So, you want to make yourself a Steam Tank? Why? Is the Games Workshop one to expensive? Or just for the fun of it? No matter what your reasons are, you will have to lay down a lot of time and care to get it right.
In this article, I’m going to talk about how I built my Steam Tank and how to do it yourself.

First of all, you’ll need a basic idea to work with. Have you ever seen a real steam tank? Do you want to make it look like some historical counterpart? The steam tank section on Games Workshop’s homepage is great for this. You can also have a look in annual 2002 or 2004. Make some scetches.
I built mine to look like the Games Workshop steam tank. I also mad a parts plan, trying to figure out every bit of the construction. The result looked pretty much like the scetches from the 2002 annual.

Secondly you will have to make sure your planned tank fit unto the basic steam tank base. The base size is 80mm x 120mm.

Thirdly you will have to build it.
Of what I have seen there are two general ways to build the Steam Tank. The first is to make it a box out of plasticard or balsa wood and the second alternative is to make it out of solid polystyrene, which is the method I used.
I won’t go into building a box-tank, but if you’re interested, this website is good.
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/andrew.schofield50/warhammer/steam%20tank1.html

When building a foamcore Steam Tank, there are a few things to consider. It will be frail, very frail before painting, and you WILL get some scratches and bruises on the hull while building it. You also have to decide what version of the Tank you will do, what weapons you will field. I won’t go into tactical advice for which one to build, so you’ll have to figure that out yourself.
I made my Steam Tank stick together with pins, so that I can change weapons to whatever I like. The only version I can’t do with it is the Implacable. (The mortar one)

One note on measure tape: Measure tape is very useful, as it is very bendable and not very thick. However, you will have a hard time making it stick to your Steam tank as it’s surface is pretty resistant to the GW glues. I found that the best method for making it stick is to cut criss cross cuts halfway into the tape on the side which you will spread the glue to make the glue stick to the material inside the plastic of the measure tape. Be cautious, though, with convex surfaces, such as the wheels, as you bend the measure tape the wrong way for this to work. Another issue is that most measure tapes have textured surfaces and that don’t look very good when painted. However, that is easily solved by sand papering the measure tape before gluing it to the tank.

The Steam tank itself consists of three main parts. The hull, the boiler and the weapons.

The Hull
To start off building the hull, you will need: A block of polstyrene, a hot wire cutter, pins, thick card, balsa wood, plastic measure tape, sand paper, knives and pencils, wood glue and lots of various decorations.

The hull itself is made up by the lower hull and the lid. To make them you will need a template, the size of a steam tank. You can use these two, which should be the right size.

Just print out a copy of each and cut out the shape for the lower hull (the red) and the lid (the blue). When they are cut out, transfer them to thick card, in order to get a durable template. Once you have the card template it is time to fetch yourself your polystyrene block. The block should be approximately 1″ or 2.5 cm thick. Mount the two templates on the foam block, one on each side, as directly as possibly over each other, with the straight end of the template against one of the edges. Stick a pin in each corner to make them stay in place while you cut. That was the hard part.
When the templates are in place it is really just to grab your hot wire cutter and cut. You might want to make two or three ones, and choose the best one. The finished result should look like this:

One the main piece of the hull is finished you’ll need to make a gun hole, unless you are building a “Sigmar’s Hammer”. Gun hole is pretty self explanatory, it’s the hole where you put the guns. Start with cutting in the fore end of the hull, the very hole where the gun comes out. If you are building a convertible Steam Tank, you have to be very careful, as you will need the piece you are cutting loose later. Once the front bit is cut away, you can pretty freely gouge out the inside of the hull to fit your cannon.

The lid is made from a piece of 10 mm thick balsa wood. Use the lid template to draw out the shape of the lid on the balsa wood and cut it out using a small saw or a hobby knife. Remember to cut a little longer in, as you’re going to glue measure tape to the outside of it. Make planks in the surface of the lid by cutting alongside the fibers of the wood.
When the planks are finished, cut a piece of measure tape, the length of the edge of the lid (you should have no problems measuring this). Start gluing at the front and work yourself backwars on the lid, one arc at the time. Use superglue, as there are no polystyrene parts in contact with the bonding surfaces.
If you are building a Tank with exchangeable weapons don’t glue the lid to the hull. Instead, insert three pins in the underside of the lid and very carefully push the lid’s pins into the foam of the hull. If you don’t get this right the first time, remove the pins from the lid and put them in another place on the lid. Then try again.
If you want a certain steam tank, you can skip this procedure and just glue the lid in place. Just don’t forget to insert the cannon first.

It is a good idea to make front wheels at this stage. They wont be seen very much, but they are important. Simply make a disk of balsa wood and split it in two halves. Glue a length of measure tape along the edge, add some scoring to make planks and glue them to the bottom of the tank. Even though the picture shows it, do not glue the boiler and the hull together, unless you have finished all four wheels. Otherwise you might make the tank lean forward or backward.

