Loyalist thunderwolf conversion

[isotope99]

The BOLS poll has advanced hobby tutorials second in the list so I thought I'd do one on my thunderwolf.

Thunderwolves

You may have noticed that Games Workshop have increased their willingness to include codex entries with no corresponding models. This gives hobbyists lots of freedom to convert their own, or a headache as to how to make the unit they want when there is no model for it.

There are lots of ideas floating around about how to convert Thunderwolf cavalry, but with the release of the new plastic juggernauts I decided to go with converted juggernauts.

Ingredients:
• Plastic Bloodcrushers
• Wolf pack kit (lots of leftovers)
• Green stuff (or equivalent)
• Dreadnought bases (optional, but makes a good ice plain effect)

The basic idea is to keep the shape and mass of the juggernaut kit, as well as the most difficult bits to sculpt (e.g. the mouth) but to make the juggernaut look more like a massive wolf and less like a scary metal cow.
Here are the key things I did:

Head

The head probably needs the most green stuff work. To start with I assembled the juggernaut head without the top plate and also cut off the nose ring and any extra spiky bits.
The green stuff work was done in two main stages, which is always advisable to avoid ruining the work you’ve already done.
The first stage was to create a more wolf like shape. This included:
• Filling in the top of the head
• Sculpting a new nose
• Adding eyebrows and lower eyelids
• Adding lips round the teeth
• Building up the shape of the cheek fur and ears, trying to match the distinctive shape of the space wolf symbol.

The second stage is texture. Luckily, adding fur is one of the easier things to sculpt, just smooth out some green stuff and cut lines into it. It helps here if you have a sharper sculpting tool than the GW standard but a simple drawing pin also works pretty well.
I kept the spiky collar because:
a) The riders are going to need something to grab onto and I’m not so keen on the idea of giving them horsey reins and;
b) It reminded me of Butch the dog from Tom and Jerry.

[isotope99]

Body

You’ll have to cut the riders legs in half at the crotch (ouch!) to fit them round the juggernaut and then you can add fur down the back.

It’s up to you how much armour plating you leave, I kept the metal ribcage, as I quite like it, and added quite a lot of green stuff fur to the top part.

The tail you’re going to have to sculpt from scratch. Find a spare bit of plastic roughly the right shape (like a spare bloodletter arm or leg) to stop the green stuff from flopping down under gravity. Then sculpt the fur onto the tail in two stages like with the head.



Rider torso

You should be able to model the rider as leaning forward holding one of the spare bits of chain that comes with the bloodcrusher kit.

Kit bash your preferred rider from the space wolf pack box.

Note: I magnetised the shoulder so that the weapons can be easily switched.

[isotope99]

Legs

I suppose you could cut off the juggernaut armour completely and replace it all with fur but that’s a lot of work and I like the idea of these guys having at least a bit of armour for protection:
• Trim down the chaos spikes and khorne symbols on the legs and then filling in any recessed chaos symbols with green stuff.
• Add some space wolves symbols or just use paint/transfers at the end.
• Model on some fur to enlarge the back of the legs and cover up as much of the mechanical parts as you want.

Feet

The feet are a bit tricky as you need to replace those hooves.

I’m not 100% happy with them but what I did was cover up the hooves with green stuff, pushed some spikes (e.g the leftovers you cut off the juggernaut) into it where the claws needed to go and then roughed up some fur near where the foot meets the leg armour.

You’ll notice I did this after putting the legs on the body and sticking it to the base, but it’s probably easiest to do it first.

Final details

Once you have everything assembled, you can go back and add any wolf symbols, talismans, wolf tails etc. you want and fill in any gaps where the fur doesn’t quite look right.

I am painting my base as an ice world using the textured dreadnought bases available from the GW site, so no real conversion needed here.

Hope you like this idea and it is helpful for anyone out there wanting to make their own loyalist thunderwolves.

[emperorsaxe]

Thats some nice green stuff work you have there, should be nice to see when its painted.
Respects, Emperorsaxe

[LemanRussCommander]

Best conversion ive seen so far

[fuzzbuket]

cool ^_^ but i have 1 problem


BALM

heresy....

:P byt they are soo cool and i like the half wolf half machine concept!!

[steelmage99]

That is SO stolen!

Excellent tutorial. Thank you for taking the time to take pictures during the construction.

[miteyheroes]

Very cool! How big is a jugger head compared to a Goblin wolf head? Could you just switch?

[isotope99]

How big is a jugger head compared to a Goblin wolf head? Could you just switch?

It's quite a lot bigger than a regular wolf. I also considered using chaos hounds and dire wolves. The only thing of comparable size I can think of is the white lion heads but then you might as well convert them instead of the juggernauts.

BALM

Anyone know what this acronym stands for?

[Snyderson]

These are the first thunderwolves that actually deserve T5 ... !

Awesome greenstuff work! They really look like cyber-puppies!

Greetz,
Sny