Longhorns and Cowboys - and lunch, too.

Been a while since last post, busy in other areas of life - including some other miniatures stuff.  But getting back to work on miniatures stronger this year than in the last few years with a push on my Old West collection.

Head on shot of 96 longhorn cattle with four cowboys that have been painted for decades, from the long defunct Frontier range of figures - there are also six Frontier longhorns in the mix - all painted but likely to get some rework to be more like longhorns, and two other painted.  Notice the lariats (ropes) in the hand of the cowboy on the right front - all four have them in slightly different angles (my modifications - the positioning, not the lariats).

 The shot below shows the dead cattle at the rear of the herd.

 A reverse angle without the dead cattle.

 A shot of the herd without the cowboys.

 All 18 of the mounted cowboys.

 The six dead cowboys, the two dead longhorns, and four cows.  Also two destroyed wagons and one skeletal horse and one skeletal man.

 The 18 dismounted cowboys - the four painted ones are Frontier.

 The two chuck wagons and their horses on painting strips (just cardboard).  Why two?  Rival ranchers, of course.  Besides the longhorns, I have a bunch of other cattle that will allow additional herds, at least one will be Herefords and another black baldies.  I will also have some dairy herds.  Plenty of cattle to keep those cowboys busy - and to fill the pens in my stock yard I will be building, already have the fences.

Nothing to get particularly excited about - except forward progress.  And that is mildly exciting to me.  Most of the non-Frontier figures are from Peter Pig but a bunch of the longhorns are from Minifigs and Irregular Miniatures.  48 of the longhorns are Peter Pig and the two dead longhorns are Peter Pig, just with the stands cut off

Towns and Courthouse growing

A few random photographs of 41 buildings that progressed today if only in a small way.

At the far left are 14 houses and then moving closer various industrial buildings and finally at the far right and nearest the camera is the courthouse.  Opposite the courthouse is the train station and to its left is the freight house.  To the left of the courthouse is what will be the Catholic church and then to its left two more smaller churches.

A view from the farther end.

 A closer view of the courthouse, there will be four columns under the overhang in the center and the same on the other side.

The train station had a bit of an oops when I glued on the roof - it is slightly askew so I'll have to work around that when finishing the building.

The buildings on the right might be some more houses.  Need lots of houses.  Or they might be small businesses.

These represent my scratch built - in process - peaked roof buildings.  There are quite a few flat roofed false fronts in a similar state: assembled and ready for detailing and painting and signs where appropriate.  

Some of the buildings have glued together box walls but most of them have solid wood under-stories as it were cut from either 2x3 or 2x4 dimensional lumber and run through a table saw to get them to correct height and width, also to square them up.  The challenge is doing 41 in a single day means a few minor issues arose such as a couple of roofs a little tweaked but, again, a little effort in further parts of the process should yield improved results.

I did pull out some of my resin buildings to guide size choices.  Quite a difference when placing the Peter Pig Old West saloon next to the Bluemoon Old West saloon - the latter completely dwarfs the former.  Also have quite a few Stone Mountain resin buildings and a few others of swap meet origin and some stone cast buildings of similar provenance.  All will find a place within my three towns:

Anachronism will be the cow town and and jumping off point where cattle are driven to be loaded on train cars to head east for slaughter and populous markets.  It will also be the last stop before wagon trains head west for Oregon Territory or supply trains head towards the southwest.

Lodgepole Creek will be the boom town and end of track invading the territory of the northern plains tribes.

And Alkali Wells will be the southwest town battling to survive within Apacheria.

I haven't done a careful tally but I can estimate there will be about 160 buildings, if not more, for the three towns.  I just might have at least 5 civilians for each building.  That's a lot of civilians!

Update

After losing access to most of my blogs for unknown reasons, seems to have gotten sorted out so I can post updates now.  Only 'big' news here is that all 120 buffalo are now painted as are all 36 pronghorn antelope.  However, they still await the texturing of the bases.  And no photos at the moment but I thought a little note will show this blog hasn't gone into a permanent dormant status.

