them anchored with?
I'm in trouble here, and could use a lifeline from one who knows better!

[Fireball]

sorry for nor answering earlier, but real life ™ keeps me busy at the moment, i haven't done much on the titan these days.

well, the overall weight of this monster is less than 500 gramms. And that includes the weapon arms, which are finished to 50%.
I used 1mm plasticard for the main structure and for smaller parts 0.75mm or 0.50mm. The leg joints are made out of PVC tubes, so you will need super-glue to keep the legs together.

And that's the crucial point. If you don't trust your super-glue to really 'glue' PVC (which is not guaranteed with standard super-glue, btw), you need a 'backup-plan'. That's what the copper rods are for. It's from a 1mm copper rod, but you could use any other metal rod as well.
Inside the legs i have a little support plate. Now i drill two holes into the leg where it meets the PVC tube. The rods will be inserted through these holes and will go down until they meet the support plate. This will keep them at place once i start to press the PVC tube onto the rods. (Of course the PVC tube also needs two little holes to do this...). Each step uses some super-glue to keep the structure firm. In the end, i'll clip the rods in the tube if i feel that they might get into the way of the rods that come from the other leg part.

Another way would be to first attach the rods to the PVC tubes so you wouldn't need a support plate in the leg parts.

With these pins the structure is very firm. The adding of the tubes in the lower sections of the legs make the connection even stronger. For the joint between the upper and middle leg part, i used a little support (part of a) ring in the back as the drawings didn't indicate any pistons there.

The waist construction that i did is completely different from the one that is supposed to do when following the CAD drawing. The CAD drawing looks a bit boxy and i thought my way would look better. Dunno if the extra-work and grey hairs that i grew while trying to make my way was worth the different look...
MY suggestion would be to follow the CAD drawing as it keeps it very simple - and firm.

In the end, i don't see any problems with the Titan crumbling because of its own weight. I think my Baneblade weights just as much though it's a good lot smaller. But GW uses plastic that might be thick between 2 and 5 millimeters. And as mine is 1mm max, that's a hell lot of saved weight. There are no real inner beams to support the structure.
Just the torso has received a second plate like the big front plate which sits in the middle of the torso. Otherwise the length of the torso might have been too long to keep the structure firm. It's really not nice when you grab your titan somewhere in the middle and the structure folds itself under your hands as you have no support in the middle.
As the dimensions of the feet parts are so small, they are firm on their own.

Also, i have to admit that i usually start working on these projects without much thinking or planning. Most parts are measured with a ruler and cut roughly to the size in the drawings, but it's not that i would have printed onto plasticard...
So there are always some small gaps here and there and you might have to adjust a piece or two before finally glueing it into place, but i think i'm faster that way and in the end, you won't see much difference

[Inq. F.P. Hatchett]

I'm with you on the whole Lack Of Planning thing!
Thanks for the detailed explanation. What you said brought to light my primary error... weight! Had I the talent displayed here, I'd not have an issue with the templates at all (it's not the fault of the designer!). Seeing this made me realize that I'm going about this all wrong.
I tried redrawing some of the templates by hand, and that too met with disaster. What you've done with this thing is astonishing to me. Do you do all of your card cutting by hand, or do you employ some sort of cutter/slicer?
Also, do you find that the model is better balanced when the legs are spread a bit with the torso turned to the side? The thing seems a bit front-heavy for the feet, but the forgeworld ones look like that too.

Again, thanks for the help! I employed it!

[Fireball]

hmm, concerning the balance i have to say it's fine as it is. The head's weight counters the one from those raised shoulder backs (in physical & visual matters).
If you keep straight to the templates, your model will be balanced perfectly. But it lacks some spirit then. And i clearly wanted it to have some kind of soul, that's why i altered the leg's positions at all. My intention was to make it look like in a forward move and spotting an enemy at one side and therefore turning the torso and head that way while the legs are still walking their last step.
I tried to find a good pose but i have to say that i'm not that perfect at all when it come down to precision-building. Here a drilled hole that's half a millimeter away from where it was planned, there a one millimeter gap and so on - and all your plannings are down the drain if you're unlucky. I'm not fully satisfied with how the legs look. The joints between legs and torso have some weird angles if you look very closely. But it was the best that i could do if i didn't wanted to grow a beard while waiting for every part to settle in the very correct position.

