Like many wargaming hobbyists I enjoy having and making terrain for my game table. I much prefer battling over an immersive, scale city-scape rather than a wooden table using books and salt/pepper shakers as terrain.
At some stage during the last year or so I was thinking about 40k ships and with some rough calculations and worked out a 'small' standard class destroyer was about 2+meters at 6mm scale. Too big for storage in the garage and no way I was trailering it around for games. Madness.
...but Ii still liked the idea of making a little chisel-prowed ship just as a terrain feature piece. So, decided to make a planetary defence monitor ship.
Part 1...
I'd previously made several terrain structures (buildings) using modular printed 'blocks' which worked well and were relatively square, so after modelling the project in sketchup I was able to start cranking out blocks.
The picture above shows several structures that make up the bridge/engine section (these stack upward, not outward as laid out in the picture); otherwise known as the rear 1/3rd of the ship. The plan was to print out all the vertical planes to ensure things were the same size and vaguely square then glue these to connecting horizontal mdf 'decks'.
Suffice to say that things went more or less to plan and eventually i had a ship in three segments; prow, mid and aft.
The original idea was that I would magnetise the three segments and they'd snap together magnetically; but the magnets I had (even though large) just weren't up to the task strength-wise. To keep momentum in the project i glued the whole thing together into a solid, single mass.
I then raided the bitz box and added gribbles, gubbins, guns, masts, and other suitable bling.
Everything got a coat of black spray paint, then exterior paint (green. filling gaps), and then a spray of silver. Next, everything gets blocked in with basic colour it's probably going to end up.
I was always probably going to go a dark blue or perhaps green colour scheme; eventually opting for blue.
On the board the ship sits (narratively) on a pair of 'grav-anchors', which in reality screw into the bottom of the hull.
yeah, like that. There was a bit of a hiatus with the project here with other things taking priority but eventually it got finished off.
This is all painted up as it was for the MOAB 2017 tournament.
Name...
The ship's name is 'spinum aureum' or 'golden thorn'. It's not big enough to earn itself a 'dagger' or 'sword' kinda title but it could give a bigger ship a nasty scratch, so 'thorn' it is.
I consulted my latin expert and after a couple of edits (and repaints) we agreed that the name was aesthetically pleasing if not grammatically perfect.
Part 2...
As nice as having stuff is, part of my usual process is 'getting it into a box'. Storage. Don't leave your toys out. Until it's boxed away a project is not finished.
For many months the ship sat in my study collecting dust and i considered building a crate for it and other ideas but eventually decided i was going to just try cutting it back into smaller bits.
I managed to separate the back segment successfully with just a saw. Next i was able to add some pvc pipes containing 'connection nuts', and glue and screw those into place on the 'front' segment. Originally i had planned to use 3 bolts but getting 3 things to align was proving difficult, so i settled on 2.
The 'back' segment has a little wooden 'tongue' that aligns the two segments and holes through the back surface for the bolt (which are reinforced with large washers).
The two 'hexiest' bits here (pic above) are the bolt heads in situ. There are a couple of repatched and rethemed bolt holes in the 'metal' section.
Here we have the ship aligned and assembled. It's a solid connection, and works as well as i could have hoped for.
And that was the ship project. Lots of little steps that eventually got there. I wouldn't consider making another one but it was an interesting enough project to do... once.
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