Basing Baccus Pike

After the paint has dried it is on with the final jobs to get these Scot's pike based up and finished...

Plasticard, something Ian uses. I quickly found out why, it's cheap and it's versatile and makes great bases for 6mm figures.

 Mark out the base size, my pike will be based for Principles Of War renaissance so I need a 30 x 90mm base



 Cut out the base (the plasticard only needs scoring and you can snap out the shape with just a few light cuts) and then paint it. I have used burnt umber which matches the bases of the pike.

 

 Pike... roughly arranged as they will be on their final resting place. This helps me visualize how they will look on the base

 

 

 Some slight modification needed now.... the Baccus strips are 20mm wide but my base is 30mm so I have had to cut 9 strips in half so as to make up the extra 10mm

 I now arrange the pike on their base in preparation for fixing

 I wanted to fill the base so went with 9 strips deep

 The pike are attached using superglue

 The half bases are added on to the line afterwards

 All pike glued firmly in place

 Some further work is needed to tidy up the edges

 The strips were so much more forgiving to use than my Heroics & Ros Swiss pike.

I think what I am saying is I am just plain lazy! but life is short..

 

 

 You can see the right hand edges of the bases stick out, I had to trim these down using a Stanley knife to tidy them up.

 On to the next stage now the pike are glued, below I have liberally applied a PVA/Wood Glue mix that I have in a jar. The entire base is then dipped in a sharp sand mix which is very cheap way of basing your models. You pick up a bag from a builders merchant for under a fiver and this will last you a lifetime. I bake the sand in the oven for 40 mins gas mark 6 as this removes any impurities in the sand. The mix is sieved and then I siphon off the larger grains to use as rocks.

 Leave to dry or cheat by placing on a radiator!

 Now it's time to introduce one of my favourite tools, Winsor & Newton nut brown artist ink.

 

 The ink is applied direct from the bottle to the now dry base

 Again I cheated and speeded up the dry time on the radiator. It's now time to dry brush the base to get the earthy effect that I tend to like. Starting with mahogany brown as the first dry brush.

 Quickly move on to the next colour which is orange brown

 Another dry brush is applied this time it's Vallejo golden brown

 And then sand....

 And finally yellow sand for the top highlight

 I always paint in the edges of the base to tidy up the dry brushing. A nice dark brown does the trick.

 Let the paint thoroughly dry before the final job, the flock.

Using the PVA/Wood Glue mix  I apply random areas of glue to the base. This will represent the grass on the finished unit.

 Baccus 6mm grass flock. I won't use other makes because the grass is too long. Baccus sell this 6mm grass for six quid a bag which has been cut down to make look right on 6mm model bases

 Again the entire base is covered in flock and then flicked to remove the surplus grass.

I always apply a second coat just to cover the glue

Here are some photos of the finished unit now ready to take it's place on the field of battle.

 

 I hope this and the previous post are some use, I have wanted to do a series of articles like this for some time but just never found the inspiration to do so, better late than never!

That's about it for the time on the Flodden Project, I wanted to get a unit finished so I had a reference to come back to in 2014 when I get stuck in to the project properly.

On the workbench next it's my Heroics & Ros / Irregular 6mm 1914-1915 British Army and Ian's Landschnekt pikes to finish.

Cheers

Russ