Tuesday, October 21, 2014

Linear Obstacles - Fences and Walls

In the historical Battle of Bunker Hill, a stone wall and rail fence played a prominent role in the battle.  For my recent replay of this famous battle, I wanted to include similar linear obstacles.  The problem for me was that I have no walls or fences in 28mm!  Most of linear obstacle type terrain pieces are sized for 15mm or smaller.  So a day or two before the Saturday game, I whipped out a few sections of both rail fence and stone wall from bits laying around the house.

First, the stone wall sections are built up from a Litko 120mm x 30mm base using a bag of talus from a model railroading supply store.  Using tacky glue, rocks were piled one on another, allowed to dry, and then hit with a spray of flat black.  Later a dry brush of light gray, a Minwax stain, a spray of Dullcote and voila, finished.

Second up was the rail fence.  This took some thought on how to build and later store a worm rail fence.  Using some old, surplus balsa laying around, I built five sections of three rail fence.
Each section is designed such that they interlock to create a hinge at the join.  A tight fit allows the sections to remain interlocked.

The sections can then be positioned anywhere from a 90 degree bend to 180 degrees.  Sections, when disassembled can store flat yet pieced together to make a worm rail fence.   Five fence sections are a start but not nearly enough for frontier battlefields. 
Both of these linear obstacles will work well on the North American frontier in either 28mm French & Indian War or American War of Independence games. These items provided a quick, inexpensive, and relatively easy addition to the gaming table.

13 comments:

  1. NIce job on both; the fences came out especially well!

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    1. Thanks, Peter! I was a bit surprised at how well the fences fit together too. Now, I need more!

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  2. I agree with Pete, the fences look great.... well done Jonathan!

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  3. I second the above, nice work. Will look great even in ACW games!

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    1. Yes, these would work for ACW too. Since I have no 28mm ACW figures, that period/size slipped my mind.

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  4. Well done. Very creative method to join the fence pieces. Thank you for sharing.

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    1. Thanks, Chris! As I mentioned, these were pretty easy to make.

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  5. Great job, love the fences too!

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  6. Good looking fieldworks Jonathan! That's something I always seem to lag behind on in getting terrain finished.

    Christopher

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    1. Terrain is often last to see work from me too. I think it ranks right above painting artillery limbers...

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