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Other Stuff => Workbench => Topic started by: Blue in vt on October 27, 2011, 02:10:21 AM
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So since I've gotten back into the hobby after a very long break (15 years or so) I've mostly been collecting and painting...but lately the urge to actually game with my minis has gotten stronger. However one of the major impediments to having an actual game was the lack of a table to play on...also the lack of money to make one....also the lack of space in which to keep it... :(
But! the other day I was looking through our local Craigslist and saw someone offering a folding Ping Pong Table for $30...I thought this would be a great compromise...a big table to game on that folds up fairly small...and a PP table for when the kids are older. So I called them and they told me I could have it but that it was cracked and wouldn't work for PP anymore...so I dropped the idea. Well yesterday the guy gets ahold of me and says I can have it for free if I come get it...I was there in 10min... lol "Awesome" I thought a huge table to play on (9'x5')...more than big enough for even large games. So I brought it home...and found that it was a cheap Piece of Crap...and it was wobbly....and as I started to set it up the "crack" turned into this...
(http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k285/csabick/bf9e9055.jpg)
:'( :'( So much for my big table! But not to be deterred I threw that half of the table away and consolidated all the legs under the remaining half....this made the remaining half MUCH more stable and still left me with a decent size playing surface of 5'x4.5' Which should be great for Skirmish games and small WFB games (3rd edition of course). here is what she looks like now
(http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k285/csabick/3dff24c0.jpg)
(http://i91.photobucket.com/albums/k285/csabick/e324ea02.jpg)
Not to shabby for FREE!!
And Yes I'll have to play in my Garage...but its better than nothing!
Now I just need to come up with some low cost terrain, and some cheap acrylic to paint the table with and I'll be good to go.
Wish me luck!
Cheers,
Blue
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Free is always good! Anyway you could fix it, or replace it with comparable sized MDF board? If the hardware isnt broken, shouldn't be too hard.
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Free is always good! Anyway you could fix it, or replace it with comparable sized MDF board? If the hardware isnt broken, shouldn't be too hard.
Yeah, excellent suggestion here. You could easily use some of the thicker MDF to expand this to a nice 6' x 5' (which you can easily mark down to 6' x 4' for standard games, giving each player a bit of extra room for supplies, codices, etc.)
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Nice, that is a big garage, over here the price of land is such that houses are on the 15mm rather than a 28mm scale............. :D
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Looks pretty stabile, hope you get a lot of joy out of it. And 5'x4.5' is ample space. My skirmish boards are normally 4'x4' which is often more than enough for 10-15 28mm minis a side depending on the game. Plus if your terrain building skills turn out to be anything like your painting we'll all be wanting to come round for a game so the garage will offer plenty of space ;)
Matakishi's tea house has a good variety of reasonably cheap terrain building building ideas.
For bare grass I have a moss/grass green piece of fleece cloth I put over my table. Folds up nicely, doesn't crease and very cheap. I reckon if I watered down some acrylics a little I could add different shades, but not tried yet.
Duncan
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Easily available is GW's mat.
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Easily available is GW's mat.
And pretty good I've heard too.
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Even the GW bashers rate it.
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Great suggestions guys...I'll have to look into a mat of some sort. I've got number of Dave Garffam paper houses to assemble so thats covered for now...to get this off the ground I need some trees...material for hedges...and a couple low walls...I can probably fake most of those.
If I were to expand this to a "full" sized table I'll go whole hog and make some better legs for it....these are not the highest quality...but will work for now!
Cheers,
Blue
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You can probably pick up a lot of GW scenery at Flea markets or yard sales, lots of teenage boys buy them and then dump them when the fad ends.
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I threw that half of the table away and consolidated all the legs under the remaining half...
so does it ping or just pong now?
used to use a friends pingpong table as a gaming surface when I was a lad... quite sturdy for what it was... and a good height...
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That's a good cheap solution. I have a couple of the super-hard plastic folding tables. They fold in half and store n the closet easily, but fold out to 6' long. I can put MDF pn the top to get the table size I want. They're not to expensive and extremely stable. They also make impromptu painting tables when the kids have friends over who express an interest in the hobby (tip: Keep cheap plastic minis at the house for these occasions).
Tables Galore (http://www.officemax.com/office-furniture/tables/folding-tables?cm_mmc=Google-_-FURN+-+Tables-_-Folding+Tables-_-plastic+folding+table_Phrase&002=2109531&004=1236051154&005=148949293&006=10333612984&007=Search&008=&gclid=CIO6x7WaiqwCFUZd5QodiG-Aow)
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@dave...I have considered this solution...do you fasten the MDF to the folding tables some how or just tell everyone to be careful?
Cheers,
Blue
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You’re up to a nice start...
I sure hope your garage is warm enough this winter so your avatar’s name won't become a reality ;)
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Heated garages? That is surely a luxury? Gosh, a fellow will want heat and light in his shed next! lol
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@dave...I have considered this solution...do you fasten the MDF to the folding tables some how or just tell everyone to be careful?
Cheers,
Blue
Yes. You can use washers and bolts with wingnuts. Carefully drill holes through the MDF and the table (so they line up) and slip bolts through washers/mdf/table, then fasten with wignuts. Strategically placed hollow scenery or objectives cover the bolt heads on the surface (or you can go with countersunk fasteners depending on thickness of mdf). If you get the 6' table then a 6'X4' board only overlaps on the long sides and presents little problem. The nice part is you can get the roll-up terrain mats and throw-em out on your fold-up tables in any room of the house and it all goes back in the closet in just a few minutes. This prevents divorces caused by monolithic immovable tables and dedicated gaming rooms. ;)
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The other alternative, which I have used on my gaming board, is to just glue and screw some lengths of wood to the bottom of the MDF.
Just lay the board on the floor, flip the table over and mark the outline of the table on the MDF.
Then you can fix some lengths of wood to the bottom and the board does not move.
I did this and left a small gap so that I can put a cloth on my kitchen table first to protect it and put the board down on this.
It also makes for a tighter fit.
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Nice guys! thanks for the info...some day when I'm flush and have more time I'll follow up on these ideas!
Blue
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The other alternative, which I have used on my gaming board, is to just glue and screw some lengths of wood to the bottom of the MDF.
Just lay the board on the floor, flip the table over and mark the outline of the table on the MDF.
Then you can fix some lengths of wood to the bottom and the board does not move.
I did this and left a small gap so that I can put a cloth on my kitchen table first to protect it and put the board down on this.
It also makes for a tighter fit.
Great idea. I'm going to try this next for our dining room table. Thanks.