28mm WW2 Scenario For Dumfries Show (2)

Boards have progressed a bit.

I decided to make the terrain using 5mm thickness blue-foam board. This gave me the potential for a ground level of 3 boards thickness (15mm) into which I could easily model the roads at -5mm and the water features at the level of the base board (-15mm).

I haven’t used this foam board before since any previous terrain boards I have used were made from polystyrene ceiling tiles. Got to say though I am seriously impressed with it. Anyone that has tried to sculpt even the simplest of Wargames terrain from polystyrene will have horrible memories of the mess it makes unless you cut it with a hot wire, and then if you decide you want to shave a little bit off something you end up pulling out a ‘bobble’ and just making a terrible mess. This foam board though is a dream. It is very easy to cut with a sharp knife and you can shave pieces off it easily. The manufacturer recomends using PVA glue for sticking it down and this seems to work really well, although I have a slight problem at the moment because the temperature in my loft is pretty close to freezing so it is taking a while for the glue to set. (Before you wonder – the loft is well insulated under the loft flooring, but nothing under the roof tiles).

My approach has been to stick two thicknesses of foam board on each wooden base board, I then stacked them all up and put some boxes on the top one then left them for a couple of days to set. The first time I did this I actually watered the PVA down too much and the boards came off but it was a simple matter to re-glue them with a stronger mixture of PVA. If you try this my advice is not to water down the PVA at all and just use it neat from the bottle. Also go to a local builders merchant and buy a 5 litre bottle, its much cheaper than buying smaller amounts.

Having now got a two board layer. I placed the third layer boards on top, drew out the main terrain features, cut the boards and then stuck down the third layer as previously. For the Rivers I simply cut through all three layers with the third layer held in place by kneeling on it, and then pulled/pried the first two layers off the board. It was then a simple matter of lining up the cut edges when I glued the third layer down.

The roads (which are cut outs from the third layer) will end up being a little less than 5mm depressed against the ground level because I am going to paint polyfiller on them to give a rutted appearance but they should still (hopefully) be depressed by a discernible amount so that they look like worn tracks.

Anyway some pictures of work so far:

First two boards showing the German entry point, River Bug and first section of the roads on the Soviet side. That dark grey block is a 28mm scale Panzer III to give some idea of scale.

The river is cut on the join between the two base boards and is 4″ in from the edge at each of the corners so that the boards could be placed side by side if ever required. All roads exit at the mid point of the board.

The middle section.

Basically a long straight but I curved it a little so it looked a bit more interesting, and then realised I would need a reason for the curve…hence the small hill section which I might sand smoother so that it is more of an undulation than a hill.

The Fourth board is the crossroads that will be in the village of matykaly. I staggered the roads because it looked less contrived that way, and basically I liked it better that way.

The rail track is supposed to offer some cover so I have built it up onto an embankment.

The final board is the River Ljasnaja. Smaller than the Bug but having looked at it on Google Earth it is fairly steep banked. You can see where the road crosses and clearly this needs a bridge. I have a plan for a simple affair based on a couple of girders with planks laid over them. The current bridge over the river is a steel bridge but I think we can get away with something much more simple, and easy to model!

And finally a couple of pictures to give an impression of the whole thing together (you will have to imagine the middle board is not there in one of the photos…but you get the idea).

   

Next job is to model some more of the individual features on each board and I may increase the ground level on most of the last board around the River Ljasnaja.

After that I will paint the roads and generally fill gaps with Polyfiller.

I also need to go around the boards with the craft knife to cut away excess foam board where it overlaps the edges. I was hoping to avoid having to do this because the foam board is supposed to be 600mm x 600mm but these are clearly approximate dimensions.

Once poly-fillered…I will paint and then coat in PVA, sprinkle on some sand and then paint again + highlight.