Gorkamorka Firecar Mk II

 

I've been slowly working on a few projects over the last few months and one of them is finally finished. I've converted my second Ork Wartrakk...again. It's been missing a wheel since my then-five-year-old got his hands on it, but there were always a few other things I wasn't completely satisfied with after I finished converting it. The front fenders were a bit underwhelming, the weapon mount put the scorcha above the gunner’s head, and despite being quite tall, it didn’t really feel as boxy as I wanted. So I decided to tackle all these issues at once.

The first step was getting some new wheels. One of the reasons used the same standard wheels as the one on the front of the Wartrakk was because they were one of the standard 40K wheel sizes, which meant you could easily order replacements from Games-Workshop. But then GW stopped selling them, so I had to come up with a different plan.

To replace the wheels on my little firecar, I eventually landed on the wheels from the Genestealer Cults Achilles Ridgerunner. These ones were quite a bit bigger than my previous wheels, which would require some redesigning.

I didn’t want the whole vehicle to tilt backwards, so I’d have to elevate the rear enough that it tilted forward instead. To do this, I decided to build my little trakk a proper undercarriage, like the one my big trakk. I also probably went a bit overboard with my dismantling and ripped off a few bits that I probably should have just left alone. Oops.

I made the basic frame of the vehicle with some long plasticard strips and some H-beams. I also added a ram mount on the front. I also put some brass rods in the Ridgerunner wheels to make them detachable.

I also built a ridiculously large transmission for the track out of a piece of a soap dispenser, 

In order to have the trakk tilt forward, I had to drop the tracks below the rest of the frame, so they ended up basically turning into their own subframe. I used some brass rod to make some sturdy axles that wouldn't get bent or broken during normal use and I used part of a plastic twist-off cap (similar to those on a Squeezit cap) to make the differential.

Of course, while the brass axles themselves were pretty strong, I didn’t want those plastic joints supporting all the shearing stress on the bottom of the vehicle, so I cut some plasticard I-beams to connect the two sides.

Connecting I-beams at right angles was a bit tricky, but I just cut off the top and bottom of one beam so that they lock together tightly and ended up with a really great connection.

To connect the two subframes, I decided to model some pistons to look like a hydraulic suspension or adjustable traction bars. This would involve connecting tubes at some weird angles, so I started off by using some other bits of tube to make some connection points on the main portion of the frame that stuck out just beyond the flanges of the beams. I then chopped up some square tubing to make a C-shaped brackets on the track subframe.

A few little tubes at weird angles wasn't much to support the weight of the vehicle, so I decided that I needed something in the middle transferring the weight straight down. 

My initial plan was to create two more, even smaller pistons to squeeze into the spot between the two frames, but they were just way too flimsy. Instead, I decided to create some springs out of some plastic worm gears.  This meant that I could run some brass rod through the middle of the gears and solidly pin the two halves together. 

The hard part was cutting the worm gears at an angle to match the upper frame. They're made of some pretty hard plastic and trying to cut them at an angle across their threads just made them want to spin. But eventually I managed to get them cut and they worked great!

The little suspension bars were surprisingly difficult to attach. Trying to hold them at the correct angle and extend them to the proper length when I couldn't even get my fingers in there was incredibly difficult. I used superglue and baking soda to get a quick bond, but even then I don't know how I kept them in position long enough to glue it all together.

The next step was making an engine for my little firecar. I used the engine from the Mek Workshop and simply cut away the chains that were attached to these bits. Taking inspiration from some of the crazy vehicles you see at tractor pulls, I made a little gearbox to go beneath the engine and ostensibly connect it to my oversized transmission below.

I also made some exhaust pipes out of plasticard rod. Working with such tiny tubes at very precise angles was challenging, so I ended up first cutting out some little plasticard guides and then gluing the rods to them. I could then maneuver all the pipes together and sand them down to the correct angle to attach to the engine block. I then sanded off the guides as best as I could, so the underside of the pipes is pretty messy, but they look good from above.

The next thing I decided to add were some roll bars around the driver. I also magnetized his seat, which made getting him in and out so much easier.

I also rebuilt the gunner's platform that I'd torn off and added a spot to add some gubbinz like a big grabba or a wreckin' ball.

At this point, I put things on hold for a bit to take my updated Firecar on a test drive. I played a short campaign with Cygnus and his brothers, which included my scorcha trakk going up against his scorcha buggy. 

This particular encounter ended with both vehicles basically immobilized and their crews hopping out to beat each other up. Good times.

Once I got back to converting, the next step was making some new fenders. I spend a good deal of time sanding the joints to give them more of a smooth curve than the old ones had.

Before I stuck the two subassemblies together, I decided to airbrush them to make sure I got all the fiddly details painted. This ended up taking much longer than anticipated due to my airbrush being clogged and me accidentally shooting the nozzle across my kitchen while cleaning it.

