Paukarlahticon III

Catchy name, right? It's the product of me having enough hubris to call having ten friends over to play over the weekend a "convention" but not having enough imagination to name it after anything else than my home village. We assembled for the weekend for a series of miniature games, sauna and beer. The event was also the first time we've used my workshop/mancave as a playspace and I have to say it worked well. The space fits three individual 4*6 foot wargame tables with plenty of room left to move around the space and I think we can fit a 24*6 foot table in there if we're so inclined.

The workshop converted as a playspace. There's still room for one more table but it was not needed this time.

The theme of the weekend wasn't to play a big battle this time (unlike the previous time and before that) but to play a series of smaller, "standard" sized games. I think it was a good choice and I played a variety of different games (seven in total!) during the weekend.

Battletech alpha strike on my work in progress scifi desert planet board. The weekend showed me that the board is actually quite versatile even though I designed the set just for 6mm scifi.

The "concrete slab" bases for urban areas work quite well for the amount of work needed to make them. Definitely better than just slapping down the buildings on the table.

We played three rounds of Battlegroup Kursk on three tables semi-simultaneously. I got to play with my recently finished Germans (I also shared my command with one player without miniatures). We got our asses handed to us in every round, naturally.

a German assault gun takes out a British tank in a 1945 scenario.

The desert table set up for a WW2 cityfight. The table shows just about all kinds of building bits we could scrape together but the result was satisfactory.

German defenders spot a Sherman approaching.

A Marder tank takes a direct hit.

The second game I played. Not enough anti-tank weapons in our list.

The 88 waits for the enemy armor to come in sight.

Aaand the third game. I admit, I did place that 88 in a position in which it was easy prey for the British infantry.

A 1500 point game of Warmaster. Orcs vs. Empire.

The Orcish cavalry wing performed admirably...

..but it's success was countered by Empire cavalry elsewhere. Another defeat for my permanent record.

A game of Trafalgar using Pirates of the Spanish Main ships.

The desert table transformed into a Western town for a drunken late night game of Legends of the Old West.

The Saloon keeper and his daughters look for a hidden treasure in the town.

A showdown on the thoroughfare.

The next gaming weekend is planned for the winter if I manage to keep the workshop warm enough for it to be usable (this is Finland, as you know). Thanks to the participants, I had a blast!

Progress on Project Mancave

Since my last update on Project Mancave, there has been significant progress. Let me show you what's up.

Previously we had finished digging the foundations and laid a fresh concrete floor. Now it's time to do the walls. As fitting as it would be to have a mancave with walls of solid stone, Finland has a tendency of getting very cold during the winter and having a bit of extra insulation is quite beneficial towards keeping warm. To this end, we decided to build inner walls in the mancave.

First, a wooden frame

Then a thick layer of insulating wool and a plastic sheet to block moisture

And finally some cheap plaster sheets for walls.

As you can see, the windows are covered with styrofoam. We didn't have the time or the money to put in new windows before next summer, so the styrofoam is there to keep the cold out. It's not like there's much sunlight to enjoy this time of year anyway.

After the walls were complete I gave them a couple coats of the cheapest acrylic white wall paint I could find. Suddenly the place was ready for furniture. The ceiling still needs work (and more lamps) but I can do that later. The cost of doing the walls is somewhere around 500 Euro.

I've accumulated quite a collection of old furniture from here and there. Stuff people were going to throw away but I salvaged. Therefore I was able to furnish the place with zero cost. Lots of shelves and cabinets as you can see:

 After those were in place it took my wife just a couple of seconds to start cashing in on those "once the workshop is ready I'll haul all this stuff from the house in there" promises I made. We'll see how long the storage space holds.

Complete with a lounging area!

..and a cat entrance.

There's still much to add and do, but now the space is complete enough for me to start doing some projects in. The space which was once a stables, but has now become a workshop is kept above zero by a small radiator, and the temperature there is about 4 Celsius. When I need to work there, I can use a hot air blower to make the place above 12 Celsius. It's comfortable enough. There's a workbench to add as well as some accessories no workshop can do without (like a tool hanger on the wall) but I think I'm pretty much done for the winter.

Heating solution

Project Mancave: Laying the foundation

Last week we made some concrete progress on the workshop.I had some friends and family over to help do the floor in my future mancave.

First we put down a layer of styrofoam to insulate the concrete from the sand bottom. Then an iron net was cast on top to bind the concrete nicely. The borders of the floor are likewise insulated to keep the concrete separate from the wall.

Mixing the cement.

Quite a few loads were carted in.

I was busy with my shovel outside while my father did all the stuff that actually require some skill.

