25mm Hut from TCS

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Tactical Conflict Systems makes a product line called Hollow Houses which are - you guessed it! - hollow inside, with removeable roofs. The products vary from the Wild West to African jungles, and are available painted or unpainted. The product we were sent was H-41 (25mm scale, unpainted), Round Wood with Hide Roof Urt.

The product is made of taffy-colored resin, and seems sturdy enough. The hut is a tube roughly 3" across, with walls about 1/4" thick. There is a door and a window, and the timber pattern is deeply scribed. There is no interior detail. The roof piece is a solid dome, flat and smooth on the bottom. (You may think at first that the roof doesn't quite fit the hut, but if you rotate the roof, you can find a position in which the roof fully covers all of the hut.)

I started by trimming a minor "lip" of resin from the bottom of the roof piece, so that it did not project out further than the furs. (You'll still have a tiny "base" below the furs, but it's minor, and not easily removed without sanding the entire bottom of the piece.) The hut piece had no flash. I then washed the pieces in mild detergent, let them dry, sprayed the bottoms with flat black spray enamel (because I like that look), and primed the visible parts (the top) with flat white spray enamel.

The hut was simple. I painted the outside with a wash of Apple Barrel Burnt Umber, one of my "miracle paints." The inside and top lip was painted with Apple Barrel Brown Oxide, in two coats. I had some problems with the hut. I tried painting it with a very, very, very watery wash of the Burnt Umber, which turned out great and gave me a grey-brown hut that looked like it had been around for a long time. But I had problems getting an even coat, so that the hut looked kind of blotchy with a darker side and a lighter side. (I think the problem might have been an uneven coat of primer...) Touch-ups didn't help, so I finally painted the whole hut with a heavier wash of the same color. I think it looks fine, but my friends say the earlier version was cooler if I could have fixed it.

(If I was to try this project a second time, I'd be tempted to try a dark brown primer coat, then drybrush with a light brown.)

The roof was easy. I decided I wanted a "bleached" look to the furs, so I painted the roof with a light tan wash. I also painted the bottom with Brown Oxide, to match the hut interior. (The interior isn't the highlight of this terrain piece, so my goal was to paint it a dark color and let it fade into the background.)

I finished everything off with the usual coat of clear flat protectant (Testor's Dullcote).