Saturday 3 September 2011

IMEC Mining Robot

 IMEC often make use of Mining Robots on frontier worlds.  They're able to handle rougher terrain than a wheeled or tracked vehicle, and are more flexible for use in other tasks, able to stand in for a crane or a cargo loading droid without much modification.  Most come equipped with a triple-headed rock drill and a large rock saw (also handy in forest clearance).


This robot started life as a Mechwarrior clicky figure.  I ended up with 4 mining 'Mechs from e-bay, so far one has been painted up to see how it looks.  I haven't yet decided whether they are piloted robots or whether they're autonomous/remote controlled droids.  As you can see, this one still has the cockpit canopy, though it wouldn't be too hard to replace it with some sort of robotic head.

 

 Colour scheme is the same as the IMEC ground crew - Humbrol 33 matt black legs, GW blood red arms & torso.  The red is shaded with Vallejo sepia ink and selected areas were drybrushed with GW chainmail to simulate the sort of wear & tear you'd expect on a mining robot.  The whole thing received a light drybrush fo Humbrol 93 desert yellow to achieve a suitably dusty appearance, concentrating more on the lower legs & drill arm.

 

The rock drill arm received an IMEC logo, though I've rather overdone the weathering so you can hardly see that it's there!


 Here's a few of the crew with their mining robot & some transport.

 

The transport can also help the robot reach its destination faster than walking...


 ...or maybe not!
 

Some of the mining 'Mechs come with jury-rigged guns instead of the rock drill.  These guns might be useful mounted on something else, as will the missile pods.  I've got a few broken drill-bits, so they will be good replacements for the gun mounts.  I might give one a claw or scoop of some sort too.

6 comments:

  1. Thats a great looking mech, love it.

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  2. Nope, not vinyl, but not hard styrene either, it's too flexible for that. Some sort of polythene-based plastic, similar to 1/72 toy Airfix soldiers etc?

    No problems with acrylic or enamel adhesion; I just paint straight over the existing colour scheme which seems to work fine (I just use a white undercoat first for something like the red).

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