Building the dreaded Warhammer Townscape watermill

Hobby-wise this was a very productive weekend. I continued my Warhammer Townscape project and managed to complete numbers 3, 4, 5 and 6. To wit: the large house, watermill, wooden bridge and shack. Usually I select a few pictures and start rambling. This time my pre-selection stands at 48. Lets just treat this post as a sort of 'scratch building wargaming buildings tutorial and tips' style article. To start off here's my completed work so far.

This project is getting out of hand...

Now I'll time warp a bit. My plan is to scratch build all buildings in the Townscape book published by GW at the end of the eighties (check my previous post for more details). To make it interesting I'm building them as numbered in the assembly instructions. Previously I build the farmhouse (1) and the Gatehouse (2). They're the primed buildings in the picture above. This weekend it was time for building number 3, the Large House and so on.

3. Large house
According to the Townscape book "The large house is one simple box section." It does not mention all the windows in this box (as these were pre-printed on cardboard this wasn't an issue for people assembling those buildings). This house has too many windows and two doors. One of the doors has a slightly fancy sunken down look to it. I tried to copy this by retaining the foamboard cutout for the door and gluing it back in with a slight off-set.

Every once in a while having random crazy tools like the wooden template above is a nice thing.

The original drawing has a bit of an Arabian Nights style door. I used the wooden template for gothic windows in the picture above to make an interesting not-round or square door. Not quite Arabian Nights but it should look ok. I glued strips of balsa wood together and used them to fill the door inlay.

Good enough (I hope).

Next up I decided to go for a round door handle. That's a simple matter of taking reasonably bendy metal wire and folding a bit around a cocktail stick.

Do not use paperclips for this trick, those are not bendy enough (to my taste at least).

Next I take my diagonal cutting pliers (cheers @Lasgunpacker) to cut out the circle, using needle nose pliers to push the little ring together again.

One ring to bind them...oh wait no its another kind of ring.

Just add it to the door using a cocktail stick, some PVA and a lot of cursing and muttering.

This is a door we can actually try to open. Now where is the house?

I used a bit of instant filler to cover the door frame before adding the door.

Next step glop on some PVA.

Lets finish off with a quick shot of the mayhem that is my work area.

What a mess....

Before adding windows to the large house I first used instant filler again to get a texture on the walls. This building is partly covered with wood siding. I went for the coffee stirrers. I cut the rounded side off the bottom and leave the top long. After the glue has dried I can cut these to size using my diagonal cutters.

Plastering foamboard is a skill and I get a lot of chances to practice it right now.

Plastering the walls.

In a pinch not cutting these to size would do as the basis for a rough Orc/Orruk palisade.

After the wooden siding was added all that was left to do was adding shingles to the rooftop. This (and cutting the siding to size) had to wait so I got started on the watermill first. For sanity's sake I'll stick to the large house for now (in other words: don't get distracted by bits of watermill in the background, I'll get to it).

I always try to add some random detail with doodads from the bits box.

One of the more annoying things about this project is making windows. Doors I can live with, they're fun, easy and few. Windows seem to be endless on these buildings. Here's a shot of three windows (and the back door) of the large house. As opposed to the previous two buildings I now just stick a bit of cardboard into the house, draw the frame with my pencil and then make a windows that is slightly smaller. I can then add wood and carpet underlay on a flat surface, making my life a lot easier.

Large house, side one.

Here's the large house with shingles, doors and windows added. I made a small shutter on the first floor to stop myself going window-crazy. The (pointless) nob at the front is the head of a pin.

Large house, side two.

And here's the other side of the large house. This one is almost ready for paint (it just needed a final coat of PVA on the rooftop. Lets move on.

The 'dreaded' watermill 
The watermill is one of the coolest buildings in the entire Townscape book. It's also one of the most complicated buildings, giving it a bit of a reputation. I decided to just go for it. Starting off with the small bridge on the side of the building.

Incidentally I'm listening to Gardens of the Moon during construction. All this talk about Bridge Burners and there I am building one, almost seems futile. 

At first I followd the cardboard version of this bridge, skipping one of the four triangles on the sides. This makes it very hard to fit a deck, so I decided to change plans according to my working medium (foamboard).

I'm eating through my supply of thin cardboard from boxes right now. 