Fortunately I did eventually get both halves painted and glued together properly. I made sure to mask out a few of the details that still looked good, as well as the connection points so I could stick them together with plastic glue.

I was also now able to add the front shocks that came with the Ridgerunner wheels and axle. Some very cool little bits.

I then painted up the trakk in my mob's classic Goff paint scheme, adding plenty of cheques where I could.

I'm pretty pleased with the finished result. My little firecar turned out nice and boxy like I had originally intended, without being any longer than it was before. And I can easily mount my second Big Grabba on it, which could be fun.

The ram mount on the front is also compatible with the ram on my big trakk, but it looks pretty ridiculous on my tiny trakk buggy, so a new ram is now on the list of future projects.

And if you want an even more in-depth description of the conversion process, I have a new video up on my YouTube channel.

The Fort is Done!

 

After over four years of work, the fort is finally done! The last few years have been crazy (maybe a few others out there can relate), so I haven't had a ton of time to spend on crafting stuff, but it's very satisfying to have actually seen this project though.

I was trying to come up with a color scheme that looked appropriately eclectic for an Ork fort built from salvaged scrap, but also cohesive enough to look like an actual building that could exist within an environment. So the exterior armor panels of the fort are pretty much split, with half being bare metal, and the other half being painted. 

The interior wall panels are mostly just metal, but this is balanced by all the little doodads like mushrooms, pipes, and tools, which are all pretty colorful.

My mob's colors are the traditional Goff colors of black, white, and red, but since this fort is for all the mobs in the campaign, I added the other mobs' colors, which also included yellow, blue, and purple. I mostly focused on red and yellow, since that covers about every old-school Ork clan except Snakebites and Deathskulls, so it gives the whole thing a very orky feel.

I also really like the way my little insignia over the gate looks all painted up.

The whole thing got pretty heavily weathered, which I think works really well with all the chains and machinery. I used quite a few methods of weathering on the fort, including stippling on rust and paint chips, enamel paints, oil washes, and even experimenting with Dirty Down rust. Most of which sort of worked.

I even managed to use some Dirty Down Moss on the sewer pipe to make it look appropriately gross.

The chunk of the 'Ulk turned out really well. In retrospect, I don't know why I left the engine nozzles shiny and silver when I weathered everything else so heavily. I probably just skipped it once during the months of on-and-off painting and then assumed I'd skipped it intentionally. Maybe I'll go back and rust it up later.

The big fuel tank was one of the first ideas I had for the fort and the only specialized wall section that was part of the original version from 2019. It’s pretty cool to see it finally finished and painted up.

The pipes look appropriately busy.

Speaking of busy, I probably went a bit overboard with the storage sections, but I like how all the mushrooms and other supplies turned out.

The electrical panels looked pretty good painted up. I’ll probably do something similar on other Ork buildings in the future. 

The workbench also turned out really cool, but I attribute most of that to the Mek Workshop just being a generally cool piece of terrain.

The sleeping quarters changed a lot from my original concept. I kind of wish that I’d stuck a hammock or two in there, but I’m glad I didn’t take the time and effort to model a decent hammock. Maybe in a future build.

I also made little perches for my shoulder squigs.

So at long last, the fort is finally ready for the next campaign. It'll be exciting to play with proper terrain this time. Assuming we actually need a fort. I guess we'll see. If nothing else, it makes for a pretty spiffy Ork dollhouse.

Also, I started a YouTube channel, so you can see the whole painting process if you're into that sort of thing.

Fort Construction: Windmill

 

Belated fort update: I did, in fact, build one more random structure to the fort, a windmill. Every good Gorkamorka fort needs a windmill for power, so now all the random gizmos I built into the workshop can be put to good use.

I built it to be modular like the rest of the fort, not because I plan on having multiple versions I could swap out, but for ease of storage (a tall, skinny tower with sticky-out bits is just asking to get broken) and because you can move it around. It doesn't exactly spin well, but I still thought it was cool.

I used a bunch of random gears for most of the worky bits, as well as some high-voltage bushings that I think were part of the Mek Workshop that didn't make the cut for that section of the fort. 

Anyhow, I think this officially ends the construction phase of the fort. Painting is now well underway and I hope to get the whole thing finished soon. Like soon soon, not a year or two soon. Fingers crossed!

I think I lost Shame Golf

 

Last summer, Dana Howl, one of my favorite YouTube creators, proposed the game of Shame Golf—a way for miniature painters to motivate themselves to get through their backlog of unpainted miniatures. It's not too dissimilar to the yearly painting resolutions they used to have on the old Warhammer forums back in the day, where you'd pledge to paint more models than you bought in the coming year. The main point was to make yourself accountable to the rest of the community, because it's much easier to let yourself down than let down a bunch of strangers on the internet.

