Wraithknight wraithcannon conversions

Damn I hate when you accidentally delete something... but here it goes again... Wraithcannon conversion attempt number 2 :)

I love the wraithknight model but it's pose was a bit static so I wanted to reorient the pose so it was a bit more dynamic. As a result there was a need to change how the model carried it's weapons. Now given that I was also never a big fan of the 2 weapon pose on smaller eldar tightens (those massively long guns look cumbersome) I decided to go for a double barelled look.

I achieved the end state that I wanted in the following way.

first step was to decide that I was going to add the double barrel to the left arm as the model is leaning back away from it ... looking like he is firing from the hip on the move.

I roughed the below together with some bluetack. as a design - bluetack is your superfriend when doing hefty conversions I find.

So starting components for this was to add the mounting block on the lower arm (this is designed to hold the "targeter" weapon for the sun cannon I think) that gave me a very flat even surface to work from.

I then took the 2 weapon bodies and clipped / sanded away the rib for mounting on the arm. I then aligned both blocks together and pinned them for some extra rigidity. Spend the time here to make sure they are perfectly aligned. Putting the long barrels in the square sockets helps get this spot on but note that the barrels themselves sit slightly different in the the 2 mounting blocks so be careful... I had to slightly cut the blocks to make them match perfectly and I think it was a sprue based difference ... only slight but enough to throw you off. 

On each of the blocks you can see a little dimple where the vambrace components are designed to sit. I attached the mounting block directly over the "outside" cannon body. I just thought this offset look worked better.  You can see the alignment I chose in fig 1 below. 

Fig 1 the assembled weapon mount

You can also see in Fig 1  that I still managed to mount the vambraces. One side fits as nomal and the bottom of the outside vambrace is also fine. The top side outer vambrace had to be cut to fit slightly but it glued to the mounting block / arm perfectly when clipped back at the right angles.

Fig 2 and Fig 3 below show the fully assembled arm on the

Fig 2

Fig 3 underside of complete cannon

Fig 4 below shows the 2 cannon barrels. I left these removable as allows me to swap in the Suncannon if needs be. To do that effectively and to ensure better alignment on the barrels you can just about see that the vanes are glued together between the 2 barrels. You can achieve this pretty easily as one vane set on each barrel  aligns to a horizontal plane (you will need to rotate a few times in the square hole to get the alignment spot on. Then Ijust slightly clippe both the tips of the inner and outer vane. Glued them together and used an activator to get a good strong bond. This gives much better rigidity and makes it easy to swap out the barrels.

Fig 3 Cannon barrels

Ultimately I was left with an orientation as below. I love the look and am really looking forward to adding some finishing touches to the models design and orientation including pinned arm swaps and pennants. 

Thats it for now folks but would love to hear your comments.

Expect to see this guy on the table for a battle report soon.

Heading set for wraithgate 2-7-alpha to Menshaimesh

Wraithknight conversion and assembly

Having purchased a wraithknight I was super keen to get stuck in. As everyone knows this is a huge (and expensive ) model so doing conversion work on it is a little daunting but I love converting so....
I tried to do 2 things.

1. Repose the legs to a more dramatic pose ( decide on a juke or sidestep look)

2. To double barrel the wraithcannon as with a fast moving look the 2 big cannons looked clumsy

A 3rd goal of weapon swaps I have not achieved yet but bare with me. So let's start with the legs in this post

One leg is heavy and strong enough for support. I assembled and pinned that leg as designed to keep it simple and added 2 pins to ensure no rotation around an axis

In terms of advice on how to approach a leg conversion.... Firstly attach the hip connector to the upper leg not the pelvis.  I would then suggest cutting off the block at the top of the leg hip joint and then gluing that square strongly in the square hole in the pelvis. This can then be easily drilled and pinned.

This first stage allows the rotation you need to position the upper leg as you want.

The second step is positioning the knee joint. The knee piece itself has plastic pins. You can cut the lower pin off and this allows some rotation on the lower leg. If you want to go for a dramatic leg bend then you will need to trim the top of the leg back somewhat. Just use plenty of blue tack to get your positioning right before commiting the scalpal!

Once positioned just glue it up the way that you want. Given that I have positioned my right leg just off the ground i may pin that too but likely just a single pin. This also means the right leg provides some stability to the model but I was very termpted to go a little higher (I still might as I haven't glued the pinned leg yet!)

Once your legs are right spend time on the torso angles. Not a lot of flexibility here but just keep it simple and use the limited forward back and side to side rotation you do have.

Photos below give you a good idea of the work in progress.

Comments welcome :)