An image for inspiration

Just a photo I took in Carson, Nevada, just before July 4, 2017.  I was at the museum there where many Virginia & Truckee bits of equipment are on display.  This, however, isn't a V&T engine.  But a really pretty engine for painting inspiration.  And detailing, too.

Progress, if modest, is still progress

Managed to get eight more pieces of rolling stock moving forward today - all five remaining passenger pieces and the three modified cabooses.  Tomorrow will see the two part epoxy put to use to glue the wheel sets to the bases of the resin bodies and, once dry, out comes the gray primer.

And most of the earlier gray primer-ed pieces are no longer gray.  The passenger equipment is in a two tone scheme with a third color for the undercarriage, a creme color above a palish brown.  The box cars are all painted a dark reddish brown.  And the three flat cars are a third brown color with the undercarriage matching all the others with the same color as the box cars.  And all of the locomotives and tenders are now a nice flat black.   Only the drover's caboose remains in its primer gray coat.  I figure to paint all four cabooses at the same time in the same scheme.

Doubt I'll get to the tank cars, gondolas, or stock cars tomorrow but maybe progress before the end of the year.  November is problematic because of a miniatures convention and a model railroad show and, of course, the big holiday here in the states.

Sorry, no time for photos yet but there will be photos at some point.

With the new roof done, only a couple of doors left on the bathroom remodels to go and the changing weather, I'm hoping to make some real progress over winter.

Will be painting the five new pieces of passenger in the same base two tone scheme.  The real Big Project is getting the stock cars in shape, lots of pieces to glue onto the cores to get a suitably appropriate look.

Two challenges I've dealt with in painting using Montana brand rattle cans - the colors come out more glossy on some than I'd like and a little bit too 'powdery' on others.  If you've never used Montana rattle cans here are a couple of Critical pointers: shake the heck out of the can, way more than you think is necessary, and then some more.  And NEVER spray your object first, always spray something else first because the first 'squirts' will not be as loaded with pigment.  And always keep in mind this brand of paint as a very high percentage of pigment compared to other spray can paints.  The big advantage is the range of colors you can get versus the hardware/auto store brands - far too few flats (despite my result with the too glossy chestnut color).  Montana gives more flats in a LOT more colors.

Enough for now.

The Seventh And Friends

Okay, only primed - mostly - but at long last the Old West/Indian Wars figures move forward.  Foreground left is 120 American Bison (only six to finish painting - all in need of bases textured), center is the entire 7th Cavalry with Custer right up front and forty-nine stands following for 150 total mounted figures.  To the right is the Native American pony herd, 72 horses, and coming up behind them are three groups of allied scouts, 36 total.  In the background is the 7th again but this time dismounted plus casualties.

 A different view of the pony herd.

 Focusing on the bison.

 A herd of 36 pronghorn antelope - why white?, started the first twelve white so did the other 24 the same.  Those hills are in development - and idea borrowed from The Major General Tremorden Reddering site.  There will be more - if I'm going to do the Old West, I have to be able to create a credible Apache Pass (or reasonable facsimile).

 Another view of the native scouts pursuing the pony herd.

 And here is the cavalry's remuda, a herd of 36 remounts.

This image shows the dismounted HQ company (which I might convert to a Euro-heritage scout company) - unlike the cavalry which get just one standing horse to mark a company point of dismount, each of my scout units get four standing horses so that they can 'scout' the table.

And here is the dismounted native scouts seen mounted chasing the pony herd - guarding the flank of the dismounted 7th.

Speaking of which here is the dismounted regiment.  Each 12 man company gets three dead horses and two dead men for casualties, the 6 HQ figures get 2 dead horses and 2 dead men plus one standing horse to mark a point of dismount.

In the foreground of this photo is the two gun gatling battery - following the "walk-a-heaps".  (That's infantry for the greenhorns in the audience.)

