The new Ogrun Bokur model is absolutely huge! It towers over several light warjack models. I would certainly hate to face this monster on the battlefield alone.

Parts

The Ogrun Bokur comes with the following parts:

• Main Body
• Head
• Left Arm
• Shield
• Right Arm with Ogrun Pole Arm
• 2 Shoulder Plates
• 40mm Base (not pictured)

If your kit is missing any of these parts, contact the PPS Front Desk for a replacement.

One Bad Mutha

After the usual cleaning and filing of all the parts, my first step was to pin this hefty body to the base.

Next I attached the head. I got the surfaces to match up as close as possible. I'll fix this small gap in the chainmail later.

To Arms!

The Ogrun Pole Arm suffers from the same issues that most long thin items to in pewter form. It's very difficult to keep straight. Once it bends, it's never going to be the same. Mine came out of the blister relatively straight, but I've already decided to replace the shaft to strengthen and straighten it. Unlike many of the other weapon shafts in the Privateer Press line, the sculptor (Kev White) used 3/32" rod instead of the customary 1/16" rod. While this in and of itself isn't a problem, if you replace it with stock 1/16" brass rod it will look a bit weedy in comparison.

I've decided to leave the back half of the shaft alone. It's short enough that it's quite sturdy and doesn't need any help. I'll just replace the front half. I started by cutting a length of 1/16" brass rod long enough to pin into each component on either end. 1/16"? I hear you say. Hang on and I'll show you why.

Next I used my clippers to cut the shaft just forward of the thumb and at the flared bit on the blade end. As soon as I took this pic I decided to lose that flared bit as it would be a pain to drill into. I cut that flush with the back of the blade and carved out the molded bit in the blade. That carving out wasn't really necessary as I soon found out. I'm learning all kinds of things this week!

Here I've drilled into the hand and blade and placed the 1/16" rod for comparison. No self respecting Ogrun would use such a weedy shaft on their weapon! For my next trick: tubing. I slipped a segment of 3/32" brass tubing over the 1/16" rod to bulk it up. It fits very snugly and won't spin at all once it's glued.

I cut off a length of tubing a bit shorter than the rod using an X-acto knife and rolling it back and forth under the blade. Don't use cutters for tubing as you'll crimp the end you cut. I glued one end into the blade and then the other into the hand. I did it in that order so I could adjust the length if need be. Ready to go!

Here I've done a test fit on the left arm. It has a small nub to show the placement, but the combined weight of the arm and shield means it needs to be pinned to me. I've also clipped the nub from the forearm and replaced it with a pin as well to hold the shield securely. It's not glued on in these pics. I will leave it separate until after the whole model is painted. I've put it on the pin to check placement for the Pole Arm.

Now the right arm. Again, fit is good and there is a small molded nub for placement. I used this nub to guide my pin location to hold this heavy arm.

Now I'm test fitting the shoulder plates. One has a recess for the molded nub on the right shoulder so you can tell where they're supposed to go. You can swap them easily if you wish.

More Patch Work

Now for the putty work. I've pulled the shoulder plates and shield back off the model to get better access to the shoulders. I've worked thin ropes of putty down into the crevices and smoothed it out onto the surface of the arms to fill the small gaps. I've done the same thing to the chainmail coif. I added some leather wrappings to the weapon to dress it up a bit and hide the brass rod joins at the same time. Here's the finished piece:

Converting the Ogrun

I grabbed my second Ogrun and decided to alter him a bit to make him different from the first. Being mostly a one piece body it's pretty tough to do a significant conversion. Small changes will have to do. I decided to change the positions of the weapon arm and head. This would entail some putty work to make it look good when finished.

I assembled the pieces as before and this time I twisted the right arm upwards.

Looks pretty good from the front, but check out the huge gap it left:

I used a pin between the neck and head to turn the head more to the right. I didn't get a good shot of the gap it left.

When patching a large hole like this, it's best to do it in stages, not all at once. I did the usual dressing work in all of the other spots and filled the hole most of the way with green stuff. I set this under a 40W Halogen lamp to speed up the curing time. Once the putty was set, I mixed up a small batch of brown stuff to do the final layer on the arm. I probably don't have the musculature right, but it seems ok to me.

For the chainmail coif, I mixed half green and half brown to get a putty that would cure harder but still hold good detail. I spread out a thin layer over the area and used a sharp poking tool to poke holes at even spaces and rows to blend in with the existing sculpt. Once the new putty was set, I pinned the shoulder plates on to opposite shoulders to further vary the look a bit. Ready for paint!

Conclusion

Hopefully this will give you some ideas of things to do to your new Mercenaries. Their contracts await, go get 'em!

Until next time.

--YW7--