Pliskin's 8th Ed IG rebuild

[PliskinAJ]

I have a 20 year collection of IG the problem with a 20 year collection of IG is I have essentially 5-6 sub armies as each edition has come out. No unifiying paint scheme, woefully low amount of heavy weapons (been ripping them appart and rebuilding them with the weapon I want to use) and in general needs a really big overhaul. Back years ago I had a project log on another forum. I thought it was a great success in keeping me busy in building painting models for over 4 years. It pushed me to build to a decent quality and to try new things, my collection greatly expanded and it was a great time. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/JhracIfl.jpg

Here was my collection at the start of my blog I had. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/Np49LCLl.jpg

Here it was 4 years later after I got out of college, marriage, got a house and a real job. I built and sold a space marine army and a Tau army too in the process. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/XcjYARsl.jpg

Amazingly 6 years has past since I stopped my project log. I gave away my warlord Titan (gw wasn't going to build a titan and they weren't going to have rules for it), the war hound did fall apart i didn't. I do plan on rebuilding it. I still have all the flyers. 

 

 

The goal for my rebuild is to do a few things:

1. Uniform paint scheme

2. Modernize my models to the new edition. 

3. Make new cool things. 

4. Do this efficiently on the wallet. 

 

 

 

So without further delay the first thing I wanted to fix was my lack of heavy weapons

I do have a decent number of them but I didn't have the uniform weapon types, for instance I have steel legion lascannons, cadian plastic, cadian metal and some custom ones. I didn't want to get rid of these and I didn't want to buy a bunch of heavy weapons bits for just a tripod. I have bunches of of the actual weapons but not enough bases or mounts. My solution was to 3d print them. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/dfUtkB3l.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/uOJoYPEl.jpg

 

My first test peice, similar to the DKOK and the classic style. Takes about 10 minutes to print one and another 10 to print a base but I made more than 20 of these for less than half a 20 dollar spool of printing wire. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/zFJP88Cl.jpg

Right to mass production. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/l4IisWDl.jpg

The heavy weapons drop right into the base like a normal tripod. I opted to have 2 types of heavy bolters, the squad mounted ones will be my left over door guns from my valks since they are cut down versions of the heavy bolters. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/xCzT3eCl.jpg

Heavy bolter mocked up on a 3d printed base. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/chalpxml.jpg

I love the DKOK heavy weapon on the move just doesn't make sense to have a bunch of them in game aka not shooting. So I just made one clone. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/aBgz26Bl.jpg

My 18 new heavy weapons, 6 lascannons, 6 HWS heavy bolters, 6 squad heavy bolters. 

 

 

http://i.imgur.com/43dxrgkl.jpg

Next thing was to make my scions, I have had 4 boxes of them sitting on my shelf for about 2 years now and I couldn't choose how to make them. Had to go plasma and and bolt pistol in this picture I still had the hot shot in this picture. 

 

 

http://i.imgur.com/ozVaKK9l.jpg

The next phase was my only gw purchases so far for 8th. 3 basilisks to make platforms. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/LT7erfbl.jpg

Company commanders can take shotguns so I had to make at least one. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/nMLgl8el.jpg

Since SGTs can get cheap bolters I went for this too. Using the spare scion heads for my NCO core. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/GDyCe9wl.jpg

Officers get some 3rd edition bolters, I don't have many of these left and the look quite different than the stock ones. 

 

 

http://i.imgur.com/dZRpNaxl.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/7NCTU9Zl.jpg

My unifying paint scheme template. It is similar to my DKOK which I don't want to repaint. 

 

I know it is a lot of stuff for one post but I have been contemplating making this post since the start of 8th, just was looking for a good home for it. 

[Mr Yellow]

Wow, you've bee busy.

 

Have to say, the idea of taking our hobby hi tech is one I'm always interested in pursuing but have always wondered about the necessary price point to create a decent finish.

 

I'm playing around with a laser small cutter for doing engraving and cutting plasticard with a view to getting an A2 sized monster. However I was always dubious of 3D printers due to the uneven surface you can get as a finish as it prints layer on top of layer.

 

I can't tell from the photos but how smooth is the finish on the gun carriages? Irrespective, they look awesome and remind me of the old school guard heavy weapons where the gunner had a little seat.

