SCRATCH BUILD

Practical Wargames Terrain for a windy miller: Part 1:

A 28mm Windmill.

For the next instalment of this series, I decided to show how I build simple and practical wargame buildings from every-day materials by featuring a small windmill. The windmill was inspired by a 1/35th scale model kit which used resin and vacuum-formed plastic pieces to build an Eastern European style structure.

As usual I started with a sketch which I scaled for 28mm or 1/56th scale wargame figures. I used corrugated cardboard to build the main structure and glued the pieces together with my hot glue gun. Once the glue had set, I sealed the cardboard with strips of torn newspaper and PVA glue before ‘plastering’ this core with ready-mixed filler which was sanded smooth before adding detail and refining the shape with DAS modelling clay.

The roof section was also built from corrugated cardboard, this time triangles glued together with my hot glue gun and then sealed with the torn newspaper and PVA glue mix. Surface detailing was once again done with strips of egg box card which were glued in place with PVA glue or superglue. This was the fun part and once the roof was finished I used a couple of pieces of scrap wood (from an old packing case) to model the large wooden arm that was used to turn the windmill into the wind. This arm was glued in place with superglue and any gaps were filled with DAS.

The wooden roof tiles were modelled from egg box card and once again glued in place with a mix of PVA and superglue. The windmill sails were constructed from black plastic card and painting started with a dark brown basecoat on the wooden pieces and a light grey basecoat on the walls. I have used various basecoats, dry-brushing and washes to give a more ‘natural’ effect to this model while more dry-brushing and ‘splattering have helped to add colour and variety to the plain walls and wooden parts. The model was finished with Galleria matt varnish and the odd clump of ground foam vegetation was used as decoration.

Unlike most of the earlier tutorials I have written, this model is slightly too large to fit into an imaginary 6 inch x 6 inch x 6 inch box: the sails are just too big!

In part one I’ll just deal with the construction and complete the build and paint next month.