Conversions - Chainfist conversion, combi-melta, combi-plasma.

As promised, here are my super easy conversions.


Firstly, making a right handed chainfist.


I wanted a chainfist and storm shield guy, as you saw on the previous page, but the storm shields and chainfists provided are both left handed!


So with options for converting either to a right hand, I wanted the pose you saw, so went for a right handed chainfist.


It was so super easy.


You just get the chainsword you want from the Space Wolf sprue - I chose one with a wolf head because it was easy to cut along the marine's hand in a neat, straight line and had maximum length of gluing potential.

Choose any chainsword, doesn't have to be right handed for the right handed chainfist.

Then choose the Wolf Claw you want from the Space Wolf Terminator sprue. Now carefully chop off the claws. The one I chose (not pictured) had a nice straight line of claws, all the better for gluing on the sword part.

Choose a right handed wolf claw for the right handed chainfist, the less curvature the better.

And voila, a chainfist. Super, mega easy with a total minimum of fuss.
Here it is from the inside.

And from the outside.

Next up the combimelta or combi-melta or combi melta, not sure if it's hyphenated or what. Anyway, I got the pack of metal melta guns from GW so that I'd have a nice supply of them. Not having played 40k or having a previous army I don't have bitz like some people do! It was cheaper to get 5 from GW than buying individual bitz from ebay or bitz websites - some of them are stupidly expensive.


Anyway, firstly I clipped off the melta barrel from the front of the gun (red). Then I used my clippers and some filing to cut away the part shown in green. This was tricky and I didn't do a very good job, the clippers warped the metal a bit, but hopefully a bit of paint etc. will stop that from being way too noticeable. I'd recommend cutting and filing instead, though it might take some time.

Next I glued the barrel back on, but down where I'd cut that section away (green). Then I added bolter bits from a bolt gun (red). I put the ammo feed bit underneath, the muzzle tip above the melta bit and the clip ejector bit on top.


Voila, combi-melta. Oh, you can also see the washers I glued underneath the mini to help with weight imbalances caused by the metal gun. Some people have found it difficult to get an arm that can hold the gun appropriately and cut off the stock/brace bit at the back. I just used one of the arms that is normally reserved for holding one of the big axes/hammers instead of an arm for a bolt gun. 

For the combi-plasma I used a storm bolter. It already has two sides, so was easy to adapt. On the bolter side of the weapon I just added an extra muzzle tip bit to make it a bit longer to match the plasma side.

Then I just got a plasma pistol, cut off the part shown in green and used some careful cutting and filing to remove roughly half of the storm bolter. Once it was shaped to fit I just glued the plasma pistol part into place. It was a bit messy so I added a wolf skull (red) as decoration to hide the rough part of it.

So there you go. Pretty easy, pretty cheap conversions, no drills, saws or anything fancy like that!

Lightning and Fluff

Here's my quick and pretty easy lightning claws how to tutorial. The advantage is it's pretty quick, requires no mixing of paints and looks (in my opinion) pretty good from any distance other than right up close.


Firstly I base-coated the claws regal blue.


Next I paint on some jagged lines in Enchanted Blue. I use a fine tipped brush and my natural hand wobbliness pretty much assures a jagged line! I like to make two arcs from the base and cross them over a couple of times, but other than that it's pretty random.


In each of these pictures, the bottom claw is the one being worked on.

Over the top of that, trying not to go outside the Enchanted Blue lines, I squiggle on some Ice Blue. Don't worry if you're as poor as I am at staying inside the lines, we can neaten it up later.

Next it's white, just at the bottom of the lightning and where two or more lines intersect. Again, try to stay inside the lines, especially at intersections. You can see that I'm really hopeless at that!

Now I go back with Enchanted Blue once more and try to edge the lines better, cleaning up splodges and trying to make the ice-blue and white a bit smaller and thinner as it gets towards the tip of the claw. I also try some edging here, just with the edge of a brush run along the edges of the claw to try and brighten the edges up. I use Enchanted Blue towards the base, Ice blue further along the edges and (not shown in this picture, but you can see it on the other claws) White on the very tip.

The lightning still often looks a little too bright and washed out at that stage, so next I go back to Regal Blue and put some in between all those lightning bolts. It may not be super noticeable in the photos, but the extra dark layer between the lighter lines really helps them stand out. And that's it! I also like to do a gloss coat of varnish over them to protect the paint and make them a little shiny, but I know some people hate that look, so just do what you think looks good to you!

And there it is =)

And for some bonus fluff, here's what I submitted to the GW Elite competition (about your model and a 400 word story). I think I'm ineligible because it's a Forge World model, but what the heck...

I have been playing Lord of the Rings for years, but my brother and I have recently decided to try out 40k. For my birthday I got a whole pile of Space Wolves. The first 40k mini I wanted to paint was the dreadnought as I’ve never painted a vehicle and they’re just so cool! Unfortunately during this time my 10 year old white fluffy dog, named Loki, passed away. So in his honour I’ve named my dreadnought after him, he always considered himself to be a big wolf (really he was a small fluffy lap dog!).

I’ve added a wolf skull from the Space Wolves kit, a heavy flamer from the Space Wolf Terminators and an axe from some Warhammer dwarf bitz that is strapped on with greenstuff and a tiny bit of paper clip for a bolt. The designs are all free-handed on, like the wolf on the banner and melta arm, most of them celtic knots (unbroken lines) in the shape of a cross (right torso), a wolf paw (left torso), a claw(claw arm) and a spike on the back.

