Pontoon Stuff (2)...

 New wagons purchased and horses etc - prepped and ready for painting...

Two groups, one for each pontoon set to represent the pontooniers on the march...

the pontooniers in action... a mix of figures, some converted ....

next job is to get them all painted ....

Pontoon Stuff.....

 Having spent three days trying to locate my pontoon bridge and wagon sets - finally found them the bridges had gone to the garage and the wagons in a small box with the most illegible label in amongst an stack of other small boxes.

So taking stock of the sets, one had some cardboard boats instead of pontoons, so I decided to make up four pontoons out of plasticard as replacements...

once finished these work out nicely with the second bridge (shown at the front - which is handmade from cardboard)

I have two of the the Reiver pontoon wagons, I may get a couple more - perhaps add some more pontoon bridge crew and horse holders.

The bridges also work nicely for 40mm as well, I swap out the horses and bridge crew.

Palace Rooms go 'Flat-Pack'...

 In my ongoing quest for storage space the remaining palace rooms are going 'flat-pack', to save on storage space.

I have three rooms already which are flat-pack, plus four more which are not. The large entrance hall will not save much space if flat-packed so I'll leave that be for the moment.

I did the throne room first as it was the most complex one; cut the walls to fit the generic base (this has slots in it for the walls).

After a bit of trimming it went together...

As I'd got the hang of it I did the rest; so I have seven possible rooms that can be setup as need for story line pictures and all now taking about one of of the storage.

Coaches ....

 Sorted out some horses for the coach (some of my home-casts) and a new coachman (from Colonel Bills)

Painted up ...waiting outside the palace for some passengers....

While on coaches, I got out the Kings coach; its an old Dinky coronation coach - the old plastic horses definitely needed replacing so I used some more of my home-cast horses for a new set.

Wagon finished ...

 All painted and ready to join the rest of the wagon train ...

40mm Wagon (WIP)....

Running gear assembled and two horses based...

Marking out the cardboard body parts (base, two sides, two ends & two strengtheners)...

Cardboard body assembled and trial fitted to chassis...

Canvas covers made using masking tape... (with coating of PVA glue to stiffen)

drivers seat added, driver conversion started (Sash & Saber head, on one of the figures from the kit)..

The other two horses done, driver finished ....     (behind is previous conversion from same kit)

Replacing my old coach...

I've been looking at coaches for 28mm games, all I have is this converted western stagecoach. 

I decided I need to replace it; I have ordered the Westphalia Forder 18C coach from Crantarra Miniatures.

Recently an old model kit was kindly sent to me...

it is nominally 1/48 scale; the horses are more useful to go with my 40mm figures, the coach body is better with 28mm figures and the driver plus passengers are about 35mm+ foot to top of head.

Last time I got one of these kits given to me it was incomplete, I used the wheels and horses to make a wagon. So I sorted the pieces out to use for the wagon

I tried out the kit coach body with a spare set of wheels, a much better match to the 28mm figures than my existing coach.

So the wheels were fixed on and a roof added, with a trunk stored on the back its starts to look the part

drivers seat, steps and shaft added... ready to paint...

I could do with a new driver and some nice draught horses to go with.  Next job is make up the 40mm cart.

Fencing and Walling - quick refurb...

 I had some scenery out for a WW2 game and noticed some Warhammer walls and fencing languishing in the box; I thought it would be a good idea to give them a little tlc...

Fencing given a dry brush of light brown and the edges of the bases changed to a lighter colour..

The stone walls were re-painted a light grey and dry brushed with a darker shade of grey, also the edges of the bases changed to a lighter colour

both the walls and fencing now looking much better and ready for their next outing ....

Refurbishing some rough ground scenic pieces....

 After using some rough ground scenic pieces for a recent game,  I noticed before putting them away that some of them look rather tired - somewhat faded (too many little feet running over them in the past few years..)

So a little refurb and improvement needed, initially gave them a refresh of the bare ground areas and then added some new static grass and some other mixed scatter.

One finished and looking better..

I have some Woodland Scenics water product left, perhaps a little pool of water on a couple of the pieces would look good..

After that I found some spare grass tufts, on they went; finished ...

I like this one the most ....

The sections mixed with my pond and small marsh sections on part of a game mat - a nice bit of moorland...

Wooden Bridge ...

 I wanted an alternative bridge for my wide river sections, I decided on a wooden bridge.  I used the wooden bridge (resin one FIW21 from Ironclad Miniatures), the ramps and midstream support have been married up with an old bridge deck that I had made from cardboard and parts form an Airfix bailey bridge.

painted and ready for use ...

(the bridge deck resin castings that came with the Ironclad Miniatures bridge have been put aside to be made into a low jetty for my harbour setups)

A Blue Rinse for the River sections ....

My main set of river sections ... a bit too brown ? well sort of but they work as rivers.

Rather than start again with a new scheme I decided to give these a blue wash like the stream sections; I mixed up a turqouisey/blue wash mixed with some varnish, applied liberally to each section ...

all done and laid out to dry...

after application of a couple more coats of clear gloss varnish ... now not so brown as originally; I'm happy with the new look

and from lower down the reflectivity I wanted...

all still on the water front 😎

On Murky Pond ....

While on watery scenic features I had a look at my small pond/lakes etc...

Looking rather tired, the varnish had rather lost its gloss finish; so to chivvy them up I used some Woodland Scenics Realistic Water (left over from making some paddy fields, see here) . Its runny stuff and takes 24hrs or so to set,  great though and its looks very good ...

Tinkering with streams ...

After working on my wide river sections, I re-visited my stream sections. These comprise 'Battlefield in a Box' items and one home-made section, which have been painted & varnished. They have a 'light brownish' look - I wanted to give them a tinge of blue and perhaps a bit more reflectivity.

To add the tinge of blue I mixed some mid-blue paint with some gloss varnish, trial item on the left 

Looks better, so I did the rest of the sections with my blue-mix varnish, followed by another coat of clear gloss varnish, 

that'll do 😀 🐍

Enhancing my large river sections ...

Still wading through rivers...

I decided to sort out my large river sections before re-visiting colours and finish of the medium width river sections (and streams). The large river sections were made with acrylic sheet and sprayed on one side for effect; the top side is very reflective and I needed to reduce this somehow.

I thought about using some plastic effect sheets suitably painted stuck on top of the old sections.  There are some nice ones

• Busch BUS7180 water effect with ripples (clear plastic)  
• Faller 170791 Lake Sheet (clear plastic) 
• Amera P109 Water effect sheet (white plastic). http://www.amera.co.uk 

Alright for a small area or pond, but not suited to my needs. After a bit of thought I remembered my friend had used clear plastic shower curtain over blue fabric for a river ... very effective. 

As an alternative to using a shower curtain, I thought of scrunching up the clear plastic from some cheap A4 Pockets (you can get A3 pockets too ). I tried one out ... 

I liked the effect and set about covering the rest of the sections ....

I'm well pleased with the end result :)