T34 engine trouble #14

The base – Part 2.

Building each brick individually takes time and patience, but it’s no worse than building individual tracks for tanks. Little effort and not much thought are needed. However, to complete the ends of the piece, and to show some “natural” bomb damage, took a lot more thought. I contemplated just gluing stones and sand randomly, but as these walls were built with brick, I wanted it to show brick, something like how the ends of MiniArt buildings are portrayed. I come to the conclusion that sculpting the ends would be the easiest way to achieve the “finish” I was after.

For this I used Magic Sculpt. It’s a two-part putty that is blended together and gives approximately one hour of working time. Using tools dampened with water, it is easy to work the putty into whatever form is required. While still soft, I formed brick shapes and filled up the open ends of the walls. I had planned to place more of the cork bricks into the soft putty to help with the bombed-texture, but they didn’t sit properly. When the putty hardened, I glued the cork bricks in place with more of the white glue instead. These can now be grouted to fill them out, along with the faces of the wall.

The cobblestones were made pretty much like the bricks of the wall were. Individual cork bricks were cut up measuring 2 x 4 x 8mm. Each brick was glued in place using thinned carpenters glue. Lines were drawn on the cork base to keep them straight, and a few more evenings were spent placing the cork stones.

The main wall assembly was designed so it could be kept separate to ease grouting later. But the remaining wall had also to be shown. I made a simple little piece and placed it in line with the main wall piece, and then filled in behind with more bricks. The two pieces will be joined properly when the main wall element is fixed in place.

The image above shows the built base from behind with just enough detail to keep it interesting. The image below shows the T34 in place, so the viewer has an idea of the scale of the wall. I built the wall and base over a 2-week period, which is a lot of time when there’s not too much to spare, but the big advantage is originality and not just another bought item.