Vodkafan's Wargaming Table and Terrain project

[vodkafan]

Going to document  my progress on this thread. There will be pics as I go along. I am starting from scratch so will also tot up how much it is costing me. First the table. Sorry its a bad pic.



4 x 4 ft. My 10 year old daughter helped me paint it blue

cost: £15 but had to pay £15 to get it delivered so £30
 Cheap acrylic Paints, brushes @ £6

Running total £36

[vodkafan]

Making my own modular hills from the method on Matakishi's Tea House from thick cork tiles. The price of cork has shot up though. I bought direct from a wholesale supplier but had to buy more than £60 worth to get free delivery. Even so, I found I did not buy enough. However, I got enough to complete a basic set of hills.  To make  the hills I glued two 8mm tiles together and then a 3.2mm tile on top of that. When the grass mat is glued atop that it is 20mm thick. I bought a cheap jig saw to cut the tiles into the needed shapes plus G-cramps to clamp the work, wood glue and a Stanley knife.

 
stack of glued tiles, not yet exciting..


This shows the composite construction of the tiles glued together


first tile clamped ready to be cut


All of them cut and some complete tiles with grass mat glued on


BUT the jigsaw is dead...

Cost : Cork tiles £72.39
 two lots of wood glue, G cramps, jigsaw, 2 x grass terrain mats from model shop

Running total £151

[FramFramson]

BUT the jigsaw is dead...

What, again?!

[vodkafan]

What, again?!

Its the same jigsaw. I rested it for a day and then managed to get through the rest the next day. Only 10 cuts in total though. The tool is now kaput.

[Eric the Shed]

As I said..jigsaws and cork don't mix....is this a new thread?

[grant]

How could a jigsaw not handle cork? I don't get it. I have a very good quality makita and if it couldn't handle cork I would be surprised.

Is it the dust?

[Eric the Shed]

The cork I have used to build terrain is the flat stuff, This is a composite of small bits glued togeher. In aother words there is lot of glue,air and variable pieces of cork thickness. Cutting cork is like cutting polystyrene. You need a very sharp knife/extremely high speed to get a clean cut. A band saw or even a good quality jigsaw with a fine blade will cut through easily. A slower jig with a wider tooth blade is going to find it tough. You are not going to get a clean cut and the jig will burn out.

Its all about the blade, speed, resistance and power

[matakishi]

I use a scroll saw to cut my thick cork. It glides through it even once it's been laminated into 4 tile thick layers. Never tried a jigsaw, who'd have thought it wouldn't work.

[vodkafan]

I use a scroll saw to cut my thick cork. It glides through it even once it's been laminated into 4 tile thick layers. Never tried a jigsaw, who'd have thought it wouldn't work.

I didn't have access to a scroll saw, so the jigsaw was the cheapest I could buy to keep the budget down. (£9.93 Homebase own brand) I too was very surprised. The last two cuts (corner pieces out of complete tiles) were extremely hard work, despite the work being firmly clamped the saw was trying to shake itself to pieces and smoke was coming out the holes.   

[vodkafan]

With the cost of the grass mats and the jigsaw factored in, each complete 1ft square tile (or cut up equivalent) cost £8 to produce. However they look like they should last for ever, and the system is very flexible . To maximise the utility I have decided to paint the sides and undersides grey to represent rock, so that turned over they can be used for a barren desert mountain.
The next big thing is going to be my tree bases- this is also not going to be cheap!

[matakishi]

I made my hills in 1992 and they're still going strong even after a 5 year stint as regular scenery in a games shop. You only have to make them once!

[vodkafan]

OK been busy making my tree bases. Before I started I looked at a lot of pictures of other people's trees on wargames tables. Some ideas I liked and others I didn't. The main thing I don't like is to see individual trees plonked on. (Although of Africa I do see pictures of exactly that, just one isolated tree in the middle of a plain; usually with a lion sitting underneath it).
I thought about what  trees and wooded areas actually DO in wargames. They hide things from line of sight of the enemy, of course, but they also are an obstacle to movement, depending on the types of unit.
A unit of skirmishers would be able to move through a wood unimpeded, but a formed body of infantry (like a company or a battalion) would not be able to move through a wood without becoming disordered (or the equivalent in whatever rules you are using). And Cavalry would probably try to avoid woods altogether, thus influencing their tactics in a game.
Of course you old gamers all know this already, but I am starting from the beginning and wanted to explain my thought processes.
So I decided that my trees should reflect that on the table. I would put trees together in clumps of twos, threes and fours on scenic bases with quite a large footprint; I worked out that 3 such bases would look good in a 12" by 12" square to represent a small wood. The space between the bases would be so that single based figures would be able to move through them easily, 60mm square bases  (units of infantry) would fit, but not be able to go through in a straight line; and 120 x 60mm  cavalry bases would not fit between the tree bases at all, forcing mounted units to go around.
The number of trees to buy was dictated by the number of bases; I considered that the largest area of my table I might want to be wooded would be a 2 ft x 2 ft square, or a quarter of my table. That meant 12 bases and 36 trees.
I bought my trees from my local model shop, which had nice ones, and ordered several sets of terrain bases in various shapes from ERM.
OK sorry  about the preamble, pics next up 

[vodkafan]

These are the first 3 bases  (smaller ones) that I got to the half way stage. I am quite pleased with how they look but I still have to put a wash and drybrush on the sand and then some scatter grass.


The tree in the middle is from the Noch Gaugemaster range which I bought in multipacks of three

After I did the first 3 bases I realised there was something wrong, They would be boring if all the bases were flat. So on the next few larger bases I built up contours with bits of scrap hardboard or MDF and covered with polyfilla.











On others I just placed some nice stones my kids and I had found outside

[vodkafan]

 After 2 nights of work all these now dragged up to the half way stage. The effect is subtle on the contoured bases but I think the extra effort was worthwhile. Sorry the pics are not great.
 8 bases done, still have 5 bases to make.
Comments welcome.