 

Cheers

LM

[PliskinAJ]

If you plan ahead you can minimize the roughness on the models depending on how your print them. My printer is a solidoodle2 and I got it ~6 years ago, even then it was around 600 and with luck since it has an open source board it has been updated through the years. I normally opt to print a little bit rough as it take less time to print, the heavy weapon carrages took around 10 minutes to print but if I went to a higher resolution it would take 30, not bad if I was making 1 but 20+. I also printed my earthshaker platforms in the rough setting as it took over 4 hours to print each one of them. 

 

If I need the face to be really clean I normally have that on the print surface. I use glass so it is really smooth and all my gun shields were printed this way along with the bases. If it isn't too humid today here in the afternoon I plan on painting up a heavy weapon and I'll post the pictures with some detail, the black only print is hard to capture on the phone. 

[PliskinAJ]

This afternoon was very very humid, I primed models anyway since I won't be able to do any hobbing tomorrow so I'll have more than 24 hours to dry. 

 

I went for a 2 tone prime for these. 

Base coat: German Red Brown 73.605

Top coat:    IDF Israeli Sand 73.614

 

I figure if they didn't have some new sci fi coatings, its IG we are talking about, they would oxide prime then to coat. This will let me add some realistic wear and tear later. Also as they are used they will naturally wear start to show the red undercoat. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/QwLFNfy.jpg

 

Also took some more detailed pictures of the heavy weapon bases. 

http://i.imgur.com/uQVBNbj.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/meCqYZ3.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/MyL38Jn.jpg

 

 

The earthshakers I opted to paint the barrels chrome. The airbrush put a very clean metal coat on the model. 

http://i.imgur.com/hX18a8q.jpg

 

Top coat

http://i.imgur.com/wiejTwJ.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/jlsZ0B6.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/60JqAl7.jpg

 

I didn't have the best lighting as I did the airbrushing in my garage where it won't wake the kid with the compressor. 

 

A final bit of show and tell. I am thinking about making a set of new turrets for my Russes. Similar to how the M60A2 Starship has a secondary turret, I am thinking about putting a gryphonne pattern chimera turret on it to sub out as sponsons. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/BttBdgp.jpg

I printed out a EXTREMELY rough turret to see if I like the size. 

[Mr Yellow]

I see what you mean about getting the front of the heavy weapons smooth. Obviously you do still get the layering of the print show up in the finish.

Have you tried liquid green stuff to smooth up the finish?

 

I am curious to see how much the layering is reduced by a max quality/longer print time. It might make any need to clean up redundant depending.

 

Also, how long did the rough turret take to print. Quite a novel approach to prototyping.. for me normally it's print off on paper and use masking tape to hold shapes together. But then generally I am limited to shapes that are boxy/uncurvy.

 

Cheers

LM

[PliskinAJ]

If I really wanted the heavy weapons smooth I can file the parts down and the I would probably make one then cast it. For this purpose and the fact that most of the parts are only 1mm thick or hidden supports I don't think it will be an issue once its fully painted and not having a high power work lamp shining nearly parallel to the table. The other option is if I was still using ABS plastic is to give the parts a quick acetone vapor bath and it melts the outer shell to smooth the lines. I'm using PLA now as from what I see it prints better. 

 

The Earthshaker platforms once again its choice, if you see the feet and the draw bar they are rather clean, you can get that by making the part 'busy' so you don't see the grain. Most of the rest of the platform is actually under the earthshaker. 

 

The turret took about 1 1/2" hours to print as its just a hollow block. I do cad design for a living so it only took me ~20 minutes to mock it up in cad. If I were to go with a production turret I'll take my time to clean it up and I would cast it. I do like the 3d printer as it lets me do shapes I wouldn't attempt by hand. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/Vw5jKfom.jpg

For instance this fence I printed, I wanted a wrought iron looking fence and there was no way I was going to make 2' of this. Sorry about the different picture sizes, still trying to figure out the best size. 