On the other hand, if you choose to not have that much details, you can do these joints much faster and have a firm connection right from the start. If you glue the uppermost tube from the legs directly to the waist, that'll keep things very simple and will speed up the building of that monster.

For cutting i'm using a simple cutter and a ruler like this one. My cutter looks a bit like this one. I think it's important to have a metal blade guidance which won't break away if you used too much power (never a good idea with a cutter anyways...) and to use sharp blades. If your blades become blunt (/dull or however the correct english term is...) better change them. You might get into serious trouble if your blade stucks somewhere in the cutting process and jumpes out either if you used too much power to free it again or because it simply broke off. I don't like cutters with an auto-blade-locker. I like to do that manually but that's just my point of view. There are different kind of cutters, mostly with a slide-locker or a screw locker. I prefer slide-lockers as the lock is smaller and the cutter becomes easier to handle imho. Usually, hardened blades are worth their money.

Only if i'm cutting a very long and thick plasticard plate, i'm using a steel ruler, but for anything up to 30 cm, i have my clear ruler. If you take care and cut slowly, you won't kill the ruler with a cutter. But i've seen a lot of rulers own3d by cutters back at college.

Some smaller parts may not even see a ruler and i'll cut the free-handedly. I put those parts together to see if they fit, roughly and then bind them with glue. Once the glue has dried, i use my cutter to cut away any parts that stick out and lastly use some sanding paper to finish off those connections and smoothe them.

[Fireball]

just some pics for an update. But mind you, no work has been done for several months now. Pics just show the current state of work...

[Coco]

looking good. The lasers look um, maybe too long or small in diameter. One or the other IMO. Otherwise I love it! I still have a forgeworld one partially assembled that i really need to get done

[GreyDeath]

Looks great and I love how much detail your adding both in bits and with the green stuff sculpting into it..
The bits and pieces came together very well and he looks great.
Can't wait.. hopefully not 2 more months to see some more work done on him.

Very cool and looks great.

[Fireball]

currently i'm working on the titan again. It took me several hours to get the riveting job done, but after that i started with a black priming of the body. I'll finish the paint for the body before i'll be investing any more time into the completion of the weapons.
About an hour a day is what i can spend for this project. Forgive me for the ugly pics, they're taken at the first glimpes of morning sun (with the lighting pitched higher digitally...). Each pic is taken a day after the previous one...


black primer and some parts already painted red


like i said, no work on the weapons.


mostly covered in colours


the current state of progress. A first layer of paint is applied to everything. The armor will need a second layer of boltgun metal and a blue ink session.
All the parts that look like moveable things will get a badab black/devlan mud wash and some work on the details is the first of the next things for me to do.

[Fireball]

nope, no blue inking has been done. But the Titan is finished for now. In my IG topic, you might have seen that the titan has seen some action in an Apocalypse game and i want to field it again soon at the 'Kettenfest'. Currently it's welled packed sitting in my cellar and waiting for me to apply some sealing. But this has still to come yet.


I started with shortening the barrels of the lascannons.


i always thought they were too long to be looking good. Here's a last comparision shot before the second weapong got shortened, too.


in a next step, i added some detail to the weapons.


thanks to the magnets it was really easy to undercoat them with black.


some days later, the paintjob was done. I added some 'detail' to the titan's top with paint. It's just black lines with chainmail and mithril silver next to it, there's no real grooves.


the idea for how the lasers were painted came from an GW homepage article. I think it was the same article that inspired me to put this titan onto a crater base.


i really hate applying decals. They never work like i want them to. I guess i'll really have to order myself the microsol/microset combo if i ever want to have nice decals. Originally, there was a white skull's decal on the green part of the heraldic shield. Was. For half a day. Until i gently touched it and it fell apart like a falling leave. And all the other decals look ugly, too, as you can see the 'invisible' basic paper.


Anyways, finished for now and looking nice.