Those lined up casualties go with the wagons seen to the right, at least the tail of the train.  The four dead horses are 'extras'.

Four wagons at the rear with two horses apiece and four horses, with canopies, with four horses apiece.

 And for the Little Bighorn event, six stands of pack horses for Company B to traipse about with.

 A rear view of the full regiment.

 An overall view of what, almost all, got recently primed, haven't done a detail adding how many pieces but perhaps over one thousand total figures counting animals and casualties with the men.

 Company A - twelve men mounted.

Custer's command - no, the main man isn't drunk, each center figure on all the three figure stands is only 'tacked' in place for removal for easier painting.  They'll get glued to a strip of card for painting, the tacked figures.

 The pony herd isolated - two different cans of primer, thus the color variation.

 Custer's command between two lines of his dismounted regiment.

 The canopy wagons are Peter Pig army supply wagons.

The other wagons are from Stone Mountain's ACW range - with a cool bit of supplies in the back.  These have hoops to go over the wagon boxes but I haven't decided whether I'm going to use them or not.

After all that brown - and wee bit of white - a bit of color is needed so here is a sampling of 'flavoring' terrain, I think I'm over 120 pieces now in a variety of styles.

There is still another entire "regiment" to prep but it will be three separate battalions of four companies each - 5th, 6th, and 9th(or 10th).  Then there is a group of high command - Terry or maybe Crook.  Last of all will be the figures to populate the fort including some civilians.

And that's just the US Army above (and some animals unaffiliated with any fighting force).

There's mountain of mounted warriors and a whole bunch on foot plus a plentitude of villagers.  And then there are all the civilians including the black hat guys and the white hat guys.  Yes, it is a huge collection for the era (other than being in 15 mm).  No, not insanity, just a large amount of zeal for a fun period.  Maybe someday it will all get painted.  See earliest posts here for trains!

Important to remember the point of this collection: my penultimate Extravaganza Game:

THE WHOLE WILDER WEST, ALL AT ONCE.

The Seventh Adds

So, I've got the entire 7th cavalry ready for priming - all one hundred and fifty troopers and command, their mounts, dismounts, horse stands and casualties.

I've got the remount heard of thirty-six horses glued to its bases and also ready for priming, the six packers on their mounts with twelve pack horses for the pack train just needing five of the riders glued into their saddles for that to be ready for priming.  I've got all eight army supply wagons (4 from Peter Pig and 4 from Stone Mountain) cleaned and washed and ready for assembly.  I need to pull out the herd of twenty-four cattle for beeves on the hoof as part of the supply.  Need to decide on four of the wagons whether I'll leave the hoops open or include a cover - leaning towards the hoops because of the nice piles of supplies that go inside the wagons.

I still need to pull out the other ad-hoc regiment to get it cleaned and primed and ready for priming.  But first, I need to clean and prep the three dozen native scouts/allies for the cavalry to get ready to accompany the Seventh - or whichever unit needs scouts for a given scenario.  I've also got to prep the headquarters cavalry company and the commanding general group of figures.  And not to forget the gatling guns and crews - still need to get those ready.

That will leave the infantry and the fort and the various and sundry denizens of the fort - including some civilians and a signals detachment, some recruits, a bunch lounging about the fort (thank you Stone Mountain for having those figures from the ACW range).

Going to have to get an order off for some bases including some custom sizes for the wagons (all the wagons, not just the army wagons, including the stagecoaches and carts).

Then it will be time to work on the natives, 384 and more mounted, 288 and more on foot, villagers in camp and on the move with their travois.  Do need a few more teepees - probably from Blue Moon which will leave me with some extras which I'll probably create as burned out or make one an 'abandoned' teepee with a dead woman in it.

It is nice to see progress on this collection even though it means the FIW and AWI aren't getting the attention they're supposed to be.  Oh, well, it's a hobby and its supposed to be fun and right now I'm tickled to be working on this.