 

[PliskinAJ]

I went and started planning out the turret now that I like the size of it. 

http://i.imgur.com/TEb1KmSl.jpg

 

My biggest issue with the Russ turret is its simplify not big enough. Fluff wise you have a driver, assistant driver/gunner, gunner, loader and commander. Driver and assistant driver can fit but 3 people in that one man turret is a no go. Just take a look at a Russ turret without the rear basket and its super tiny, probably wouldn't fit the breach of the gun. Furthermore if you ever see the cutaway of the Russ they hold the main gun ammo in the body of the tank. Just no. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/Qjy6sV4l.jpg

I printed the top half of the turret and I tried to print it as a 1mm shell, it worked well up until the top of the tank and the support material couldn't hold it to a standard I wanted. This was printed at .1mm thick layers so there is 3 times the layers as my rough print .3.

 

http://i.imgur.com/DmLTGpcl.jpg

In process shot of the reprint of the top of the turret, I went with a solid turret which isn't really as the printer in fills the print with a honeycomb, it added only 20 minutes to the print and the material cost is minimal. With the status of Russes currently in 8th, I'm mainly making these as a pure hobby aspect and maybe they will make a triumphant return in 9th. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/ZbsfLGel.jpg

Got my first 4 SGTs in the new paint scheme done. Sorry about the slightly blurry picture, didn't look bad on the phone at the time.

 

http://i.imgur.com/ZlF7dTXl.jpg

Time to commit, while this was printing I started base coating and painted the armor on the rest of my new officer corps.

 

Vehicle and equipment wise since I'm going with the IDF sand grey I am thinking I'm going to go with accenting with light blue and dark flat red. Similar to this that a ripped off the web just now.

http://i.imgur.com/OVfGHQFl.png

[Captain Mike]

Got to like a rebuilding log, your army looks almost as much a mess as mine!

 

The 3D printed heavy weapon frames are a nice addition, always difficult to find enough infantry for them though.

[PliskinAJ]

I didn't know I had nearly as many kneeling legs as I did. This was one of the main worries I had for the rebuild.

 

I did manage to finish painting the non scion infantry I had on my table today. Next step is the heavy weapons. 

http://i.imgur.com/fmzG6fgl.jpg

Sgts

http://i.imgur.com/Q4cua1bl.jpg

Officers

http://i.imgur.com/Y9dqEMLl.jpg

Line infantry. 

 

On the equipment side I think I found the camo patern I plan on doing. 

http://i.imgur.com/oPZGtEtl.jpg

[PliskinAJ]

http://i.imgur.com/ttE6CEOl.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/iuWs66ll.jpg

 

A bit of a color test on the heavy weapons plates. I think I'm going to go a hexagon pattern on the vehicles and keep the shard pattern on the heavy weapons. I like the color scheme.

 

http://i.imgur.com/XWPwxaPl.jpg

Got a bit more work done on the turret. Contemplating printing the dual heavy bolter turret or to cast it. 

[PliskinAJ]

No real work on the models last night. I can blame Destiny 2 beta. I did print the tank gun barrel and put some paint on it today so I can see how the layers did with some better contrast. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/VhnFp8Bl.png

http://i.imgur.com/xLPUq0tl.png

 

This is with a random light colored spray paint I have in the garage. The print did well with the steep walls but when it started getting shallow even with a .1mm layer the stair stepping got wide and there are some gaps in the print. This is done because the printer makes 2 perimeters before it in fills with a honeycomb pattern. If I increase it to 4 or so on this part it should fix that problem. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/2LhNPnOl.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/R8z4kT4l.jpg

 

I hit it again with some primer to see if it would fill in the gaps, I did a decent job and it wasn't gap filling primer. Might hit get some putty and fill this one in. Or I might keep working on this one and modify the print files to print the next one better. 

[PliskinAJ]

Last night was more of an R&D segment. I have seen some cool stencils to make a hex pattern camouflage. My wife has a paper cutter and I have cad so I asked her to cut out some things for me as a test. We cut this out about 2x the size as I plan on using and we cut it using shelf liner, about the cheapest thing you can cut that is adhesive. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/B69LbyBl.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/TQBYlZul.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/TIRHBSJl.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/xEOu5o1l.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/L6tCz7Jl.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/WIaJ65cl.jpg

 

On our way out to eat I grabbed 4 random rattle cans and tested out the pattern on my welding table. We didn't let any of them fully dry and on the last one I accidentally dropped the stencil. Even with this I liked the pattern it made and plan on doing it to my vehicles and artillery. Going to half the scale of the pattern and use frisket film to make some proper stencils. 