And here's the end result after the floor has dried for a couple of days. It will take a few weeks for it to harden properly.

All in all it took maybe three to four hours to lay the concrete and smooth it, so it took less time than I thought. The materials for the floor cost something like 300 euros, we recycled some of the styrofoam put in the floor. The floor is now complete and the next steps will be to do the walls and the ceiling. The completion of the project is still far off, but getting the floor done was a big portion of the overall work.

Next weekend will be a treat as it's Warcon time and I will be traveling to Tampere for a full weekend of wargaming goodness. In other news, my blog statistics show me I have reached 2000 monthly hits for the first time. I'm happy people seem to enjoy my incoherent rambling.

Project Mancave: Stage 1 complete

And The Builder said, 'If the foundation is weak, do you wail and gnash your teeth? Do you ask it to repour itself? Nay, you tear it down and begin anew. So shall it be with with all My Children, whether they be Stone or Flesh.' 
- Thief: The Metal Age

So, I mentioned when we moved into our new home in the spring that the place had an old barn and that I would start work to convert the place into a workshop/gamespace/mancave. I have been working on it an hour here, an hour there and thought I'd give you an update on what's going on.

I've now completed Operation Tabula Rasa, that is, to tear down all internal structures in the barn and prep the place for the actual building phase. Initially I was supposed to just lay down some wooden flooring on top of the old, but the space really was a bit low vertically so I decided at the recommendation of my father to dig down some 30-40 centimeters and lay down a proper concrete floor. This gives me more headroom and a much better floor for the workshop. All that was needed was some good old fashioned toil, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

The first step was to clear the would-be workshop of all the accumulated junk stored there.

The barn, built in 1947 had originally housed cattle, but my parents converted it into a stable in the late 90's. The horses have been gone for a couple of years but they left their mark. I shoveled some dozens of wheelbarrow loads of old, dusty manure and bedding before hitting the old sand/rock bottom of the barn.

Next, I took apart the old enclosures and hauled the bits out. A sledgehammer was quite useful at this stage. There was some material I might be able to recycle later but I think a musky cavalry odor might follow.

Once the old structures were cleared out I got into some proper work. The old floor consisted of a top layer of sand, followed by a layer of tightly laid stones varying in size from fist-sized to the size of a man's torso. After that there was more sand and gravel until the target depth was reached. Prying the stones loose with an iron bar and hauling them out was by far the most difficult part on the project so far, but at least it teaches me that we have to work for the good things in our life.

"You see in this world there's two kinds of people in this world my friend. Those with loaded guns and those who dig."

After the floor was dug to the correct depth and evened out (my friends were already warning me against delving too greedily and too deep), the last thing to do is to scrub the ceiling with a steel brush to make all the flaky old paint come loose. I'm not in a hurry to get to that part yet though, I just need to get the floor done before winter kicks in.

At the moment the space is about 7*8 meters so I'¨ll have plenty of room in the finished workshop. I've booked my friends to come help me lay down the concrete this saturday. After that, it will be smooth sailing, right?

New place, new possibilites

Me. my wife and my son moved from the city to a house in the country a little over a week ago. We bought it from my parents who didn't need as much space anymore. The place used to be a small farm built after WW2 and my parents bought the place from the sons of the original owner after he had died in the early 90's. When we originally moved in, there wasn't running water, the electricity wiring was original (1950) and there was a lot to do. We did some small scale farming there until Finland joined the EU and well.. small scale farming ended up being a losing business. My father has spent a lot of time, money and effort modernizing the place and we're continuing the effort.

The house is a 25 minute ride away from my place of work so it's quite well situated. What's more important, there's plenty of room for all sorts of hobbies and activities. When I originally moved out from here to study in the university, I felt claustrofobic in a 12 square meter dormitory room. Not much space to paint miniatures and build terrain there, either. Now.. I have this:

Its the old barn of the farm. Part stone, part wood. My dad kept horses there until a couple of years ago, and its now used as storage. I intend to convert it into a workshop/gamespace/mancave!

The barn is filled with junk and it will take a lot of work, but I will dismantle the enclosures, put down a new floor, paint the roof and insulate the walls. As manly it would be to have stone walls in your workshop, the temperature drops sometimes below -30 celsius during the winter and the place definitely needs the extra layer of insulation inside if I intend to keep it warm and dry during the winter months. 

Building the workshop is somehow not on the top of the list of things to do over here according to my wife, but once I have time for it, I intend to bore you with the details. I'm happy I have enough space to put down a decent gaming table and leave projects lying around again. Heck, I have enough space to host a re-enactment if I want to!