Skaven Doomwheel; completed

When last we looked at the progress on the Skaven doom-wheel I had painted the two large wheels, but had not pulled anything together.

I was desperate to create the impression that this machine was not only travelling at considerable speed, but was also a little out of control!

The original idea was to have the wheel flying through the air after climbing a take off ramp in the form of a shield of a terrified opponent.

However, when I started building this together it was obvious that the base was never going to be big enough to let this arrangement fit on the base and enable it to be used in a game. The wheel would simply just hang off the base far too far.  I changed it to have the wheel hitting rocks and bouncing into the air, but now it is assembled it looks like the Engineer is trying to pull a wheelie, which is much cooler and doomwheel like...

A whole was drilled into the smaller wheel, which then sits on a paperclip, which passes through the base and loops on its underside. You can see the top of the paperclip projecting upwards through the rocks on this photo of the unpainted base.

I originally started painting the rat that came with the model as its assistant driver, but I was just not happy with the look of the model. It was just far too static for a fast moving model like the doomwheel.

 I would much rather have this rat hanging on for dear life. This meant that I had to make a rat from scratch. To achieve this I took the body of a night goblin and added a right arm, tail and two legs off the clan rat sprue. 

The right arm is  that of a goblin archer, with half a bow.

The flag was attached last, just before I mounted the assembly onto its base. It was a little rushed because I was hoping to take it to tournament the next day. Accordingly I am not that pleased with it and I may have to go back one day to revise this..

The intention was create the look of speed and to reflect the crazy - devil may care nature of the Engineer and remainder of the crew. I believe that I have achieved this, I hope you do too.

Skaven Doomwheel on the workbench

I painted so much so fast in May that I needed some time away from the brush and daylight bulbs. It has been a couple of weeks since my last post and I guess it is now time to climb back on the wagon. But whilst I am doing so......


I recently put together a Skaven doomwheel as part of my Skaven army for the Legionary show. I had such fun, I thought I would share the experience.

I chose to only part assemble the model before painting so that I could get the brush to all those hard to reach places.

These were then base coated black and the wood painted with scorched brown followed by a dry brush of bestial brown and vomit brown. I then carefully painted the raised areas of the timbers near the edges with fortress grey.

I chose to then wash each plank with a different wash, including red and purple, to create some variety. The grey was then re-applied. 

I managed to drop the center piece whilst painting this, which broke off a length of the cable. This I had to replace with a length of guitar wire. See if you can spot where it is..

A little later and the centre is painted..

I put some work into the centre bit and the crazy skaven pilot of the doomwheel. The eye looks a bit strange when viewed in this shot, but since you will never see him from this angle when the outer wheels are added. The guys fabric colour matched the remainder of the arm, but I just knew he had to have a leather hat and gauntlets. It just felt right.

 There is a lot of bronze in this section, but it does not get over powering too much.

Next up I assemble him..