He’s on a lava style base made with some cork tile to match my citadel realm of battle board. The colours range from Fenris Grey through to a 1:1 mix of Space Wolves Grey and Shadow Grey.

And now just 400 words about Loki, a small part of his long saga...

Loki, White Wolf, is a venerable Space Wolf Dreadnought. Each white “tattoo” is s signature of a major battle. On his back rests Vorecaster, his pre-internment axe. It was named after a Tyranid assault on a colony. ..

Waist deep in gaunts, Loki, then a Wolf Guard, saw a massive Pyrovore settle back on its haunches and angle towards where his Lord was defending the last of the evacuating colonists. As gelatinous ooze began to collect around the hideous bioweapon’s sphincter, heralding the imminence of the strike, Loki tore his massive axe from the head of another gaunt, swung it straight back over his head two handed and with a mighty full bodied heave he sent it flying through the air!

Axe whirling towards the hideous creature, Loki used his wolf claw, boots and a long stream of shouted invectives to clear himself from the chitinous horde surrounding him. The axe thwacked home with an audible splacking sound, right in the grotesque bioweapon’s muzzle.

Packmates supporting him with well placed bolter fire, he hurled himself forward, dodging, weaving, clawing, kicking through the fray. Whenever a larger creature reared up in front of him, accurate fire from his pack sent it down.

The Pyrovore fired, but the axe had both blocked and damaged the colossal biogun. The bioplasmic discharge still emerged, but ripped free through the weapon itself and was sent off course. Tyranid blood and ooze splattered from the wound in a hideous shower of green, red and purple ichor. Just at that moment, Loki leapt up from the back of a surprised gaunt, whose jaws clicked shut on the air where an armoured boot had just been. Impaling the back of the wounded pyrovore with his claw to stick his landing, Loki ripped his axe free in a shower and spurt of putrid ooze, lifted it high, jumped forward and brought it crashing down with his whole bodyweight behind the blow.

He half severed the massive head and slid to the ground amidst the acid blood and slippery tyranid ichorous goop. The massive beast slumped dead over him.

“The vorecast is mostly vine vith a chance ov green acid rain.” Loki quipped when they pulled him out after the battle and put a drink in his hand. Toasting the axe, they called it Vorecast after the “joke” and ex-Pyrovore.

And that’s just one of many stories in Loki’s saga.

Space Wolf Drop Pod Part 2

Well, sorry for the long time between posts, but this baby doesn't seem to understand my hobby yet =)


My wife has been taking him for daily walks, so I squeeze a little time in here and there (most often for napping rather than painting!)


So here's some of what I've been doing...


Firstly I finished off one drop pod door, then got the rest of them out and have been working on them.

I can't remember what I was up to last time, I think just black spray? Anyway, I clipped these out but forgot to trim the little bits off from where they were attached to the sprues. Rookie mistake, I know! Anyway, you can probably see the nubbly bits poking out in places.


The blue part is Fenris Grey foundation, fairly well watered. I used a 1cm wide flat brush and applied it in a diagonal fashion one way, let it dry a little, then went back in the opposite diagonal. It seems to cover very well. Then I tried to highlight it with a shadow grey/space wolf grey mix. One more heavily on the shadow grey side, one towards the space wolf grey side of things. I'm not planning on going as light as pure space wolf grey, I think it's too bright for my liking (although it would make things a bazillion times easier - I hate mixing paints!)


The other side of the doors are boltgun metal for the metal part, two layers of Iyunden Darksun foundation, a layer of Golden Yellow, then two layers of Bad Moon Yellow, yes, it seriously takes that many layers for my yellow paints to cover it well. I don't know if it's because they're old, or just that I'm impatient. I have a really hard time making yellow cover things without showing brushlines or being too thin to work well.


The black lines are just Chaos Black. Then it's a Badab black wash over the metal bits.


As you can see, I've decided to paint bits first, then assemble. With interior stuff I reckon it's gotta be easier this way.


So here are the doors almost finished. Some neatening up to do yet, but pretty much there.

Here's the platform that sits inside the pod. So far all I've done is a drybrush boltgun metal over the mesh, then a Fenris undercoat.

I've also assembled the undercarriage, had to glue on the little turbine things. Glue's still a tad wet, so no paint on it yet.

And you can see in the above shots that I've clipped out the harnessy bits. I'm just putting them together with blu-tac to see how it all works before I decide the order in which I'll apply paint. I think I'll actually paint the harnesses separately, then assemble the middle column, then paint it, then attach them all together.


I'll try to take WIP shots of that when I get up to it. There's one small trick in that one harness is supposed to be like a commander's one, and has an extra little loop of pipe and attaches next to a little monitor and keyboard on the central column. As I said, I'll WIP it when I get to it!


I've clipped them all out and trimmed the nubs off them, but will have to do a little more trimming to get them to fit snugly together it seems. Still, I'm impressed by the jigsaw nature of the bits that clip into other bits, very clever - though fidgety!

So that's the work in progress so far of my Space Wolves Drop Pod. Birthday is next week, so at some stage I'll actually have some Space Wolves to put together =) Looking forward to putting them all together, though I think it will be a long term project!