Magnets: Wave Serpent, Fire Prism, Razorback, Rhino, Predator, Dreadnought, etc

[Dangermouse425]

Rather than just spamming 10 random posts in General Discussion to get a chance to win this army that made me join BoLS, I thought I'd post something vaguely useful - please find below my guide for magnetising Eldar vehicles. Hope it's of some use to you all!

First off, a vital point before we start: always dry-fit the magnets first and check their polarity. There’s nothing worse than spending ages magnetising your vehicles and then finding out your left sponson weapons won’t attract properly!

Magnetising can be a slow process, I find it helps to let the superglue dry before you start putting them together. A brief test is fine, but you will often find the magnets will break free of their gluey bonds and fly out of your weapon towards the other magnet! Just be patient and be prepared to re-glue a magnet into its hole if this occurs.

Sorry for not having any WiP pictures of the Eldar tanks, I did them all last night before I thought of doing a tutorial.

Wave Serpent Turrets:
Magnets used: 2mm x 1mm
Quantity needed: 4 per turret (2 turret, 2 shield), 6 per each weapon pair.

Start by chopping off the slightly thinner part of the middle strut that normally plugs into your weapons. I've drawn red lines across where you need to cut.

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/waveserpturret.jpg

Then, drill a small guide hole with a 1mm drill bit using a pin vice drill as close to the centre of the strut as you can. It's imporant that you get this right, otherwise you're likely to destroy the strut by drilling through it.

Then use a 2mm drill bit to widen the hole and allow space for your magnet. Drill gently enough that you can stop every now and then to check how deeply you're drilling, you want the magnet to fit flush with the surface of the rod.

Once the hole is drilled, superglue a 2mm wide magnet into the hole. I used 2mm x 1mm magnets.

Here's an example of what it should look like:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3096.jpg

Then find the weapon options you want to use. You'll find that three 2mm x 1mm magnets fit perfectly in the hole GW have provided, so simply superglue three magnets into the weapon, ensuring you've got the polarity right!

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3097.jpg

Then, stick them all together:

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3098.jpg

[Dangermouse425]

To magnetise the gun shields, simply superglue a magnet in the existing hole. (Try and get them as level and as flush as possible, mine aren’t great examples!

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_31111.jpg

And voila! Your fully magnetised Wave Serpent turret is ready for painting and gaming!

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_31121.jpg 

[Dangermouse425]

Fire Prism/Night Spinner Turret:

Magnets used: 4mm x 1mm
2mm x 1mm
Quantity: 2 x (4mm x 1mm) per turret.
2 x (2mm x 1mm) for Night Spinner weapon pair
? x (2mm x 1mm) for Fire Prism – NB: I’m waiting for more magnets to arrive before I start this one, the tutorial will be updated soon!
Start by drilling a slight recess with a 4mm drill (using a pin vice drill to create the guide hole) so your 4mm magnet sits as close to the curved notch as possible. See pic:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3086.jpg
Obviously they’re not going to fit flush, and you can’t really drill that far down without drilling through the bottom of the turret. If this happens, don’t worry, no one will be looking at the bottom of the turret!
This is how I did mine:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3087.jpg
Then, once you’ve glued the magnets in, shave off the plastic lip just above the magnet, I’ve drawn a red “jellybean” shape around the bit in question in the above picture.
This will allow the weapons to be slotted in and out without catching on the plastic ridge once the top covers have been glued on.
My shaved-down turret looked like this:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3088.jpg
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3089.jpg
That’s the turret complete for now.

[Dangermouse425]

Moving onto the weapons.
I’ve not done the Fire Prism weapons yet, but I can’t imagine they’ll be hugely dissimilar.
Using a 2mm drill bit (again, use a 1mm pine vice to create the guide hole exactly where you want it) drill a hole for the magnet to fit into in the bottom of the Night Spinner weapon, like this:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3091.jpg
The magnet needs to sit as flush as possible to allow the weapon to slot in and out of the turret once the turret is fully built.
Once the glue has dried you can test out the magnets on your turret:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3093.jpg
Once you’ve done the Fire Prism weapons too you can then glue the last pieces to the turret. It’s best to dry fit it first and hold the “turret cap” down as hard as possible, to simulate it being glued, whilst you get a friend to try and swap the weapons in and out. It should easily pull out without too much resistance, but if you’re encountering problems, work out what’s getting caught and shave it off with a sharp hobby knife before gluing the last bit of the turret on:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3094.jpg

[Dangermouse425]

Razorback Turrets:

(Please forgive the shocking state of the bits used here, they were salvaged from an eBay item)

Magnets Used: 4mm x 1mm
Quantity: 3 per turret (2 for mount, 1 for blast shield)
2 per weapon set.

This is possibly one of the easier ones to do, much simpler than the tricksy Eldar vehicles.

Start by slicing off the pegs on either side of the weapon mount.
Drill a 4mm hole all the way through where the pegs used to be. Now glue two of your 4mm x 1mm magnets together into the hole (or one 4mm x 2mm if you have any).

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3096-1.jpg

The next step is to magnetise your weapons:

GW have conveniently again provided a whole to place magnets into.
If you have magnets that fit into the hole snugly and can be glued, by all means use this. I however, didn’t so I needed to drill a 4mm slot for my magnet in here: (Again, ensure you don’t drill too shallow or too deep to allow your magnets to fit as flush as possible with the surface of the weapon.)

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3097-1.jpg
Repeat these steps for the other weapon, ensuring you get the magnets the right way round!

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3098-1.jpg

Before you place the weapon together, test them both on the turret.

Once you’re happy with the fit, glue the weapons together using the rectangular joint that GW have provided. It’s best to switch to plastic glue at this stage, rather than continuing using super glue. You may find the magnets are so strong that they are pulling your guns apart before the glue gets a chance to set. If this is the case, you’ll need to glue your guns together “in situ”, ie: on the weapon mount itself. Like this:

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3100a.jpg

[Dangermouse425]

Razorback Turrets Continued

So that’s the weapons and weapon mount complete, all you need to do now is the blast shield. If we skip forward to a “here’s one I made earlier” lascannon.

Drill a 4mm hole in the centre of the lascannon where the two rectangular joints meet. You will need to definitely wait until the glue has dried at this point, otherwise your drill-bit might rip the weapons apart! I left mine 24hrs just to be sure:

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3101.jpg

Then, dry fit your blast shield onto the grooves and work out where you need to drill the corresponding hole in the bottom of the shield. Using a pin vice 1mm drill to create the guide hole, I drilled yet ANOTHER 4mm hole in the shield. Be very careful here. The plastic is very thin and it’s easy to drill through the shield.
Here’s my step-by-step guide:
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3102.jpg

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3103.jpg

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3104.jpg

[Dangermouse425]

And there you have it, once the glue has dried on all the pieces, you’ll have a fully magnetised Razorback turret ready to rock!

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3106.jpg

http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y47/Danger_Mouse/Fun%20With%20Magnets/IMG_3105.jpg

[Dangermouse425]

Reserved for Rhino.

[turiya64]

i alwise try to magnitise to get the most out of my kits but i have to say i had not done the razerback turrets before and i love the way you did yours. thanks

[Dangermouse425]

i alwise try to magnitise to get the most out of my kits but i have to say i had not done the razerback turrets before and i love the way you did yours. thanks

No worries, happy to help. :) Hope it's a useful guide for everyone.

[Mr_Circle]

Very nice! Thank you!