I made the top of the bridge out of foamboard. The sides are pinned down thin cardboard (probably a tea box although no thin cardboard is going into the recycling bin in my house right now). I choose cardboard over foamboard because it is flat, making it easier to follow the contours of the triangles. If I used 5mm foamboard for this bit I'd have to cut down the sides like I did with the top part here.

Working with foamboard, the slow and tortuous way.

The advantage of this technique is that you get no ugly sides on a construction. In case of the top of the bridge on the picture above I mad sure the top wasn't too high. When you use this for a triangular shape you have to cut down an angle at the top as well. That's a lot of work you don't have to put in with cardboard. After the cardboard is covered with plaster and PVA it will be solid enough to survive a good game.

I did not quite perfectly cut out that circle, but its good enough.

The most important part of the watermill is the mill wheel itself. I started off cutting out two open circles to serve as a base to glue bits on. Step two (which should've been step one) consisted of checking what the watermill wheel actually should look like. Studying it, I thought the Townscape wheel did not look very convincing. It is closed up on the tops making it impossible to scoop water around. I did a quick check and found a nice site with a lot of Dutch watermills on it here. I used that for reference.

Four rough planks ready, eight more to go.

To start with I marked the bit of the wheel that will be underwater in black. I'll cut that off at some point. I cut bits of balsa wood in shape of the wheel to make planks on the side.

The trick to building industrial looking stuff is to add a lot of different sized elements. 

I used a small and a slightly larger plastic rod to make the central axle gluing straight bits of balsa to it to make the scoops for the water. To make it all look reasonably convincing I glued wood to both sides of the front cardboard circle. The back bit only got balsa on its front side as the back side will be quite close to the wall.

I used yet another doodad from the bits! No clue where I found this thing.

I found a plastic industrial looking wheel bit in my bitsbox and added it to the front.

Yes I took a few minutes to feel very satisfied with myself.

I finished up cutting the scoops down to size a bit and removing the bottom bit of the wheel.

I'm getting somewhere, time to add (a lot) more detail.

Next up I made a hole in the wall of the watermill buildings to see if it fit. This was starting to look ok. I did not make a lot of pictures of the construction of the rest of the building.

I should consider how to make some realistic looking horse droppings for this bridge.

As you can see on both pictures above I also added instant filler to the bridge. I used a bit of spare wood to track some wheel markings into the wet filler. On its own instant filler makes for a poor base for gaming (it will chip). But if you add enough PVA later it will become strong enough.

Cutting tiles from cardboard is an arduous task that I keep having to repeat.

Next I was back to sticking tiles on top of the roofs.

Getting creative with chimneys using pins.

I also decided to get creative with the chimneys in my Townscape. I already used the old pushpin trick from the 'How to make wargaming terrain' book by GW on a previous building. For this one I stuck four needles into the chimney.

No rain will disturb the hearth beneath this chimney.

I stuck a spare roof tile to the needles and another chimney was properly capped off.

Step 1: glob PVA on the project. Step 2: spread it out with a very wet (old) brush.

I thought the waterwheel looked a bit odd from the top. I added a cardboard ring to it, just to flesh it out a bit more. I think I'll paint that up like rusted metal to complete the look later on. As you can see by the picture above I also spent quite a lot of time adding windows and half timber beams to the building. On this house I put the instant filler on first, giving it the texture. I pressed the half timber beams (mostly prepared first) into the filler (with PVA to help them stick). This makes it a lot quicker and easier to add half-timber then my previous building where I applied the instant filler after gluing the timbers in place. The fat globs of PVA on the roof and (not spread out yet) on the bridge are there to seal everything in place.

I can't wait to add epoxy water to this building's base.

I decided to detail the bridge beneath the building with wooden beam instead of stone. It was quicker and easier to do and it looks quite nice (I think).

Sometimes I get a bit carried away adding detail to a random hole in the wall.

I also got so sick and tired of making windows I decided it was time to just make a small cargo door (with a crane included).

And another side of the building has had detail added to it.

I almost forgot to make the railing on the bridge. It looks rather crooked in this picture, but it is actually quite straight. I changed the windows here when I realized I had some old Mordheim windows I could use. I should probably hunt after a 3D printer file to print me more windows. That would save an enormous amount of time (assuming I can borrow (time on) a 3D printer somewhere.

I hope a bit of paint and maybe some posters stuck on later will help alleviate the boring look of this wall.

Here's a last shot of the watermill's rather shoddily build rear door. I think the original construction had this door on the wheel side of the mill, but I found that just look very odd. I will be basing this building so I can add some nice epoxy water effect to it later on. Mental note: make some modular river bits as well.

