Reinforcements Deploy

Its been a few weeks since my last update. We last saw the Situation room with table material arriving and a snapshot of the steel supports.

Well, there has been a change! The first piccy is out of focus but shows a technical me checking the alignment of the steel. Actually, it isn't Anne wanted me to look as if I knew what I was doing. Alas, all the technical expertise is being furnished by my neighbour John, an artisan extraordinaire to say the least! He's most happy surrounded by dirt and thinking of how to solve the next technical puzzle. Some of his solutions are brilliant!

The next shot shows a full size table with all the main supports. The legs are 4" x 4" timber and there are 5 sets on 6' centres (2 metres to metric guys). The strength is enormous and it also means that using the steel results in only using 40% of the timber had I used an all timber construction.

The little white patch under each leg is white concrete paint to seal the floor. The next stage was to mount the MDF, only 2 sheets per 24' length. It takes 5 guys to lift the stuff!!!

So now you have a large table with a single join if you can spot it? At this point the areas of floor under the tables was also painted with sealant paint leaving only the walkways unpainted. These will remain unpainted for another 6 months to allow the water in the concrete to continue evaporating. The dehumidifier sucks out about 2 litres of water a day. Added to this is that as we use the timber, it has all been tannelised and so is "wet2 and this of course needs time to dry out.
Now the tables actually look like tables. The MDF has also been painted underneath to ensure it is sealed as MDF will always produce dust if not sealed. All the MDF we use has been sealed on all surfaces with emulsion paint except the shelving on the main tables. This is laminated MDF and the edging will be with capped plastic.
The last piccy this time shows the tables with their base coat of paint.

All the base coats are green done with BS standard 12 D 45 which is Sherwood Forest Green Vinyl Matt emulsion. Always use a BS standard as you then can always replicate the colour everywhere. All troop basing uses a base colour which is the same. The thing in the middle is a saw, it saw a lot of work cutting the shelving parts. I'll explain more in the next installment.
In addition, the figure front develops. All the initial WWII is with the painter and should be ready for Easter. I might also have purchased all the ACW by Easter, to be painted later in the year. The Napoleonics is ongoing, I now have 4 full French infantry regiments. I hope to game something Napoleonic late in the year.
And at long last I have got the WWII rules to the printer and they shall be ready next week.
All in all I'm knackered!, I've used muscles in the last 3 weeks that I forgot I had (and aren't they telling me now!!). But all of this is really exciting, seeing something start from a bare patch of grass and grow to fulfill a dream.
Like all things good there are some hiccups and the ever present financial pressures, but I can really see what it might be like now and any doubts I may have had are going.
I'll do another later this week when hopefully the build is nearly finished and I'll even put some figures on the table to give an impression of the overall scale.
Watch this space!!!!!!