I never really participated back in the day, mostly because my purchases tended to be more along the lines of "24 left arms, a chunk of a broken Chimera, and a sock full of Necromunda bits." Still, I liked the points system of Shame Golf, and the gaminess sort of appealed to me. And I'm always looking for more ways to motivate myself to be more consistent with painting. Besides, these days I play all the weird skirmish games. How often do I even make big Warhammer purchases? Seemed like an easy wind.

Turns out the last six months or so have been kind of weird. 

That's not an entirely fair assessment. The last few years of plague, natural disasters, and civil unrest have been pretty peculiar. Still, due to personal stuff, I kind of dropped off the planet for most of last year. Plus, Games-Workshop for some reason decided to stop their tradition of releasing 90 percent Space Marines and instead made a bunch of weird skirmish stuff and Orky terrain. As primarily a Skaven player, I'm accustomed to only getting a handful of new models every decade, so I probably went a bit overboard. Probably.

Anyway, I started trying to tally my Shame Golf score, but I stopped counting somewhere around 400, which surpasses even my worst score playing the old PGA Tour Golf for DOS back when I was nine, so I think it's safe to say I lost. Still, with an even heftier backlog of plastic than before, I decided to start with a clean slate for 2022. Wish me luck.

Fort Construction: Towers upon Towers

 

I still need to set up my airbrush to start painting the fort, but why do productive stuff when I can get distracted by random side projects? To that end, I decided that my towers needed to be more towerey, so I made a little watchtower out of plasticard.

In contrast to the main towers of my fort, which are pretty solid, this little guy has more of a ramshackle scaffolding sort of look, supported by a couple of steel beams. I managed to get the beams mostly symmetrical and at the same angle, but found it was pretty hard to attach crossbars to all those weird angles, so the crossbars are basically just long pieces of junk stuck on to hold it all together.

Speaking of my main towers, I made the base of the watchtower slightly smaller than their tops so that it can be set up to overlook the walls.  It can also be set up on the ground or another flat surface, so this piece might get some use beyond fort scenarios.

Also, gotta have a ladder so that da boyz can get in and out.

Fort Construction: Gate

My fort now has an appropriately orky front gate. Astute observers might notice that this gate is substantially different than the original one that I created and isn't actually made of foam. You would be correct.

My original gate was built from XPS foam and had a drawbridge-style gate that was essentially just held in by friction. This severely limited what I could do with the gate, since I couldn't really add any additional detail to any of the parts that had to fit together, nor could I really add any sort of hinges or mechanisms for actually opening the door. As such, I decided to abandon the pressure-fit gate altogether and start out with a new one. 

Since I couldn't really make the foam any thinner without compromising its already weak structure, I opted to build the structural framework out of some aquarium filters. Although they're not made of the most rigid plastic, their grid structure made them pretty stable, except at the joints. Still a definite step up from the foam.

Also, the grid made it super easy to add the magnets!

The doors themselves were also based on the aquarium grating. I built some hinges out of plasticard rod that both allowed the doors to swing open for my vehicles to exit or to be removed if a band of Muties decides to blow them up during a siege.

I also added a nice bulkhead door from Necromunda, since I wouldn't think that they'd want to open and close the gates every time a mobster came in or out.

I made the doors look especially ramshackle, with big sections that looked like they'd been damaged and then hastily patched over. I also made sure to run some wires to that light so that the guards can see who's knocking at the front door in the middle of the night.

The framework of the door can be seen from the back, and I made sure to add plenty of bolts as well. I also added a few big chunks of detail in the corners to help shore those joints up against shearing forces. 

Again, since the fort is modular and meant to be used by all the mobs in our group, I didn't want to put any specific identifying details to tie it to my mob. Instead, I added some magnets above the gate so that whichever mob is using the fort can have their insignia showing.

I'm quite pleased with how my mob's sign turned out.

Finally, I decided to add a bit more detail to the bare walls on the inside of the gate. I modeled some big mechanisms with chains and pulleys that were probably once used to open the doors, but were now clearly broken. I'm sure the spannerz have jury-rigged a temporary solution to operate the doors that has become the norm now.

This makes for the eighth and final wall section of the fort, which means I'm really going to have to hook up my airbrush for real one of these days. Hopefully it won't take me a whole year to actually paint it. 

Fort Construction: Magnets!

I've now magnetized all the wall sections of my fort because of course I have. They were quite a bit easier to magnetize than all the fiddly little gubbinz I made for my vehicles; however, I was pretty surprised at how tightly they hold together. They also snap together in a very satisfying way.

Each wall section and tower got three quarter-inch magnets on each side. I also ended up adding a few extra lead weights at the bottom for some extra stability.  The whole thing is pretty solid once it's all assembled.