All basic bits for the bridge have been cut to size. 

The wooden bridge
I was not quite finished building this weekend. The watermill took up an inordinate amount of time. Luckily the wooden bridge looked easy enough. Except for the stone supports it rests on. I decided to make these a bit thicker for my bridge (3cm instead of the ~1.5cm in the orignal). First off I cut all the foamboard bits to size and cut out some thin cardboard at the proper length for the bridge (32.5 cm) and 6 cm wide (the bridge will be 7 cm wide).

I made a few simple boxes for the supports.

I started with two simple boxes made from 3mm foamboard. Next time I should add a central part to it so they stay more rigid while adding detail.

Green Stuff World texture rollers make life a lot easier.

I used cheap air dry clay and a Green Stuff World texture roller to make a Dutch brick pattern. After a few failed and messy experiments I cut a strip like the one above to the proper size to cover a bridge support.

Brick support, the easy side.

I carefully folded the textured clay around the support.

Brick support the slightly less easy to make side.

On the back where the ends of the strips meet I used a cocktail stick to hide the fold. The brick is a bit rounded around the corners but this will not be a big problem. The scale should distract and besides brick tends to wear off around the sides of a bridge and take this shape anyway (at least, that's what I tell myself ;).

The bottom of the bridge.

I glued and pinned the support columns to the cardboard strip. I covered this in PVA on the bottom and added a few coffee stirrers to make the sides more rigid.

I don't want to talk about the time spent cutting those wonderful stirrers to size. 

Next up I added a simple railing to the bridge and cut a hell of a lot of coffee stirrers to size.

That looks like a bridge. Now to defend it...

Now it was just a matter of covering the cardboard with PVA and sticking coffee stirrers to it. I added a couple of full size coffee stirrers to the top of the railing to give it a bit more of a finished look.

I added a clothespin to the railing after this picture to close the ugly gap there.

I like having uneven 'planks' on the bridge. It will give a bit more texture to the finished building. I will probably base this one as well. (And as I'm basing anyway I'll most likely base all other buildings as well).

Watered down PVA, its what keeps scratch build buildings together.

I covered the bridge in a generous dollop of watered down PVA to give the finished thing a bit of strength.

6. Shack 
By now Sunday was almost done and gone but I had a little bit of time left. Checking the Townscape assembly instructions my next building was the shack. As the book says: "This is a straightfoward small building and is ideal for practicing on before assembling a larger more complex building." Hmmm  maybe my 'lets start at one and work my way down'-idea wasn't all that bright. No matter.

Now for a quick and dirty build.

I quickly cut the sides of the building from spare bits and tried a new approach for the windows, I put 3mm foamboard in the 5mm cutouts. This is a nice approach, but next time I should texture the building first. That will save a lot of time cleaning out filler from the closed windows.

Adding the roof.

I used the last bit of ancient Land Raider box to make the roof.

Inadvertently using it for its intended purpose I filled an ugly looking gap between the roof and the side with instant filler.

Added filler to texture the sides. As with all other buildings I allow the filler to dry slightly before using a dry sponge to scrape excessive texture to size.

Another building, another door.

I decided I wanted a very rough door for the shed so I used different thickness bits of leftover wood to make it.

More wooden siding.

I stuck coffee stirrers to the top of the building to make the wooden siding.

Windows you say? Let me tell you about windows...

Added windows using bits of balsa and cut to even smaller size leftover bits of coffee stirrer.

Add a roof, cover it all in a blob of PVA, etc.

Then I cut the wooden siding to size without waiting for the glue to dry (bad idea, but I made it work). I added a few bits of cardboard and a metal ring to the door. Stuck on the roof and covered it in PVA.

And here we are...let's find out what a paint job will do for these.

And that brings me to the status of my Townscape so far. I finished 6 of 39 buildings including the dreaded watermill. I think I'll paint these six first to see how the new things I tried in the construction department hold up when paint is added to them. I'm also thinking of skipping the watchtower (21) and tower (35) as I never really liked the look of these two buildings. I'm also on the fence about the windmill (16). I already have a scratch built windmill and in all modesty I like my building more then the cardboard one. I might just rebase that one to fit with this set or if I'm going to build another windmill I'll use a classic dutch version as inspiration. But maybe I'll change my mind. We'll see.