Thursday, July 7, 2022

Custom magnetized accessories for Astra Militarum tanks

In the current Astra Militarum codex, any tank can take items from the 'Vehicle equipment list' - augur array, dozer blade, hunter-killer missile - but only the Chimera kit has these items. Since I have 2 Chimeras and 2 Leman Russ tanks, I decided on converting these items so that any or all of my tanks could equip them.

Augur array

This one is simple enough, I had extra guardsmen bits so I just used two extra vox casters. Drilled out the holes for magnets, make sure to watch for the polarity.

Hunter killer missile

The launchpad is pretty simple - sprue cut to size and magnetized.

For the missiles, I have some resin missiles from GreenStuffWorld. They are way too small, so I extended them with 3mm plasticard rods. Drill out the rods for the magnets.

Pin the warheads, just in case. We are gluing resin to plasticard after all.

Superglue in the magnets as well as the warheads.

Dozer blade

This has two components, the actual dozer blade and the armature that holds it. I had no idea how to do the armature, green stuff or milliput seemed to fragile for the task. So I took these extra Chimera back doors (the bits go on the inside, I have no use for them) which are about the right size. I glued on magnets where the dozer blade armature would join the hull. I cut off some of the lip so they won't wobble on the raised lines on the underside of the hull.


Dryfit the dozer blade to the mounted armature. It is way too close to the Chimera tracks, whereas it would be a comfortable fit on the Russ. As a result, I made it fit the Chimeras.


As a first step, mix up some green stuff and connect the pieces such that they fit comfortably.

Reinforce with plenty of superglue.

Cover up the green stuff worms with plasticard.

I just glued on these first pieces using superglue, and it looks pretty flimsy.

So I filled out the voids with green stuff.

Press on small pieces of plasticard.

Like so.



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