CSM Defiler Conversion

One of the models I got with my first batch of CSM eBay stuff was a hard used Defiler. It had been roughly painted, overpainted and primed again and none of the legs were connected. At first, I just put it together as designed with some magnets to hold the legs. Not really worth writing about.

Having seen a really nice looking conversion on DakkaDakka, I decided to either successfully convert the Defiler to a bi-pedal model - or to scrap it.

First I took it apart using my hobby knife, alcohol and some gentle brutality. Then I soaked the bits in Sterilium for a while to break up the paint and primer before brushing it off with a nylon brush and running it though an ultrasound bath with some dishwasing detergent to bind the fat the Sterilium leaves behind. Sterilium is a hand disinfectant for medical use and my go-to acrylic paint remover on plastic minis.

Using Patafix poster glue pads, I assembled the parts to try out possible build options. I had a Landspeeder without the cockpit parts which I decided to use as a stepping stone.

The Defilers Claws make up the legs in this build. I removed the usually movable pincers and flipped them around. Since they don't fit into the cut-out then, I put some sections of a ball-point pen housing between them and their counterpart.

As you can see in the picture below, the front third of the Defilter's lower body makes the hips in the new setup. In the picture it's still the wrong way around compared to the final version. I just used the hobby saw to chop it to size and then slapped on a few layers of plasticard cut and filed to size on the resulting opening.  I dilled a cone shaped recess into that to receive the piece that holds the upper body by default.

Compared to the mock-up, I moved some armour bits around and built a plasticard cover for the shoulder thorso extension which is a short section of electric installation pipe from the hobby store. The plasticard is cut into rectangles with added thin stripes on the borders. That echos the design of the Defiler's upper body. The gaps between those plasticard bits were a bit rougher than intended. Yet, since this is chaos, Spikes are an obvious solution to cover those bits. The picture below shows the model after glue-up.

The four rear legs of the Defiler make up the arms in this build. To make that work I cut off the claw bits off one leg and the ball joint of the other, filed things round and glued them together. Unfortunately, one of them didn't hold, probably because the fit wasn't as good as it could have been. This was easily remedied with a pair of magnets though. The balls on top of the arms are just glued into holes in the plastic pipe. The weapons on the shoulders are stuck on magnets, so I can swap them as needed.

Here is an action shot of the model with the first bit of painting thrown on it.