Tonksche Station (Terrain Part 3 of 3)

I finally got around to finishing Tonksche Station, my most recent entry into the Necromunda Terrain Builder's competition series.  With C19 hitting and everything that went with it, I'd suggest that people have been otherwise occupied this time around as there were only a couple of entries - understandable to say the least!  Fortunately, I started my build pretty early and it didn't take much effort to finish it despite all the distractions of the world as of late.  Firstly, here's a video of the build so you can reacquaint yourself with the structure as a whole.

I found it hard to create my entry's submission this time around: the size and relative complexity of the build was such that a single photo, even a collage, couldn't really do it justice - alas, I am a builder, not a photographer. So to close out another project, I thought I'd include a series of photos here in my blog with some commentary.    You might like to look at Part 1 and Part 2 of the build which provide work-in-progress shots etc.  But if that doesn't interest you particularly, how about we take a more detailed look at the end result...

There are two elements I really like here.  Firstly the watery ooze leaking from the central pipe - it turned out as a green-tinged gloss that was right on point.  To the left, inside the hub of the wheel, is a lovely touch as well - you can make out the wheel nut and it looks as though some fungus is growing out of the depression.  Excellent!

This little pipe is another source of ooze.  I used hot glue to start with, then some acrylic ink mixed with a gloss medium.  Finally, I applied a clear gloss.  This particular picture doesn't quite do it justice - my daughter, upon seeing the finished model, asked when she could touch it, thinking it was still wet and drying.  Just the effect I was looking striving for.

The ground-layer is simply paper, well cardboard mache.  I've become quite the fan of that lost art (lost because we all did it during Primary School and likely never touched it again!).  My current set of terrain boards have employed this approach and I love them.

The gangways were an interesting challenge.  They were made using computer circuit boards with some extra rivets attached and finally doused in a liberal mixture of sand+pva before painting. If I had put more effort into the pre-build planning, I would have likely painted them separately and installed them at a later date.  This particular picture's lighting makes them look much browner than they are in real life.  I used bronze with brown, so there is definitely a metallic tone to the end product.  The pipe and tank to the right side are a nice touch - the tank was part of the toy truck (some part of the engine I suppose) but I installed the pipe myself, primarily to fill a hole in the truck's bonnet, where a soft rubber exhaust pipe had stuck out.  That pipe weaves below the gangway, where it appears to be threading its way to back of the clock-work inspired control face, oozing plenty of fluids along the way.  The next picture shows some of the underside and the ladder connecting the ground level to the gangway.

I was very pleased with the way that the ladders turned out.  After making a jig, it was very easy (relatively speaking!) cutting the nails to size, cutting down two paddlepop sticks, drilling out holes and assembling all the pieces - here's a tutorial of the same.  The fact that the nails have some ribbing on their middle is just another little detail that adds to the immersion.  To the right of and behind the ladder, you'll notice some vertical poles, holding the gangway up.  I ended up using a few of them - make from coat hanger wire - not because the structure needed more support, but rather to add to the effect - you could imagine the scum inhabiting the Station making running repairs and reinforcing sections as they started to give way.

Early on, I hadn't intended to include that huge pipe to the left.  When I had finished my first 'cut' of the build, I struck me that the two sides were altogether too similar.  About that time I started imagining that the Station could also be the powering an underground labyrinthine - that's a nice hook for a game there.  If that was the case, then pipes would be required to convey the power underground or pump promethium up.  Whatever the reason, I am glad I went with it as it also masks the original structure that little bit more.  

The doorway/airlock-thing in the centre is from my sons' Beyblades.  I covered the middle section with a strip of card to hide the branding, but left the R and L visible... clearly, they're not indicating "Left" nor "Right"!  I wanted to include a doorway of sorts that I could use as an objective or spawn point during games.  The pipes were to add some more theatre to the build, while the ladder provides access to the gantries.

The front of the Station presents this delightful collection of W40k-ish cogs and mechanisms.  Where are they from?  Desktop PC's CD drives!  I cut a number of them down and ended up stacking two on top of one another.   There are some additional bits and bobs thrown in such as a serial port (?? that yellow bit in the middle???) to fill the voids.   I used predominately copper and bronze paints here - while I could have gone steels, there's something about the red hue that I find very appealing.  Also, many wires are threading their way around the face, maybe pipes or conduits?  It doesn't really matter, the looks better for it.  One thing I had meant to do but forgot was to use chains to give it a bit of a Fury Road look.  Oh well, there's always next time.

The top of the Station lies above the wall of cogs.  I imagined that the scavengers hacked their way into the engine of the once-mighty Mechanicus earthmoving machine, jury-rigging and retrofitting components to keep its machine heart beating.

The left side of the above picture was a piece of cardboard that I struck all manner of scrap to then stuck it into the body of the truck - my original plan was to make it such that I could swap it out on-demand, but I changed my mind during the course of painting.  Creating the additional hole meant some serious multiblade work which, given the thickness of the children's 'toy' was a lot harder than you'd likely expect!

Behind the engine bay, lies some more gangways, overlooking the walkway joining the Station's two sides.  I tried to replicate the feel of a working, not necessarily safe, factory floor.  That green panel recessed in the background?  That was my nod to an old cathode ray tube-style monitor aka 'green screen'.

I thought I'd provide a close-up of one of the side sections of the Station - right above a wheel arch of the original toy truck.  You can see just how heavy-handed I was when it came to adding texture - that's primarily pva+sand.  Here's that same section but zoomed out some:

That metal bar you can see near the top of the above picture, that's a section of thick wire mesh that I used to create a stable platform on which to rest the top level of circuit board/walkways I deliberately kept it from being too neat to create a bit of a scaffolding-like feel.

And finally, we come to the hatch to the laboratory?  Bunker?  Arsenal?  Whatever it is, it's got one mighty hatch with plenty of wires and oozing pipes around it.  It was a bit of a void in the build, so I made it removable, with the intention of maybe coming back to it again in due course and tackling that part of the build again.  And as it happens, inspiration struck today, so I think I may have something more to share before too long.  Also, as I want to use this for gaming, I ended up cutting a section out of the upper-right corner.  Why?  To provide defenders with the ability to fire into anyone foolhardy enough to attempt to storm the laboratory outright.

So that closes the chapter on this particular build.  It was a fun project, I'm proud of the outcome, count myself lucky that inspiration hit suddenly and I found the opportunity to get it built - now I just need to get my hands on the rest of my kids' Tonka toys 😈