BLA: Assembly of the Greystoke

Professor Maximilian Poireau realized that while Europe was putting effort into the advancement of the tank, such a vehicle would be of little use in the mountainous jungle terrain of the Congo.
Guides assured him the only way to get deeper into the interior and up the mountains was to walk.
Therefore the solution was simple.

A walking machine was required to get to the locations they needed for exploration and to defend the Great Apes from poachers.  And thus the Greystoke was envisioned.

When the BLA takes the fight to Europe, these machines should prove quite valuable as a weapon of war.




I made this from a R.A.T. from West Wind Productions.
I didn't do much converting as you can probably tell.
The hull has an exposed cockpit with a driver. The driver is fine, (though it didn't seem to fit without a lot of clipping of his arms) but I decided to make a closed cockpit for a few reasons:
1. Versatility: now I can use this in the BLA, or for my Quar, or as a 15mm sci-fi vehicle.
2. I just like how it looks better this way.

Overall, I love this model.  The design is fun with just the right balance of menace & quirky for my tastes.
The only problem is the construction design.  This was very annoying to assemble.  Not recommended for people who are not comfortable with pinning. The holes for where the leg pieces are supposed to slot into were half-filled from casting errors, and even when excess metal was removed, the hull is so heavy it creates far too much drag on the leg joints: sturdy pinning is required.  Similarly the hull attaches by a flush contact with the plate at the end of the 'body piston'. If it was plastic or resin it might be enough to glue it, but not a solid chunk of metal. I sunk two pins all the way through the connector plate, so they'd look like bolts on the back end.  The cockpit roll-bar was also very badly mangled when I got it, but managed to get it to the right shape. The metal seems a bit soft: thin parts like the arms seem to bend quite easily. It will take some gentle care to keep those arms from someday breaking.  So I mounted it on a 60mm metal base.

Even with the assembly issues, I'm very happy with this unique model.

Here it is with a BLA soldier for scale:


And here it is next to a 15mm mini.


With the closed cockpit it works well either way, maybe only a difference of 1 crew or 2.
For 15mm I plan on using it for my as-yet-to-be-started British Lunar Marines as a Churchill S17 to face the Nazis on the Moon for the sci-fi pulp setting.