Empezado por Machinator

Well I'm back. After far too long away I'm finally here with something new. Unfortunately it has nothing to do with Fellblades, but I digress....

As the title hints at this is all about true scale vehicles, and a lot of them. The project is for a client who has a growing collection of true scale Space Marines but wanted vehicles of the same scale. As I had already been pondering about how to do such a project I jumped at the chance to give it a try (especially with someone else's money). So here we go....

First up are the Rhinos as they will be the basis for most of the army. The trick was going to be how to true scale the current kit while still making it easy to assemble. As I recently had done an Mk1 Rhino conversion kit I looked at that for inspiration and discovered the solution. Like the Mk1 kit I would use large panels on either side but these would increase the length, width, and height of the model. First up I had to cut the Rhino track sections in half:



With the exhaust pipes cut off I designed a plate with a spacer in between that increased the length about 3/4 of an inch and added 0.25 inches to the height. A scratch built wheel was also added on the spacer. Also to keep with the Mk1 theme a round door, running board, and new exhausts were added:



A spacer was also made for the inside of the Rhino:



Finally the track sections were widened 0.25 inches so that the Land Raider treads can be used:



So there's the start. Once these are finished and detailed up I will make molds of the pieces so that I can produce enough of these parts for all ten Rhino chassis.

The challenge after that is figuring out the mods for the rest of the body. As always, more to come....

Empezado por Machinator

More updates today. The conversion bits for the tracks sections are complete and ready to be cast. Once I have those done I can assemble a set and figure out how the rest of it will go together.





Here's some pics on how it looks next to a "normal" Rhino:

Empezado por Machinator

Well today has been another busy day. Over the past week I've completed the molds for the first set of parts and got them all cast up. Today was the start of assembly so that I could start on the second set of parts.

As you can see the masters for the track armor sections are now done along with the front armor plate. The cast resin pieces glued onto the original kit rather nicely although some tweaking was still needed. As for things like the rear and top hatch I chose to space those with plasticard instead of remaking them. I've also decided to cast up a new set of treads as I realized the Land Raider treads were much too thick. But that will be next weeks project.

Empezado por Machinator

Just a short update today. I finished the molds for the front and the track section armor plates:



As mentioned before I decided to make a new set of tracks for this project as the Land Raider tracks were just too thick. I made them in a more traditional standard as I'll be able to use them on a future project, but they should still look good. I made six masters and should have their mold done today. Once that is complete and I have a few casts done I'll make up some longer sections to save me some time. That should be the last mold for this project



Then there's just a lot of cutting and assembly....

Empezado por Machinator

Here's a final group shot with a "regular" Rhino in the middle to give you some scale. Now these are off to the customer for paint.