Decorate the Steam tank with all the major details; hatches, doors, shields, big modular decals, cigars, pennants, fowl, fish, tapestries, skulls… whatever you want. But save the more intricate decorations, like religious texts and purity seals until after painting, as it will be much easier to paint them separately and then glue them in place.
The blanket on the roof is made from thick card which I rolled tightly and wired some thick thread around it. The two streamers are made from green stuff and measure tape and I must say the tape one got better, even though it was harder to make (super glue everywhere!). The shields are from the soldiers sprue.
The stripe at the bottom was made in a very special way. First, make a template of ordinary paper of every one of the eight arches and number them, in order to not confuse them with each other. The templates are made by laying the paper on the hull and drawing with a pencil at the bottom. When you remove the paper, you’ll have an arched line on it. Cut along the line and make a counterpart out of measure tape. Make a parallell line, at wished width, beside the first one and cut along it, and Vióla! A piece of measure tape which matches the shape of the hull!

The Boiler
To construct the boiler you will need: A cylinder of polystyrene, balsa wood, wheels, a chimney stack, measure tape, a big soft air gun bullet, sprue plastic, a little bit of green stuff, wood glue, knives and pencils.

The basic shape of the boiler is a cylinder on wheels, with a chimney stack at the rear. To make the boiler itself you need to make balsa planks and glue them to the polystyrene cylinder. The original Steam Tank has a carriage to mount wheels, but as my wheels already had an axis, I decided gouge out a little of the underside of the boiler and have the axis there. However, there was not enough room for pistons between the wheels and the boiler, so they are “built in”. Pistons could be constructed in the same way as I made my helblaster part, look under the weapons section.
My wheels are from an old plastic toy cannon I had lying in a box, so I had no problems finding a pair of matching wheels. Unfortunately, everyone doesn’t have old plastic cannons lying around and will have to find wheels elswhere. Wheels could be made from balsa wood or plastic, just make sure they are perfectly circular. You might want to look through your old LEGO box as well, or browse some other toy manufacturer’s home page or catalog.

To make the back piece, which the chimney stack is attached to, simply cut a bit of polystyrene and cut it to a fitting shape. You might have to use other materials if your chimney stack is very heavy. Use a bit of green stuff to cover up the joint when you stick the stack to it. I made my stack out of a small tush pen (for painting easter eggs) and the joint piece of a bamboo fishing rod.

To make the iron bands around the boiler, simply use more measure tape. The boiler system on top of it I made from sprue plastic and a big soft airgun bullet. On the real Steam Tank there’s also a skull on top of the ball, but I was out of those. They can be found on the Knightly Orders sprue.

The Weapons
The helblaster of the steam tank can be made in many ways, but the easiest way is to use plastic tubes. They can be bought at various hobby centres, but I’d recommend looking at model aircraft stores. Both the steam gun and the helblaster parts of my Steam Tank are made from this. Simply cut the length you want and glue together.

For the steam cannon, the by far easiest way is to simply use a great cannon barrel. If you have used up all your barrels you could maybe find a fitting tube out of old ball pens or something similar.

The turret is made from polystyrene, which was filed and cut into the right shape. Filing tears up the surface of the styrene, so if you can, try to cut it with a hot wire cutter. Then decorate the turret with rivets, hinges, hatches and the top hatch, unless you want a commander peeping out, in which case you will have to make the turret hollow.
The turret is fastened in the roof with a pin, so that it turns freely all around the Tank. The hole is barely noticed when the turret is removed.

To make the gunplate simply take the bit you cut away from the hull earlier and glue some measure tape to it with wood glue. It is a good idea to make a few criss cross cuts at the backside of the measure tape to make it bend easier and help the wood glue stick to it. Make sure the tape covers the cracks when you re-insert the gunplate.

Painting the Steam Tank

CAUTION!!! DO NOT USE CITADEL SPRAY PAINT!! IT WILL RUIN ALL FOAM PIECES OF THE STEAM TANK!
(NOOO!! It’s meeeltiiing!! Meeelting!!)

With that said, it is just to suggest hand painting it black. With a big brush. The shields are unpainted here, but I panted them white later, as I made my red and white colour scheme on them.

Paint the Steam tank in the colours you want.

