This is the first tutorial I make for the hobby, but its pretty easy. The idea is to make stairs "playable", so players are able to actually place miniatures on them without having them sliding or falling.
Lets begin, the materials needed are:
- popsticks or balsa wood (I use the popsticks).
- White glue, silicon applied with a hot gun or liquid silicon (I use white glue).
- Ruler.
- Exacto knife or sharp scissors (I went for the knife).
- Sand paper (optional)
------------------
1.- First, Gather your popsticks, I use them instead of balsa wood since I have the impression that they are not as flexible as balsa wood. You'll need to cut off the round edges.
2.- Each of GW bases are 2cmx2cm, so cut each stick in sections of 2.5cm so that your mini's can fit in each step (of course this can change if you want a wider stair). Its important that each step it's well measured and cut the same size, otherwise the steps won't hold on its own (yeah it happened to me
)
Optional: If you want a clean finish, you can use the sand paper to smooth the edges of the steps and to make sure they are the right size.
To get the right angle in which you will cut the "support sticks" (the ones that go at the sides) depends on the building's hight and how vertical you want your stairs, so it's up to you. I used rulers like these ones to mark where to cut and where the steps would be placed:
http://ukadas.com/tecnouko/tema_001/horizontales_ec.gifPreviously to all of this, I messured the hight of the GW bases, they are roughly 0.3cm, of course this can vary depending if you added sand, fluck, rocks, or wooden planks to your own bases, so I recommend you to messure your own minis' bases and come to an average.
I figured 0.7cm should leave enough space for all bases to fit and "hook" so they wont fall. So each step is separaded 0.7cm from each other. I proceed to mark with a pen the places where I'm placing the steps.
3.- You can apply white glue on the edge of each of the steps, or just apply it in one side the whole support stick, up to you. Work on one side until you have all your steps glued on the right place.
4.- Forth step and we are almost done; Maintain the whole piece on a flat surface and wait a few minutes, letting the white glue dry.
Now apply some more white glue, either on each of the steps' edges or in one side of the remaining support stick and place it on top of the steps and put some pressure on it (but not too much, the glue is still fresh and the steps can move out of place easily)
Hold the stairs for a few minutes like this:
And thats it, here's the result (look at that, you can see the forum on the screen
!):
----------------------------
I hope you like it, and sorry about my chunky English
Feel free to toss any questions.
Cheers.