I've seen the future (and its dark)

This weekend I went for another proverbial arm sweep over the hobby desk and got started on a long held ambition: getting back into Dark Future (or maybe getting into Gaslands). I may have dropped the occasional hint of liking Mad Max (style) movies. For those who missed it: I like Mad Max (style) movies. My favorite used to be Mad Max 2: the Road Warrior, but Fury Road has left that one eating dust. Weather beaten, heavily modified and gun toting cars chasing each other through the skeletons of society. All that needs is a soundtrack by Slayer, but I digress...On to the hobby part, here's my first converted car for the project.

Vroooom!!!!!

To be quite honest, I don't know anything about cars (or really care). I drive mine stick (because of a national insanity revolving around driving stick). I know where the wheels are (should be) in relation to the roof and I can sometimes recall my car's brand. I can also nod like an expert while daydreaming when someone enthuses about cars in my vicinity. I still can't quite figure out what makes post apocalyptic driving so much more fun (to watch (from a distance (in a comfy chair))). A future where mankind has destroyed the planet's biosphere and sports gear toting bands of raiders fight over gasoline by driving circles around each other with the worst gas guzzling vehicles you can imagine. Is just idiotic and over the top....aaah I suddenly realize what makes it fun. This should work great as a setting for games.

Looking out of side windows is an overrated experience.

Back in eighties I remember Car Wars by Steve Jackson (the US Steve Jackson not the GW Steve Jackson). It was (if I recall correctly) mostly about arena fighting with combat cars. Dark Future by Games Workshop came (much) later. It improved on the concept by centering around laying down tracks of road on a table. You sped through a landscape, rolling for obstacles and in the meantime blasting away at your opponents cars and motorcycles. It had one of those 'everything went wrong but we still refine fuel' types backstory required for the setting. I also seem to remember the rules (as with most GW games) where quite off kilter. One side had all the advantage, the other just looked cool. It also had some expansions including miniatures on foot, but I missed all of those and I still can't quite fathom what use a pedestrian is in an 80mph car chase (except to test the bounciness of car hoods). These days there are quite a lot of variant 'wasting gasoline after the apocalypse'-style games out there. I ordered a copy of Gaslands as it looks like a rather nicely made game by people who like Mad Max a lot too (it even has a war rig style mission).

don't get me started on the almost cuts in my finger tops while shaving down the sides of plasticard on this scale.

Playing Dark Future these days either requires an antique box purchase or a bit of creativity. I prefer the latter. The game itself is in the 1:72 (20mm) scale. Or as normal people call it: the toy car scale. Meaning you can just pop over to a regular toy store, garage sale, second hand store or anywhere else toy cars are found and pick up the start of your road warrior gang. I bought a box of Hot Wheel cars, gave the ones I couldn't use to my son and set the others down on the 'dirty' side of my hobby area. I also visited a second hand store to pick up some more cars by Hot Wheels, Matchbox, Siku and other brands. I've also ordered a (hopefully properly scaled) gasoline truck, futuristic looking city bus and car transport trailer from a second hand seller online. I'll also need to keep my eyes open for pick-up style cars. I found none in the second hand store here. Maybe these are more prevalent in the US as (according to Hollywood) everyone drives either a pickup or an SUV over there, so the toy cars should reflect that ;). The car I've been showing so far is my first test piece. It affirms my suspicion that modeling for a Dark Future style game is extremely fun, takes a hell of a lot less time then building a Warhammer army, gives you an excuse to use left over bits, troll toy stores and just have some fun with something new.

Next time I think I'll try airbrushing on racing stripes, my hasty free hand is not quite as straight as I intended it to be.

I stripped a toy car and added two cut down lasguns as 'hood guns' on the hood. I used half a flamer to make the back look more interesting. A cut up paper clip was used for bars on the wind shield and some plasticard has been added to the side windows. I also glued the wheels down to stop it from rolling. The paint job was a quick and dirty mix of airbrushing and sponge stamping with a few added washes. I rounded of by varnishing with high gloss followed by mat. Varnishing is extremely important as the paint has quite a tenuous grip on the model.

With the quick and dirty description done, lets move back in time and go for a slightly longer form tutorial.

Welcome to my car park.

Here's my 'car park' with a mix of second hand and new cars, two caravans (people have to cook meth somewhere in the dystopia that's tomorrow) and a bunch of trucks (only the center one scales with the other cars). The car I painted is the blue one in the center of the bottom row. If you're feeling really lazy you can just start gaming at this point. For the rest of us, let's get the power tools out.

Toy cars, meet mr. Makita. Mr. Makita, do your thing.

The hardest part of the job is taking toy cars apart as (to my surprise) they tend to be riveted together. I used a spiral drill to drill the rivet away (hurting my hand somewhere in the process because I'm an idiot). Just stick the drill to the center of the rivet (take care not to slip and hurt your hand) and drill. We'll be gluing the cars back together later so the damage is of no concern.

Welcome to my junk yard. 

After the car has been taken apart you can marvel at the fact that these things actually have quite a bit of detail on the inside. The caravan on top even has a stove and sink modeled in! Unfortunately no Walter White miniature was found. I took the picture above to keep track of which bits went with which car.

Off into the biostrip with you lot!

Next up was a little bath in Biostrip-20. I covered the cars completely (after taken the picture above) and left them in their chemical soup for about four hours.

I had not dared hope the Biostrip-20 would work so well on these cars.

All it took next was a toothbrush scrub under a running tab and the toy cars are completely clean. I let the wheels, carriage and other (unpainted) plastic bits marinade in a bowl filled with washing up liquid and water. After cleaning the metal bodies of paint I threw these in this mix too. No matter what you're trying to paint, a quick soak against the finger grease and dust is always a good idea.

(Semi)Pro-tip #1: always wash whatever you want to paint with some washing up liquid first (and let it dry). It stops paint from flaking off later.

After the soak I used the old toothbrush again to clean everything under a running tab (wearing gloves). Then you get to the fun part. I'm not burdened (or bothered) by game rulesets. So I can just convert away by taking bits from my overlarge bitsbox and gluing them in place. When it comes to playing, I'll just proxy the hell out of it. Unfortunately I've managed to forget (once again) to take 'in progress' pictures of the car above. So here's two other cars I'm working on.

Armor of the future: paperclips and screen door.

Once again it's a mix of plasticard, paperclip and bits from a cut up lasrifle, a plasma gun the old screen door that got damaged and flamers. I keep the top, windshields (where present) and body of the cars separate until after painting. This makes it possible to paint the car's interior (black in the case of my test piece) and paint the windshields from the inside.

Not knowing anything about engines helps inform conversions (I hope).

The only challenge right now is to find a few drivers to add to the open vehicles. I've already placed a small order at Ramshackle games for a biker gang and some upgrade bits and I've been scouring the internet for more. The biggest challenge is getting the parts to me before this obsession wanes and the Skaven sneak up on me again ;).

(Semi)Pro-tip #2: always buy 'art of' style books when they are not collector's items yet. You may want to peruse them for inspiration.

In the meantime I have to admit this is more fun then expected, and I haven't even tried the game yet. On a side-note my three year old has taken me aside and, while giving me a very stern look, told me: "Dad, you are not allowed to drill holes in my cars." I consider myself warned....