This Steam Tank was painted using these colours:
Metal: Boltgun metal, Chainmail, Mithril Silver
Gold: Shining gold
Brass: Shining gold + Flesh wash
Wood: Drybrushed Beastial brown, Snakebite leather, Black ink
Red: Blood red, Red ink
White: Skull white
Scrolls: Snake bite leather, Bubonic brown, Bleached bone, Flesh wash, Chaos black text
Blackened Chimney: Paint as normal metal and drybrush with watered down Chaos black

After painting the base colours and highlighting/inking the parts you want, it’s time to find all those nice details which are hard to paint while they are glued the the Stank, things like texts and sigils. If you paint them before gluing them on, is up to you. The scrolls on my Steam Tank are banners from the Knightly orders sprue and the glade rider sprue. The tip of the tank is the end of the trumpet from the Knightly order sprue. The shield decals are from the soldiers sprue and a cavalry hammer from the White Wolf sprue.
The big paintings on the sides are really not hand painted. (Although I wish the were!) They are decals (same as those you use on model airplanes) from Imperial Forge. If you want to make the modular griffins instead or a similar motif, try to find a miniature or a pedant that you like and cleave it with a small metal saw. This would give you two mirrored parts of the emblem. With the new empire models there are a small griffon chick at one of the captains base, and this model could be used for this purpose. I would have done that, had it been released before I built this one.

The actual cost of this model is 0 $/£/€/SEK, as I had all the spare parts and equipment at home. What it would cost in time, I don’t even want to think about…

Now good luck with building your own!

Shadowwolf

Steam Tank gallery

I am not the only one who have made a steam tank myself. Here are a few other forum member’s scratch built steam tanks.

Rejector

This Steam tank is made by Rejector, and is made from 5th edition Skaven screaming bell, 5th ed Helblaster, Tamiya WWII field kitchen model, 40K Rhino parts, wooden ice cream spoons and other various bits. The actual cost of building the Tank was about 50-70% of GW model. More pictures of it can be found at http://s14.photobucket.com/albums/a327/Rejector/Hexenhammer/

BK one and two

This is BK’s first version of the Steam Tank

The hull sides were made from picture frame and the smooth front is made from plasticard. The platform is made from thin wood (not balsa – way to fragile for everyday use – good old sturdy oak). The ball and chain model was made from a spearman and a morning star from the Skeleton box and the man-catcher model from Empire artillery bitz. The blunderbuss figure is metal handgunner with an inverted tip of cannon crew ram-rod fixed and modified to look like flaring barrel. The pintle for the Hochland Long Rifle was made of Green Stuff. The large hatches are Chaos Warrior Shields.
The engine is from 5th edition steam tank with parts from th Dwarf Flame Cannon and old dwarf Anvil of Doom…

The second Steam Tank by BK is made from two 4th edition Steam tanks, the steam gun is made from a six pounder gun from napoleonics…
The rest is more or less self explanatory, except that engines were filled with Green Stuff and bitz from Helblaster Volley Gun added. The whole thing was mounted on wooden frame. The top was made of wood and then the original top was added. The steam gun mount is inspired with pintle mount of anti-aircraft machine guns on real tanks. The handle is from some kind of bolt thrower but he doesn’t remember which one. Might have been the Goblin one…

Procopius

A steam tank made from an old war wagon, a battering ram, and a dwarf organ gun and flame gun.

Arntiboi

Arntiboi made the body out of some sort of insulation foam and covered it with plastic sheet form an icecream box.

The wooded parts are covered with strips of balsa wood. You probably recognize the various plastic pieces from mainly the knights sprue. He made the exhaust pipe from a broken pen and used an old metal cold one head for the eh… head of the pipe.

He want it painted black (pun intended for all who knows the Stones), so black and bronze was the main scheme for the Steam Tank.

Liuzheng

This utterly fantastic steam tank was made by Liuzheng. He wanted to make the tank’s figure like a mobile renaissance church. The Turret would look like a dome, and the chimney would look like a bell tower. The hull would be heavy decorated.
He first made a plan of it in PDF, which he printed and applied to a sheet of cardboard.

After cutting all the pieces out, gluing them to cardboard, cutting them out again and assembling them, the steam tank looked like this. The structure of the dome is made up of a rib structure, covered with putty.

The material he used for the extra detail is Tamiya Epoxy Putty. It is just like the GW Green Stuff.
At first, Liuzheng was going to make stained glass windows at the side of the tank, but after realising how frail it would be on the battle field, he decided to make embossment of saints.

And here it is, with all the amazing decorations finished! As sculpting tool, he only used a toothpick (!) and almost all of the decorations are made freehand. Only a few sprue plastics can be seen. Liuzheng also made this base for it, making the steam tank crash through the orcish defences (and the orcs too!).

And this is the finished Steam tank, painted to look more like a moving cathedral than anything else in the warhammer world!
From left to right: The Saint of Orb, the Saint of Sword, the Saint of Scourge, the Saint of Sickle and the Saint of Candle.

Although Liuzheng didn’t do stained glass on the sides, he chose to make a large stained glass window at the rear.

Li Zhe
We only know him as Li Zhe. His steam tank posted on the forum by one of his friends, but I thought he had earned a place among the steam tanks in the gallery. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to get my hands upon one of the pictures of the finished steam tank, but what I wanted to show you is really better shown by the unpainted tank.

This steam tank is a great example of how almost anything can be used to make a steam tank! Just take a look at the batteries and the cogwheels, lego-bits random sprue bits!