SCRATCH BUILT MDF BOX GIRDER BRIDGE

Hillary Eylül 07, 2022

I have been busy scratch building a number of MDF building projects, here is one of them its a Box Girder bridge ready for MOAB 2019.
It measures 51 cm in length, 16 cm wide and at its highest point is 16 cm high and is geared for 28 mm miniatures.

Some images of WIP ,I used 6 mm MDF for this task.

MDF struts support in place as the glue sets.

Once set the top portion of the bridge it cut out and glued in place.

The railing is constructed from wire mesh I found in my garage glued in place, odd bits of thin MDF were added to key areas on the bridge .

Food for thought:

On completing the bridge, I thought to myself I could have just cut out each side of the bridge from a solid piece of MDF using a drill and a electric jigsaw, anyway I will keep this in mind if I ever have to make another bridge.

To create the walk way I cut a strip of 3mm MDF and used a hand saw to create horizontal cuts to simulate planks of wood, I also used a sharp pointed instrument to scratch in some detail into each individual plank.

I coated the road portion of the bridge with a very thin layer of white caulking.

Primed black with spray can.

This image shows my first attempt at painting, I started painting it a greyish colour but was not happy with the results.

I changed the base colour to Vallejo Model colour Flat Brown using a wet technique to add the paint.

First highlight was done using Vallejo Game Colour Carne Marron and continued with a highlight of Vallejo Panzer Aces Flesh base.

(its like dry brushing but with a more loaded amount of paint on the brush and its down with more careful brush strokes)

I add some random spots and streaks with Agraxearthshade

The walk way was first coated with VMC Beige Brown being careful not to cover the black Primer between the planks.

I highlighted with a 1:1 mix of VMC Beige Brown and Iquai sand.

Final highlight: was done with random streaks with a mix of 40:60 VMC Beige brown and VMC Flat flesh.

The railing was coated with VMC while grey and highlighted with VMC offwhite.

VMC white grey was used to simulate bird droppings on the bridge, I was inspired by Nick and his take on MDF bridge follow this link.

The road was painted with VMC black grey mixed in with VMC Iquai sand , I started with a mix of 1:1 ratio , highlighting was done by increasing the portion of Iquai sand to the mix.
Note try to leave some of the black primer come thru in the middle of the road.
I also added some flock on the egdes of the road to simulate weeds and a bit of VMC Flat Earth spots where added on the edges of the road to simulate dirt on the road.