 

If you plan on making your own stencils you need to plan for 2 things. 

1. You want 2-3 points that cover up the last layer to act as a index.

2. Make sure you do not cover up any single hex cells. 

[PliskinAJ]

Got some color on the guns them self and painted the wheels. I might see if I have valejo rubber in the house to repaint them. Seems too brown almost wood like. 

 

http://i.imgur.com/jSqDDDml.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/YkLUwYFl.jpg

 

Anyways its slow progress since I'm doing all 18 at the same time.

[PliskinAJ]

Was going to finish painting up my heavy weapons but I have a 2k game tomorrow so I had to sort out my stuff. I'm using my 2k list I posted in another thread. If you want to see what it is I'll post a link. 

 

|2K foot guard|

 

Foot guard can sure take up a lot of restate. 

[Custom Hero]

Coming along nicely. I really like hiw you've hit the printer for the extra pieces for your conversions.

[PliskinAJ]

Yeah, I am glad I had the printer, it has managed to make nice enough things and I already had it so it saved me a heck of a lot to make my heavy weapons. Its not quite good enough to make a complete model but for misc parts it works great when combined with GW components. 

 

I posted this on the build log for the 2k but I figured its relevant here too. 

 

First battle report of this list. 

Turns: mostly 2

Time: 3ish hours (We were at my house and I had some honey do's and the kid had some issues so I ended up holding him for about half of it. Speed wasn't key for us.)

 

He was running 2k of chaos space marines.

 

DOW deployment 6 objectives.

 

I failed to seize initiative he runs up the center ready to attack. He bubble wraps his demon thing, maybe a prince, I don't really remember just know its got to die.

 

His shooting takes out 2 heavy weapons teams and a sentinel, he wants to get in to melee as soon as possible. 

 

My half of 1, I tell my 105 conscripts to leave the fighting positions to meet him in the field.

 

Shooting cripples both rhinos and I knock off about half his cultists. Probably should have focused my fire more and I forgot to shoot the 3 line squads closest to me in the picture. 

 

Start of 2, here he comes, right into my bubblewrap. 

 

Sorry for the blurry picture. Center conscript squad wiped, other 2 at around 60% strength, doing their job. His flier eats my heavy weapon team in shooting and smashes into my line squads. 

 

I fall back my conscripts and let out a lot of fire into his berserkers in the center taking them down to 3 before I'm doing with 1/4th my shooting. 

 

At this point he concedes the battle my las/plas vet team 1 open up and knock out the rhino with the lascannon and knock out most of his berserkers. The breaking point was when las/plasma vet team knocks out half of his red marines with a plasma volley (he didn't pull them yet). I still had 5 of the line squads to fire, the earthshakers, flamer vets 2 full heavy weapon teams and the command staff. 

 

----------------

This is what I got out of this battle. 

 

- Conscripts are brutal. This hit like a wet noodle and you honestly can probably ignore them or just tie them up with a vehicle burning orders for me to do anything with them. But when the other player sees 105 "guardsmen" running at them they attack them.

 

- Line infantry, flamers were never used to effect. I think I shot 1 in offense and 1 in defense, for the cost plasma is the way to go unless you make a dedicated burning squad like the flamer vets.

 

- Bolters did just what I wanted, all the bolters I have in this army, 18? off the top of my head would kill 2-3 things a turn. 18 points to kill a few more, yes please. 

 

- Command staff with bolters. Worked great they could stay back, give orders or a bolt to the head and give fire support. I had all my command staff fire on the cultists on turn 1 and at max range I think every one of them took down a cultist. 

 

- Earthshakers, I think I made them the right size but they are HUGE but deadly. 

[PliskinAJ]

I have been holding off with my guard since the new book is coming out so soon. Now that almost all of the book has been previewed. I am looking forward to the new guard. I picked up a digital copy of the rule book, print copy, new cards and since I was just short of free shipping and I had to have an excuse to get one. I picked up the steel legion LT.

