Conversions

Now I remember why I never do them!

It all starts well enough. I find the 1mm drill and dremmel, mark where the holes are to go in the head and the shoulders of the mounted officer. Then the hands of the two foot officers who require new swords. Slowly does it, fine that's the hands drilled and quite neat too. The hole in the torso next; skidding around a bit still not too bad. Finally the head - good, good , almost there.

Of course I have not bothered to wrap the head in anything or put it in clamp. OW! suddenly hot! I let go of the red hot head which swings madly round on the drill before snapping the tiny drill bit in half. OK I have more drills carry on. That is a nice fit now. A bright idea why bother to go to the garage to get some soft metal wire the broken drill bit will make a perfect fitting peg for head and torso.Perfect in it goes, press hard. Oh, wait it has slipped entirely into the torso and is sitting there just below the level of the body. Now the swearing starts. Too flush to get out with pliers; it is a perfect fit and cannot be levered out or hammered further in.

Ten minutes of fumbling then OK if it won't come out then I will have to drill holes on each side of it into the soft metal then force a needle pliers in and pull it out. It will ruin the neckline of the figure and need rebuilding with green stuff but that's the best option.I start drilling and drilling and drilling. The wife arrives: "are you using power tools in the bedroom? I thought we agreed you wouldn't do that anymore?"

Finally out comes the rod. Still the up side is that I now have plenty of room to move the head around. In fact I could put a couple more heads in if I wanted to. Glue it up scoop in the araldite and stand back.

Actually that doesn't look too bad at all. Time for a coffee. I don't know why I don't convert more of my figures.

simplicity

I was painting some English Civil War figures a week or so ago. They had lain unpainted in my box for some years. I can remember when I bought them being really impressed with them.
"Look at the detail on these" I enthused, " Look, Wow! this ones got a cheese sandwich in his pocket!"

I must confess to being less impressed when I came to paint them, and in fact they have gone back in the box half finished. I had done the clothing, equipment boots weapons and still had masses left to do. Frankly enthusiasm just ran out.

I contrast I was reading 'Flashman at the Charge' again last week when I suddenly felt the need for a fictitious 19C German unit. I had some old plastic ACW cavalry to hand and in a spirit of nostalgia got a scalpel and started carving at the hats. Two evenings later I had a unit of eight cavalry and I had really enjoyed myself in the process. To be honest I am not sure what the moral of this story is, I leave you to draw any conclusions you may wish.

May I recommend..

The Blasthofblog. This is a joint venture by four enthusiasts to celebrate the Wargames Classic, Charge.

http://blasthofblog.blogspot.com/

I have the great privilege to be collaborating with Steve Gill, Phil Olley and Stuart Asquith to produce a blog that will honour this great book. We hope to share, however faintly reflected, the magic that we have enjoyed.

I may add that it will have the bonus that since all posts will have at least some relevance to the book readers will be spared my opinionated rantings.

Please do visit and if you can leave a comment about your own experience of Charge it will be greatly appreciated.