Another day, another shack...

Another battered old shack to add to my developing shanty-town. I spend far too long making these little buildings because of all the little details I keep adding. "Why do they all have to be so run down and grotty?" asks Laura. "Because that's what gives them character," I reply.

The main structure is 5mm foamcore with thick cardboard roof panels. The tarpaulin on the roof is kitchen roll soaked in PVA, painted with Inscribe olive drab acrylic. Corrugated panels are corrugated craft board scraps painted with GW enchanted blue & Inscribe burnt umber/burnt sienna rust. Oil drum from Continental Model Supply Company. Also featuring here are a few balsa scraps (Inscribe burnt umber drybrushed with taupe), rocks (sieved from a bag of sharp sand), GW static grass and some reindeer moss foliage. Windows are scraps of clear plastic packaging.

Round the back it's just as untidy - more balsa, reindeer moss and static grass plus a small patch of shredded foam undergrowth. Grumpy really needs to have a tidy up.

The attached garage is where Grumpy the colonist worked on his "Z-Wagon" zombie-proof transport. (Pretend that you can't notice how I didn't build the walls high enough for it to fit in with the garage roof on!)

I've tried to have a few places where characters can hide or get some cover. Looks like Grumpy has spotted this masked felon lurking outside though.

The "Z-Wagon" ready for action!

Grumpy's survivalist "Z-wagon" caravan is ready to take on the zombie hordes!



It took a while to decide on a colour scheme, and after a quick play on photoshop, my wife Laura had to be called in to provide her opinion. Here's what we thought...


White - too like an ambulance.


Red - too like a fire engine.

Black - too like the A-team!

Green - quite good.

Blue - that's the one!

Here are some more pictures of the finished article. Black undercoat was followed by Humbrol acrylic matt 104 oxford blue, highlighted using successively lighter layers of an oxford blue + white mixture. I was thinking of adding some rust patches, but I rather like this as it is. It looks weathered, but well maintained, which is the effect that I was after.

The red stripe was added using humbrol matt 60 scarlett (why does humbrol scarlet have the extra "t" at the end?) with a dash of matt 33 black added to make it slightly darker. A lighter stripe of pure matt 60 scarlett was added to highlight the top of the stripe and the the edges. The petrol cans are matt 32 dark grey with matt 64 light grey highlights, and the same goes for the coiled cable from the missile launcher. Lights were painted in citadel colour acrylics - skull white base, followed by red gore and red gore/sunburst yellow mix as appropriate.

Front headlights are citadel mithril silver.

The wooden crate is humbrol matt 29 dark earth, with a drop of matt 33 black added for the shading and some skull white added for the highlights.

Wooden parts of the tools are painted using the same colour mix as the crate, and the pick-axe and shovel heads have been left matt black for now.

Here are Grumpy and friends preparing to repel the zombie horde - click on the image for a larger view.

(GW fantasy zombies used for a forced perspective photograph - that will have to do until I get by Rebel Minis zombie hordes assembled and painted!)

A survivalist's mobile home

Vroom vroom! Grumpy's survivalist vehicle is nearing completion! Those zombies had better watch out!



This is what it has taken to get to this stage...



First, the rivets were drilled out and the vehicle was disassembled. I'm afraid that the interior probably won't survive the refurbishment in its original 1960s orange!

Although it's difficult to see here, the white body shell needed a little bending with a pair of pliers to get it back into shape. At some point, it had been slightly caved in, damaging the door, but after a couple of minutes I had it pretty much straightened out.

So... what do we need to protect us from zombies? One of the most obvious requirements is something to stop attackers climbing in through the windows. This mesh came from a model railway shop, and seemed like just the thing. It sticks quickly and easily using superglue (cyanoacrylate), in this case applied carefully using a cocktail stick. The mesh was cut to size, constantly checking against the vehicle to make sure it matched the shape of the windows. I've already used some of the mesh for fencing around one of my shacks.

Here we have the motor caravan with the window grilles stuck in place. I have also assembled a collection of useful items from my bits box, mainly 1/72 and 1/76 scale WWII and modern accessories in resin and white metal, with a few left over kit parts. Let's see what might come in useful during a zombie apocalypse...

From top left to bottom, left to right, we have the following items:

Thick cables/hoses (ie. guitar strings - 2 sizes)

Hatch (spare from Old Crow Glaive APC)

Missile launcher (another spare from Glaive)

Vickers Machine gun on vehicle mount (Continental Model Supply Company)

Jerrycans (I think these were from an Italeri WWII accessory set)

Another jerrycan (from the same set - being a different style, this one will probably be a water container)

FV432 stowage box (CMSC again. One sits either side of the rear door on an Fv432)

Generic stowage box (CMSC)

Wooden ammo box (CMSC)

Wire coil (hand made from fine fuse wire)

Shovel and disassembled pick-axe (from an old Matchbox Challenger MBT kit)

Wing mirrors (CMSC)

Dozer blade (cut from plasticard)

Assembly almost complete! Some items have been dropped, others added. The bulldozer didn't really work, so I've built some bull-bars from brass rod instead. These have been superglued to the chassis, sitting in a couple of grooves cut in with a steel file.

You can see the hatch added at the front, over the passenger seat. I had intended to fit the machine gun here, but there wasn't really enough space. I've saved it for another time. I also left off the wing mirrors as I didn't think they'd survive rough handling during a game.

Spare fuel cans go on the back. At this height, they're easily to hand when you need to refuel in a hurry- or quickly burn out a nest of zombies. You can also see the heavy duty cable linking the missile launcher to the stowage bin.

The top views show the tools tucked safely between the front stowage box and the wooden crate, and the water container by the rear stowage bin.

The interior will certainly need to be repainted. It definitelyl needs to make it into the finished vehicle; although nominally 1/114 scale, GZG's seated NAC marines look pretty comfortable.

Grumpy's shopping trip

Time for a trip to the shops! And being environmentally aware, Grumpy the colonist, his missus and their friend have decided to take the bus. (OK, actually it's because his survivalist motor-caravan isn't yet finished so he hasn't got any other transport - one more reason to look grumpy...)

This bus is from French manufacturer Majorette - hence the Parisian route information & advertising on the side. As always, disassembly followed by paint stripping (metal parts only!) and re-painting will provide the colony world with another useful item of scenery. It could even form part of a scenario - rescue the helpless colonists from the evil alien invasion.

I'm thinking that with a couple of magnets concealed in the roof, I could also build a clip-on armoured shell for more post-apocalyptic adventures.

Grumpy's caravan

Following my holiday, Grumpy now has a motor caravan (25p from a junk shop) to park outside his grotty colonist's shack. I'm planning to strip it down, and rebuild & repaint it as some sort of survivalist's vehicle, with mesh protecting the windows, bullbars and so on.

Grumpy's Shack update

Grumpy the colonist is slightly less grumpy today as he proudly shows off the latest additions to his grotty shack.

First, we have the lovely rusty fence which now surrounds the outbuilding where he intends to conduct his zombie experiments...

It even has an opening gate - a must for quick getaways when experiments go awry!

Here are the ammo crates where Grumpy stores the "Zombie killer" rounds for his autorifle.

Here are the drums of toxic bioplasm which Grumpy uses in his experiments. Hmm... should they really be leaking like that..?

The fence is plastic mesh that I got in a model railway shop many years ago. It's had a coat of black acrylic, followed by patches of brown and terracotta for the rusty effect, and finally a drybrush of GW chainmail.

Oil drums (resin) and ammo boxes (white metal) from Continental Model Supply Company.