Saturday, April 4, 2009

Thunderchild

A flicker of flame went up through the rising steam, and then the Martian reeled and staggered. In another moment he was cut down, and a great body of water and steam shot high in the air. The guns of the _Thunder Child_ sounded through the reek, going off one after the other, and one shot splashed the water high close by the steamer, ricocheted towards the other flying ships to the north, and smashed a smack to matchwood.





She was alive still; the steering gear, it seems, was intact andher engines working. She headed straight for a second Martian, andwas within a hundred yards of him when the Heat-Ray came to bear. Thenwith a violent thud, a blinding flash, her decks, her funnels, leapedupward. The Martian staggered with the violence of her explosion, andin another moment the flaming wreckage, still driving forward with theimpetus of its pace, had struck him and crumpled him up like a thingof cardboard. My brother shouted involuntarily. A boiling tumult ofsteam hid everything again.




A few simple cuts and application of magnets to the Brigade Martian walkers allows them to serve double duty on both land and sea. I used 1/16" diameter neodymium magnets glued onto both ends of the legs to allow the upper half of the torso to be removed. Another trio of magnets recessed into the water base hold the body securely when wading through the depths.


Normally I like to recess the magnets, but in this case they are the exact same diameter as the tripod legs so just gluing them on creates an almost invisible seam. The magnets are available from http://www.kjmagnetics.com/ in an amazing variety of sizes and shapes. I used the D101-N50 for this project. The 1/8" diameter disks are also incredibly useful. $10 will buy enough magnets for literally dozens of projects. Please remember that magnets can be lethal if ingested so no gnawing on the mini's, and keep away from small children.

Monday, March 30, 2009

British Centurion Class 1 Ironclad

A Centurion and an Imperator face off against two Martian Fighting Machines



The latest in the escalating arms race between Britain and Germany, the first Centurion rolled out of the Enfield Works just days before the Martian invasion of 1901. Quickly reduced to molten slag by the heat rays, the tradeoffs made between hull armour and additional firepower became painfully evident. It would be two years before another Centurion class entered service.

Type: LI(1)
Hull: 19
Shoot: 16
Melee: 12
AA: 4
Speed: 4
Command: 5
PV: 110



A fairly simple modification of the Brigade Sovereign, the base for the deckhouse was filed smooth then scribed to continue planking across the deck allowing the deckhouse to be slid towards the rear and given a pair of funnels from styrene tubing. The mounting notches from the original sponsons were filled in and new ones fabricated from tubing sections bisected and filled (though 1/2 round rod would have been much easier).

Looking like the Imperator's meaner older sister, I'm quite pleased with how it turned out. I have another Sovereign model set aside for a mate. Playwise it hasn't faired as well though - having the greatest firepower on the board (and being my HQ) in its first game the martians immediately set upon it with five tripods and reduced it to slag in 2 turns!

Ulla


German Wotan

Brigade Models has released their German Wotan class 1 Ironclad, and a mighty fine model it is.


A quick review and additional photo can be found on the Brigade Models Forum.

We'll start all over again!

A blog for all things Land Ironclads, as well as whatever else might find its way onto the table.