The Middle Earth Bug.

The lead Rot Cure!

 Well over Christmas I pulled out my trusty old toothbrush and set to work trying to fix my lead rot problem.
 I first brushed all of the affected figures down, I did this over a sink so I could see just what was coming off them, turned out quite a lot. Poor old Mengal Manhide gets a good scrubbing to remove the 'rusting' lead.

 The moment of truth, After mixing a small pot of mineral oil and pure turpentine (50/50 mix) I dipped the figure into it. I only made a small pot as a kind of tester. It turns out it's all I needed to do the whole lot.

 The dipped figure went a nice deep tone and already looked a lot better. Once wiped over it looked even more healthy.

 The dipped figures were then placed into a cardboard hospital to dry.

 Old night elf before.

 Old night elf after.

 It was interesting to note the difference between the before and after of the process, the mini's did look better after a dip.

 I even gave the very worst affected a dip and I have to say he is probably savable now. After a good paint job he will be able to limp back onto a battlefield.

 Everyone relaxing in the hospital after the op. Some will be scared for life and others are less noticeable.

Here is a close up of the medical team.

 So far so good, the figures look much better for their dip and as far as I can see the rot has been stopped. I will keep an eye on the figures in the future just in case, but I am quite confident the problem has been sorted. If anything happens I will update you.

 She elf takes the plunge.

 Another look at the worst affected figure and his result after dipping.

Early Saxon Reference

Early Saxon Reference

Just some quick reference pictures taken from the inter-net. Researching new eras is really fun and can be full of surprises. I am amazed at the range of colours used and the bright spear shafts will be a nice touch to my rather drab army.

Arthur takes a break

The Warlord Arthur takes a break and enjoys a squirrel lunch, times are hard...

Making Early Saxons from Old

 West Wind Saxon heads really come into their own when trying to re age these figures.

 Since taking these pictures I have sculpted furs and cloaks. Nothing says early Saxons more than a cloak and some fur on the shoulders. I think it sets them apart from the later look, something tells me I will be going crazy with the green stuff.

 Here are some of my old painted Essex minis, the bare headed ones are fine but the nasal helmet guys will have to be changed.

A large base with around twelve figures on it, I intend to use Footsore miniatures for the leaders and command as they are some of the best sculpts on the market. My old Saxon figures will back these up.

Sutton WHO?

Early Saxons

This new year I have been playing around with getting a base of Early Saxons painted up for Dux Bellorum. I have around a hundred old Saxon figures from Essex Miniatures I painted back in 1998. A lot of these figures are for a late Saxon ( Hastings) range but can be easily used for early stuff too. I have bought some extra heads from west wind productions and I'm in the middle of cutting off the nasal helmets and replacing them with earlier designs. Single heads are great for conversion work and West wind do a nice range, they will come into their own now there are lots of plastic ranges to play around with.
 Anyway, I thought I would give you all a heads up as I have been sitting on these old Saxon figures for a while with no chance of using them. I did use them once many years ago in the Roman campaign as Germans, but that was the only time.

I'm not going to stress out about painting another army with these guys, I've given myself the task of doing one base (one war band). This way I won't start feeling bad when other projects start to mount up. I see this as a very long on going project I can dip in and out of when the mood takes me. It's nice to revamp the old figures and get them into units I will use.

One of the main pulls for this project is the chance to do a large unit on a single 120mm x 80mm base. I had planned to do the units on the standard 120 x 60 bases but looking at them it didn't give me enough space. I'll do one and we'll see how it turns out.