The Mysterious Cases of 200 Shells

Entry posted by KH1 November 23, 2017

837 views

Actually the only mysterious thing about this case is why I am so mad to have started this in the first place! My search for new wagon loads has led me to loose another four days modelling time in the pursuit of realism misguided or not. This particular one is one that will actually go the other way to usual being spent artillery shell cases which were collected whenever possible and sent back for reuse. Before anyone gets too picky I must point out that they are not of any particular caliber, the dimensions being dictated by the raw materials.

I have been pondering this load for some time and have turned up some particularly nice shell cases on the lathe but the time taken and indeed cost of the brass completely ruled out this approach. I did consider casting from these but the wall thickness was just too thin for my casting skills. Quite some time ago I experimented with some 3mm (actually 2.8) drinking straws but experiments with closing off the ends with tiny discs of paper or plasticard was just too fiddly. And then last Sunday afternoon my obviously under taxed brain suddenly realised the relationship between a BBQ skewer and the drinking straws and the game was afoot. Obviously not happy with just one brain wave that day I then employed what has turned out to be a very useful device that I bought last year intended for cutting brass tube. From a picture I worked out the diameter to length proportion of a shell and applied it to the straw so although it may be no caliber known to man it is in proportion to a real one. With the application of a sharp craft knife I soon had about 200 identical length small and fiddly tubes.

Having established that the skewer was a good fit in the straw I found that, in no fancy terms, shoving one up the bit of straw a couple of mm and then sawing it off again in the useful gadget was the best way forward. By working with five skewers at at a time and a straw on each end what could have been and unimaginably tedious task was turned into just a tedious task. Having done this two hundred times the next stage was painting. It was obvious each case would have to be primed and the good old Halfords grey spray was the obvious choice but how to hold them was not quite as obvious. Enter the third brainwave - Stickle Bricks! A quick ransack of now not so little Iz's toy box found me a couple of victims and the craft knife was taken to every other stickle and the result mounted on another block. Result a custom made spraying jig.

Having undercoated 16 at a go I then had to repeat the process for the final colour which was done with water colours and then a final wash with dirty grime. All very time consuming but done in small batches in between 'proper' work.

Next up was mounting them on a false floor with a coat of varnish to start followed by a dose of Astonish floor polish followed by dilute PVA followed by super glue for any that were still loose - can you tell why it took four days yet? During this a few cases were filled with bits of sawn off nail to provide something for the magnet stick to pick up on for easy removal . All the previous glueing steps took place in a spare wagon body with cling film acting as a prophylactic to aid removal.

So here you have four days spent on one wagon load! But I do think it looks pretty good.....