The Walk Through: so let’s get straight into it with some photos followed by my comments.
1. The promotional pack came with a mixed selection of the different types of sheets, one Fortress Stone Wall sheet, one sheet each of the plain 0.6, 2 and 3mm sheets and several sets of round and square section strips.
The sheets are 200mm by 120mm.
2. Having a fairly limited supply of the material to hand I wanted to make a building that tested the various properties of the material, but was also a finished piece in itself.
I decided some kind of watchtower built on top of a ruin would be the simplest way to go so I took the Fortress Stone sheet and cut a section off that I could bend around a tube, to represent either a large chimney or a round-tower on the side of a house.
3. One of the interesting properties of Reddiprene38 is that it can be heat and curved/bent about and once cooled it will retain the shape it has cooled in. I decided to bend the sheet around a fairly small diameter card tube (going for the chimney effect). Heating the sheet with my wife’s hairdryer, it soon became fairly malleable and I pulled the sheet around the tube. I am used to working with hot material (I do a bit of welding and silver soldering from time to time), but even so I would recommend a good pair of gloves if you are working this sheet by hand. In my case I used oven gloves and although they worked fine they did make it a little difficult to handle the job.
4. The problem with the 4mm thick Fortress Stone sheet was that it retained too much of its springiness and I was unable to get the sheet to form a complete circle. This, I think was down to my lack of experience with it rather than the fault of the material itself. I think I simply tried to push it beyond its limits. A larger diameter tube would probably have worked better, or maybe I should have used one of the thinner plain sheets.
5. Anyway, I then modified my design and glued a flat piece of sheet in the back to use as an interior wall.
One of my main concerns about the Reddiprene38 was how well it would glue. After visiting the website I was aware that Modelscenery.com recommend using superglue to glue it together. Most wargamers I know have a love/hate relationship with superglue, and although it is commonly used for metal miniatures, I certainly prefer to use plastic cement (dichloromethane based adhesives) when constructing this type of model, which I traditionally would build with plasticard (polystyrene sheet). I was pleasantly at how well the Reddiprene38 sticks with superglue. Simply put, this stuff sticks almost as well as human skin does (again I am sure most of us know how well superglue sticks human skin).
6. With about half the sheet of Fortress Stone left, I had to be quite frugal in the design of the rest of my planned ruin, so I cut along the lines of the brickwork to create the two walls for the building. Using a new scalpel blade the material cut very easily, being only marginally harder than a knife through butter.
7. I shaved off the edges of the curved wall so that I could attach the wall sections at 90 degrees to each other and again found that the superglue worked very well.
8. Next I added a section of first story flooring. I the plain 3mm sheet to the shape I wanted.
9. I then scored the sheet with the scalpel to give it a wood grain effect. Finally I cut a series of parallel V shaped grooves to give the impression of separate floor boards. Normally I would spend a little more time getting the wood grain a little more even, but I wanted to finish this model quite quickly and I planned on adding plenty of detritus lying over the ruin anyway.
10. Next I used some of the square section strip to make joists. The Reddiprene38 strips are supplied in sheets that are held together with very thin joins that are easily parted by lightly running the scalpel down the join.
12. First Floor glued in place.
13. Next I moved on to the actual watchtower platform, which was to be a jerry rigged platform added to the top of the ruined house. I cut a piece of sheet for the floor in the same way as I did in No.9, then I moved on to making some rough fencing to go around three edges.
14. Platform in place!
15. At this point I glued the whole structure on to a base board (6mm MDF, sanded down around the edges and varnished for strength and damp resistance) and moved on to some final detailing.
16. Firstly I added a tiled floor, using the 0.6mm plain sheet I scored a chequered pattern into it and stuck it to the base board. I had planned to put a fireplace on the back wall, but as I had not cut a hole in the wall I decided to doors on the wall instead. I constructed the doors and door frames using strips cut from the plain sheets.
I also added some piles of rubble around the base of the collapsed walls. I kept the rubble to a minimum, both to allow figures to stand around the model easily, and also because I only had a small part of the Fortress Stone Wall sheet left, that limited what I could do.
17. The last pieces of detailing were to add a drain pipe down the outside of the building and a short cast iron railing. To build the railing I drilled a series of holes in two strips of Reddiprene38. This was the least successful part of the model, anyone who has tried to drill rubber will know it is very difficult to get clean hole. The best I can say about the result was that it looked like a ruined railing. I also added a couple of ladders to access the first floor and the watch platform.
Conclusion: Reddiprene38 is certainly an interesting material to work with. It glues surprisingly well with superglue and is very easy to cut. My attempt at heat forming was not too successful, but I think with further experimenting I could achieve better results.
The finished model seems very sturdy and should easily stand up to regular use on a wargames table.
I must admit I would be very interested to try a larger project with Reddiprene38. The different types of sheet available include flag stones, roof tiles and a very nice looking medieval doors and windows set. My only concern is with the price. The embossed sheets are fairly expensive considering you only get two sheets (200mm by 120mm). It could work out really quite expensive to build a larger model.
Personally, I think I would probably go back to using plasticard, balsawood and foamboard, as they offer more variety in my model-making, however, Reddiprene38 certainly adds something new to my supply of materials.
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