Tanks, tanks everywhere and not a drop of paint

So, after a temporary forced hiatus due to a build up of all too adult responsibilities, i'm back. Bet you didn't even notice!
But yes, i can finally swap pencils, calculators, rollers and house paint for hobby knives, razor saws, needle nose tweezers and polystyrene cement! With two weeks off, now is the ideal time to return with a vengence!

But where to start? So many projects, so little time. During my exile from the hobby i still managed to keep collecting "bargains" off ebay and fuelled by inspiration from the tinternet, a plethora of ideas made it into my little head that are all jostling to be attempted. From finishing a variety of projects to do with the guard, to getting cracking on some grey knights or refurbing an A-10 warthog (saw a bit of terminator salvation the other day which had them in it), to  Decisions, decisions...its such a hard life!

In the end i haven't really settled on one project after all, variety is the spice of life. However, i thought it would be prudent to bring some focus to my motivation and decided to channel the inner treadhead in me and make finishing my tank companies the priority as frankly its a travesty that they sit unfinished when they only need a bit more work. The problem though is deciding the final finished look. At the moment they are servicable as fresh out the factory. However they lack markings, an essential detail to be truly regarded as "done". What i did know though was i wanted a more rugged looking tank force and after seeing a multitude of excellent examples on ammobunker, definitely knew more stowage and weathering is required. But there in lies a further problem, what stowage and where to place it? Furthermore the number of tanks that needed treatment has been daunting, with 15 Leman Russ, 12 chimeras and 7 artillery tanks now.. how am i going to get through all those?....yes i know, i buy too much, but tanks are my weakness, especially at well below rrp!

However, in recent weeks, inspiration has been drawn having come across a plog on the afore mention forum by Bigwill, (who i have since discovered also has a blog - Heresy Workshop -added him to my reading list) I was inspired by how he put his winter themed WW2 American style guard tank force together.(wow that was a mouthful) taking it a tank at a time and applying some of the techniques and finishes i recognised from the forgeworld master class book. It was the detailing that really added to the force and was the deciding factor in making me set about my own force. So primed with the inspiriation decided to proceed along the same lines, although i'll be going a squadron at a time and not as detailed as all that stowage will drive me bonkers.

Therefore i bring you what i have been working on the last couple of days, "Breaker squadron" - 3 demolishers, a couple of predators to fix/refurb and my version of the King Russ to act as a command tank.

The predators should be relatively quick work, the Ultramarine one is one of my originals and only needed a repair job as one of the lascannons had broken off. 

The other one is an ebay special that was just a tenner! bargainous! who could say no?! Unfortunately on arrival was a bit more work than it seemed in the sale picture, the lascannons had broken off in transit and after initial inspection it appeared to have been resprayed several times so had really thick paint work over it....nothing a few goings over with fairy power spray wouldn't rectify...or so i thought....even with some hefty scrubbing didn't manage to get it all off and left it looking like this. 

Working through the layers discovered it has previously seen action as both a Blood angel and Dark angel  tank. Well soon it would see service once more but this time for the sons of Ultramar.

Otherwise the only other pics i have are of WIP on the king russ, This has been in progress for at least a year already, kinda stalled when i got to the engine block, but having recently obtained another ebay bargain -a Forgeworld Gryphonne vanquisher tank for under a tenner. Felt the turret was just the ride scale to balance the look of the enlarged tank thus has spurred me on to finish it. Only work needed on the turret  is a new lick of paint and pinning the cannon back on. Here's how it looks now

and on the tank.

and work on the engine block

New enclosed exhaust system

I also added in a pseudo engine as the cover will be partially see through as its a grate from the baneblade kit, but also it was to use up the other half of the baneblade exhausts. Waste not want not as they say. Looks alright not that it will be highly visible.  The exhausts were spare anyway having upgraded my baneblade and shadow sword's engines with the landraider engine block but i'll post that at a later date once the tank company is up to shape.

part of the engine.

So lots of work. Hope to keep it up so will keep you posted! but now back to the forge