Alan's second offering is a fine fort, built from polystyrene coffee cups, cork floor tiles and other intriguing materials.
8 Polystyrene coffee cups
Hardboard, plywood or MDF for the base
Polystyrene ceiling tiles (at least 10mm thick)
Cork tile
Balsa wood
Glue
Filler
Matches
Sand
Cereal box card
The towers needed some preparation: push one cup inside another, and then cut the bottom off both so you have a double thickness tapered cylinder about 5 inches high. I find it easiest to set the cutter wire up 5 inches off a smooth surface and slide the cups into it rather than try to do it with my shaky hands and bad eyes. Then cut out a quarter of the tower.
This is the clever bit, take the ends you cut off, and place one of them inside the tower to make a floor. It should fit perfectly about half an inch from the top. When it's glued in, straighten off the edge of the floor. The tower is now ready to be stuck onto the base.
Next, make a template for the walls. This is made out of cereal card, and is a four inch high section with a battlement every half inch, about 16 inches long. Use this to cut out four walls from the polystyrene ceiling tiles with the hot wire cutter. Next, butcher these wall sections so they fit between the towers. Lean them back a little when they are glued in. Amongst other things this makes your fort look bigger! Make one side a main gate, the photos should show how this fiddly bit is done.
The main archways are made using a door template as for the walls.
Then construct the interior of the fort. I did the walls and walkways with cork tile. I made the left and right hand walls with lift-off roofs, the front and back were not. Either way, the walkways were about 1"3/4 wide.
The stairs were fiddly, I made a template with steps on it and used the hot wire cutter to cut them from polystyrene. If done carefully you can do two at once. Following this I glued small rectangles of cereal card at strategic locations on the walls and walkways, to represent stone blocks sticking out.
I painted PVA onto the courtyard and outside of the model, and then scattered sand onto it.
First, I mixed fine sand and some PVA glue into a quantity of sand coloured paint. I painted the walls and floors with this.
The glue helps harden the polystyrene and cork, the sand helps with dry brushing later. I then glued little circular bits of wood high up on the interior walls to represent beams sticking out 'adobe style'. Second, I mixed up some lighter sand colour and drybrushed it over the external walls. Then I painted the room interiors white.
I also picked out exterior details such as cornerstones. I painted the doors sand coloured on both sides, and then did a dark brown wash, followed by drybrushing with light brown. Other exterior wood, such as window frames, I did in light brown (khaki) with a light sand drybrush.
The interior floors and roof sections I painted a dark, reddish brown, and drybrushed in a lighter shade. Be careful not to get any on the walls. I then painted all sandy ground a sandy ground colour.
Sit back and wonder what to do for the NEXT six months.