 

I have always wanted one of these. With the new rule set I think I'll finally go Armageddon with my guard. 16" rapid fire is too nice to have in my mind. I have always wanted to but when they first came out I couldn't afford them. When I could they were OOP so I got some DKOK. Now, I won't be using the models for them, I have a few and I will slowly insert some more of them but I have a large amount of Cadians and Cadians is what people will see. 

 

Well I made a deal with a friend that decided to ditch Cadia an went 100% DKOK. He had a few Cadians he never finished around and I told him if he wasn't going to use them I'll buy them off him. He told me to make him an offer and if it was more than 50% of their worth he would be angry. I had no idea on how many models it was so I saw the boxes and told him 100 dollars. He agreed. 

 

I just finished trimming the bits of the sprues. 

It looks like 50+ guardsmen, 14 heavy weapon teams w/ bases 3ish russes. Some pig iron heads which I finished popping off. 

 

Also that same day he knocked 2 of my tanks off my shelf a Malacador Defender, and a Basilisk. The Defender blew up but is repareable and the Basilisk has some decent damage on it too. He felt bad so he threw in another Russ. 

 

Just a few bits de sprued. 

 

I did think this was odd. I must have given him my old chimera side skirts. Because there was one in his bits he had. 

 

Here they are on my chimeras in 2009.

 

Anyway there is my boon for IG. Time to keep cleaning up these infantry and get ready for the new book. With these new Hulls I might see about halting my M60 Starship Turret and just sponson these 4. This would give me 5 with sponsons and I think 5 without. 

[PliskinAJ]

Wow I know its been a while but I didn't realize its been since October. The guard got sidetracked by some other non model projects mainly my wife has been wanting to get her 4Runner more off road ready so we have been spending a most of the weekends working on either her 4Runner or my FJ but I think its safe to say while they are never done but have leveled out. 

 

On the table top hobby front I started working on a laser table, once that is done going to make some sweet terrain amongst many other things the table is going to have a cutting area of 2'x4'. I found once you decide to make your own its not that much more expensive to make it bigger.

 

Both of these along with a 1.5 year old has been taking up a lot of my time. 

 

Now whats the point of this being on the bolter and chainsword? I managed to get out to a friends house for a few hours and make myself a salamander command tank. 

 

I still have to crew it and do some gap filling and filling but I'm glad I managed to get back into the building of the army, also picked up some dual heavy bolter chinera turrets, 2 annihilator turrets and a vulture to build.

[lionofjudah]

Wow!!! That looks outstanding! I had a FW sct (sal com tank) but never liked the look... this is great

[PliskinAJ]

I forgot one big thing, 99% of the time I put stubbers on my vehicles, I know meta wise I probably should put storm bolters on but the current version of vehicle storm bolters in my mind look horrible with the dual feed. I also added a few scion pouches. 

 

I figured I was running out of real estate for the gun so I decided to mount it right above my com panel and put a scope on the gun so it can be "remote" mount. 

 

Then I filled some gaps. 

 

When it dries I'll sand it back down to make some good angles I also added some to the bottom of the treads as I needed so little but when you have the milliput in such a large tube you can only make the batches so small. Anyway if you dab the milliput with a dry paper towel it makes a decent mud/dirt texture. 

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Good job on the Salamander. The plasticard structure is surprisingly well done.

[PliskinAJ]

Thanks for the complement on the plasticard. Been doing it for a while but I haven't done any in easily over a year kinda rusty. The plate on the front of the hatch is a patch as I stared making this as a colossus a while ago just never got around to finishing it. I do like using the track guards to make the platform a bit bigger I think it changes what the tank looks like a lot to give it a bit more room. 

 

I managed to sand down my problem areas and put down a 2 tone prime. Vallejo German Dark Yellow and a top coat of IDF Israeli Sand followed back with a very light German Dark Yellow. This tank will also be my test pattern for my repaint of all my other armor. 

 

[PliskinAJ]

Had some fun yesterday cutting up a fine "chinesiusm" Russ a friend of mine gave me. It was just a hull and I always wanted to make a knocked out tank but couldn't justify killing one of my expensive tanks and I had non damaged beyond repair.

 

 

I 3d printed a proper turret ring so its doesn't look like a knocked out toy tank.

[Bjorn Firewalker]

Looks promising.

[Doghouse]

Attention to detail on these is fantastic mate! :tu: