The Gorgonaught
8-30-2007:  The upcoming release of apocalypse has me pumped up about getting back to basics with my orks.  The news about the inclusion of an Ork "Stompa-Titan" datafax is really exciting.  The modelling possibilities are going to be endless.  The recent pictures of converted ork stompas in White Dwarf gives us some idea about the correct scale, so I've decided to start construction on my first plasticard stompa using those pictures and the availible pictures of the epic supa-stompa as guides.
I had a chaos landraider with double tracks taking up space in my bits box.  I wasn't really happy with it and I didn't think I'd ever use it for its original purpose, so I stripped off the weapons and the front hatch and it became the propulsion unit for the Gorgonaught.

I started by cutting rear and side panels that I thought were about the right size.  I'm going for a  shoulder height of roughly 10".  Converted to epic scale, that would make the Gorgonaught roughly the same size as a supa-stompa or a mek-boy gargant.

I wanted to make sure that the initial structure would be sturdy, so I built a frame of plastic sprues to reinforce things on the inside.

I also covered some of the forward tracks and the open front with the start of some armor plating.
9-4-2007:  I got some work on the Gorgonaught accomplished over the holiday weekend
First up was the head / control room.  I wanted it to be large enough to hold several ork crew and some detailing.

I'm envisioning hatches up to the top of the head and down further into the stompa at the rear of the control room.
Then came the front plate.  I started by cutting out the rough size I needed to cover the front.  Then I put that aside and built a housing for the belly gun.  The gun sits in a simple box.  There won't be any exciting details buried down inside there, so it is pretty small.  Getting the gun housing sides cut to a matching angle with the front of the stompa was something of a trick. 

I got away from my "structure first - details later" plan and added some strips of reinforced armor plates around the belly gun opening. 

I also cut a slot for the head to rest in at the top of the front plate.  I'm liking the way he's got a hunched shoulders / out-thrust jaw look starting to take form.
Next up were the shoulders.  I wanted them to be sturdy, so I cut each of them out of the thickest plasti-card I had availible. 

I wanted to make sure everything was going to fit correctly, so there was a lot of dry-fitting at this stage in order to line things up.  Once I was satisfied that it would all come together, I broke out the glue and started attaching the front and shoulders.

The head is still loose at this point because it will be much easier to detail that way.
9-13-2007 Update:   I moved the projekt along some this week.  I needed another arm weapon, and although I was a little uncertain about how I was going to do it I wanted to do a big gatling kustom kannon.  The basic arm shape is the same as the mega-choppa arm.  I figured that ork meks might not be big on symmetry and standardization, but they probably stick with what worked for them before.  (which is exactly why I decided they would be the same size).

My first attempt to build the kannon barrels wasn't very inspirng.  It was definitely orky, but it looked like that if the kannon was to fire at all it would jam or fly apart in its first rotation.  I went back and rebuilt it a day later using a better guide to line up the barrels and keep them straight.  Now it looks worky and not so self-destructive.
Mega-Choppa Arm Gatlin' Kustom Kannon Arm
Front View with both arms.
I only had a rough idea of what I wanted the rear of the Gorgonaught to look like.  I knew I wanted to use a big tank from the chemical plant set and I wanted a couple of levels of platforms for the meks and grots to clamber around on.  I pulled out a big box of bits and started trying to line things up and get some more concrete ideas.

This type of work always seems to take forever to conceptualize and then only a short time to actually assemble.  There was a lot of dry fitting the various bits I found and trying to decide what should go where.  I'm pretty happy with the end results though.  A lot of the bits are black, so they don't show up well in these photos because of the high contrast between them and the white plasticard.
Rear view of the Gorgonaught.

Definitely not an OSHA approved workplace.
Update 10-09-2007:   I’ve been working on the stompa, but it has been slow and I’ve been lazy about taking pictures.  Most construction is done to my satisfaction at this point.  I still need to add a launch rack with three soopa-rockets to the right shoulder, but I’m waiting on parts to arrive in the mail.

Since my last update, I’ve added a bunch of secondary weapons (soopa skorcha in a nipple mount, twin-linked big shoota down at ground level, a big shoota in each shoulder control room, and a rear mounted big shoota), put on shutters for the view ports into the shoulder weapon control stations, installed a gadgety power field generator on the left shoulder,  added lots of armor plates, and glued on lots of rivets.
The weapon arms are both attached with magnets to make it easier to transport or modify the model later.
Soopa-Skorcha nipple-mount:
Power field generator:
Twin-linked big shoota:
Left shoulder gunner's station:
Right shoulder gunner's station: