A July Workbench update - Concluding some miniatures, and starting some new ones

I'm really impressed when I see fellow bloggers and wargamers just paints a lot of miniatures in a short time. Due to nice weather and 3 garden railway running sessions within a week, my recent painting projects has actually taken quite long time to finish. Here follows some updates on my Airfix Cowboy knock-off since my last blog-post. Here they have finally got their basic colors. I've taken 'liberties' with the painting scheme, but perhaps you can see where I got the inspiration from?

I think they looks good this way, but I prefer to give them a 'dirty - brown wash', and bring out the details with drybrushing in lighter colors. The details were not so crisp on these knock offs. I also added sand to the bases.

Then they're sealed with another coat of ModPodge as this will give them a though surface which alow handling during games without the paint coming off again.

Even if the ModPodge is flat I prefer to give my miniatures an even more 'dead flat' looking, so I give them an overspray of flat varnish.

When the final layer of flat varnish dries, I think they are about done...

Click on image for larger photo

I think these miniatures are ready to see some action on the tabletop now. I like my home brewed 'Wild West' rules, but perhaps any of you recommend some other free, fast and easy to play 'Old west' rules as well?

More Knock-offs

A while ago I fond some really cheap Army Men in my local toy store. In the blogpost I asked if someone knew the origin of these knock-offs? - I found an answer to that on an excellent (new?) Army Men website and blog called Toy Soldier Central. The 54mm soldiers which looked like WW2 paratroopers, was originally knock-offs of Forces of Valor's WW2 82nd Airborne miniatures:

This photo is from Toy Soldier Central 

This made me think if the more modern Army Men in the same bag perhaps was Forces of Valor knock-offs as well, and probably they are:

So, what's next?

I've had a bucket of 'The Force' 'Starship Troopers'-looking  space marines for years and haven't quite decided what to use them for. Now I've finally got around to start painting a handful of them for an upcoming wargame.  I really hope that I'll not use 'a billion years' to paint these miniatures as well. 

I don't think a bayonet is needed on a blaster rifle, so I removed it. I also added visors to their helmets.

Another thing hitting the workbench this month is this 3D-printed model:

Even if they are printed as 'kits', the fit are usually far from perfect. In this case sanding was needed...

...followed by a good portion of filler.

I'm excited to see how this turns out.

Now I'm eager to use my recently finished 'Cowboys' in a game soon. Please stay tuned for updates.

How to spend a sunny Sunday?

In Norway summers are short and intense, so hot and sunny weather really invites to outdoor activities. -Like when a friend on short notice invited to 'coffee & trains' (...and waffles) in his garden today.

I brought both my German Heeresfeldbahn...

...and British W^D trains

My other friends brought their new acquisitions and somewhat more colorful trains:

Today's last train on the timetable with a 'load' for the host

When coming home and placing my trains away, I could tell that my youngest son had 'played' with my Winter Pizza:

Looks like there will be time for some workbench-projects tonight as well...

An Inglenook Sidings and military goodstrains in the garden

Tuesdays are usually club-nights in our Model Railway Club. After a long period with rain and cold weather we finally got some nice hot and sunny summer weather this week, so one of the club-members invited to a running-session on his garden railway this Tuesday as it was better to spend the afternoon and evening outside than indoors at the club.

After I mocked up an Inglenook Sidings at home several of our club-members got interested in this kind of shunting layout, and we decided to build one in G-45 at the club. This guy hosting our club-night in his garden is very effective, and had already start building this Inglenook Sidings layout. It was made so it could be connected to his garden railway too, which it was today so we could all try it out.

With this Inglenook Sidings connected to the rest of 'the line' it was now possible to assemble rakes and make up my military trains in 'the yard' before sending them off to the front:

I usually doesn't get time to take so many photos of my livesteam locomotive in action, as you can simply not run it by just pushing a button or give it some throttle, which usually makes me so busy that I have no time or chance to takes any photos of it. So thanks to Arne, a fellow club-member, who would run it so I could finally take some photos of it.

There was some 'civilian' traffic on the line as well:

'Bodil', the dispatcher was overlooking that trains were running on schedule according to the timetable. 

Getting together like this, running trains, drinking coffee, barbequing and and have a chat is in the very social end of this hobby. Thank you Erik for your hospitality.

What type of trains, scale or prototype do you prefer?