Post by loyalist on Mar 9, 2016 11:48:55 GMT
I've started a Red Martian conversion. This was to be an improved version of the original terror-inducing machine with two 'sirens of terror'. At first I'd planned to make the sirens from resin copies of the metal part at the top of the Energy Pylon's red plastic rod, inserted into short lengths of styrene tube. Then I went though a box of old 40K bits looking for a suitable 'dazzler' and found something better for the sirens - the original 1990s plastic spotlights for 40K Chimera APCs and Leman Russ tanks.
They are 3/4" long, taper smoothly to a point at the rear and are a good match to the Martian 'aesthetic'. The 'light' end is glued on, has a few rivets around the rim of the light, and a small projecting hood at the upper side of the rim - those features were trimmed off and the sharp edge of the rim was rounded. A row of spikey decorations along the top of the rounded conical light housing was carefully trimmed off. With the stock base that was to be glued to the 40K vehicle hull the 'sirens' projected too far from the hood, so the base was trimmed down to just the piece that is glued into the bottom of the light housing and the four small flanges on that were trimmed off, leaving a short cylinder that was glued into a small hole drilled in the hood. The hole is centered 3mm below the joint between upper and lower halves of the tripod hood/head, and above the middle of three small half-cylinders molded at the front of the lower piece. As it happened, that hole was directly in line with the front snap-fit cylinder inside, but deep enough so the siren fits close (1.5mm) to the hood.
I think the sirens look really good and at more than twice the size of the original Red Martian's are much more obvious.
For the 'dazzler' I found the shock absorber pieces from the support legs of the alternative 3-legged (versus box-like) 40K Imperial Guard Aegis gun platform that comes with the Imperial Bastion kit. You can see them in the parts sprue on the upper left if you look up the Bastion kit on the GW site. I'd cut the pads off the shocks to make stabilizers for a scratch-built 40K artillery truck. The shock absorber part is just the right size to glue into the recess on the front of the tripod hood. It's cylindrical with several circular ridges around the cylinder and a fitting at the end that's round and slightly tapered with 4 rivets around the circumference. A spike protrudes from that. With the spike cut off and a recess drilled in the end it will hold a crystal or 3-4mm diameter white HO railway light.
Photos to follow. (Also photos of the first Constructor machine conversion using a Scout kit with shortened legs and the reaper claw arm from an Energy Pylon.)
They are 3/4" long, taper smoothly to a point at the rear and are a good match to the Martian 'aesthetic'. The 'light' end is glued on, has a few rivets around the rim of the light, and a small projecting hood at the upper side of the rim - those features were trimmed off and the sharp edge of the rim was rounded. A row of spikey decorations along the top of the rounded conical light housing was carefully trimmed off. With the stock base that was to be glued to the 40K vehicle hull the 'sirens' projected too far from the hood, so the base was trimmed down to just the piece that is glued into the bottom of the light housing and the four small flanges on that were trimmed off, leaving a short cylinder that was glued into a small hole drilled in the hood. The hole is centered 3mm below the joint between upper and lower halves of the tripod hood/head, and above the middle of three small half-cylinders molded at the front of the lower piece. As it happened, that hole was directly in line with the front snap-fit cylinder inside, but deep enough so the siren fits close (1.5mm) to the hood.
I think the sirens look really good and at more than twice the size of the original Red Martian's are much more obvious.
For the 'dazzler' I found the shock absorber pieces from the support legs of the alternative 3-legged (versus box-like) 40K Imperial Guard Aegis gun platform that comes with the Imperial Bastion kit. You can see them in the parts sprue on the upper left if you look up the Bastion kit on the GW site. I'd cut the pads off the shocks to make stabilizers for a scratch-built 40K artillery truck. The shock absorber part is just the right size to glue into the recess on the front of the tripod hood. It's cylindrical with several circular ridges around the cylinder and a fitting at the end that's round and slightly tapered with 4 rivets around the circumference. A spike protrudes from that. With the spike cut off and a recess drilled in the end it will hold a crystal or 3-4mm diameter white HO railway light.
Photos to follow. (Also photos of the first Constructor machine conversion using a Scout kit with shortened legs and the reaper claw arm from an Energy Pylon.)
