Here’s my home made Chaos Dwarf Earth Shaker Cannon Work-In-Progress.
I built this using the two white plastic rings which came from a styrene sprue runner. I can’t remeber what was on the runner in the rings, but the rings remained.
Once the rings were cut from the sprue and reshaped, I then cut and rolled a flat piece of sheet styrene, placed it between the two rings and glued it in place. It was at this point I discovered that the two rings were different sizes, therefore the cannon tapers.
The cannon was then “Skined” with Plastruct HO scale roof tiles, making sure that all the curved edges of the tiles pointed forward.
The outer A frame was built using 1/8"x1/8" square beams cut at a 45% angle.
The front ring of the cannon was cut to shape and drilled open using a 3/8" hole cutter drill.
The end of the cannon is a front nacelle cap from an old AMT U.S.S. Enterprise model kit that I cut down so that only the ball and inital taper remained. Without measuring and by total fluke, it turned out to be the perfect fit for my cannon.
More details will be added including a set of working gears so that I can position the angle of the cannon by turning the gear crank.
Crew will be a problem. I ran out of Dwarf mini’s. Someone said they were going to give me their BFSP Dwarfs as they were not going to use them, so hopefully they can do that soon. Otherwise I might just temporarilly man this with “Good Dwarfs”.
Wheels are actually part of the equation. The CD's need some way to bring it onto battle. I was going to make a base for the A-Arms and then use some Cragar 5 star mag wheels from a 1964 Chevy Impala model kit. HEY! you need style, right? :D
Here’s the cannon with the inner barrel attached. I also added the gears from an old tape cassette recorder so that I could position the cannon by turning a crank.
The back end of the cannon. A Chaos Maurauder shield acts as a loading door and a model train break wheel acts as the opening mechanism for that door.
The primered cannon just after I sprayed it. The paint is still wet in this photo. Note the Dwarf Buckler Shield on the side of the barrel. I used them for spacers between the gears and A arms.
The two gear mechanism for adjusting the barrel height. Both gears are from the broken Cassette Deck.
The reverse side of the mechanism. Note the crossed bone adjustment wheel. This was taken from an old Vampire Counts shield decoration.
There’s still alot to do on it though. The Cannon Barrel and A arms are finished from a model point of view, but I still have to mount it on a mobile base so that the CD’s can push it into battle. But with the cannon still in wet paint, I can’t start work on the base. I need the cannon to space it correctly.
I really like your gun and I’d like to give a couple of suggestions: add rivits to the carriage, a little touch that add a lot of realism to the model.
Join the two parts of the carriage with a couple of transversal bars (four would be optimal) to give the idea of a solid and sturdy carriage.
You can lay it on the ground or give wheels, as you prefer. If you go the wheel way, I’d suggest you 6 wheels in total, it looks very heavy!
Could you place a dwarf next to the beast to see how large it is?
I like the idea of a platform but, sorry to tell you, I do not like the Plastruct sheet: it’s too tech! It’s a fantasy army, not 40k. I would be better if you left bars of metal or, if you preferred a platform, wooden panels.
As Scotty said to McCoy in Star Trek 4 when McCoy asked Scotty about him giving the secret of transperant Aluminum to the owner of the Plexiglass factory -
“How do ya know this isn’t the guy who invented it?”
Yes, the gears work. I have the model painted up and “Finished” with exception to crew. I ran out of Dwarf models, but one of my customers is giving me his BFSP Dwarfs sometime soon and those guys should be able to handle it…with a little conversion.
Ok, here’s the finished Earthshaker Cannon. I still have to find crew for it, but for now, one of my Death Rocket crew will show you how it works.
The working gears in action. They are strong enough to keep the cannon in this position (or any other) by turning the hand crank.
The barrel has a brass outer housing and the rear of the cannon is copper plated to help with cooling as copper takes more heat to melt than Cast Iron.
The awesome Earth Shaker firing a deadly shell.
The Chaos Dwarf weaponsmith standing beside the mighty cannon.
Wow, a working gear, this has got to be the ultimate torture for any opponent, to see the barrel being adjusted to fire the next round.
The barrel has a brass outer housing and the rear of the cannon is copper plated to help with cooling as copper takes more heat to melt than Cast Iron.
Tarrakk Blackhand
Are you sure? Because Wikipedia states that Copper has a melting point of 1084.62°C while cast iron has one of 1150-1200°C depending on the alloy composition.
I just had to look this up, but I find your thinking behind the painting of the model awesome nonetheless. :hat off
