Revised and updated gaming table

Over the last couple of months I have been able to spend more time in the garden and on my hobby. I've written magazine articles and searched through my Lead Mountain to pick-out miniatures to model and paint. One of my larger projects was to up-date my well-used gaming table. The image above shows the finished table or table topper.....

The table was built many years ago from three panels of white polystyrene packing material (used to protect display fridges during transit) with a strip-wood frame or surround. The gaming surface was first covered with manilla envelopes torn into small sections and glued in place with PVA glue then painted green. Over the years I have added layer after layer of railway scatter material or dyed sawdust. Images of the gaming table have appeared throughout the Blog. 

Here is an image of the bottom of the table. Note the torn newspaper sections which have two uses - firstly; they are repairing damaged sections of the exposed foam and secondly; they help to secure the two wooden battens which were added to strengthen the polystyrene panels and stop 'bowing'.

My first job was to sand the surface and remove any obvious rough areas. Over the years of use and adding more dyed sawdust the main surface was far from flat!

I added three areas of high ground. These were built from more polystyrene. The first (top right and covered in white filler) was a domed hill with the top cut off. Like the main board this was built many years ago but had not been used for ages. The second area (also to the right and just below the domed hill) was the section that I had cut off the top of the domed hill. And thirdly a much larger and flatter hill (bottom left). All three hills were glued in place with No More Nails and further secured with cut-down cocktail sticks pressed into the hills and board surface. I smoothed the transition from flat board to hill with both ready-mixed filler and Modelling Compound from Gaming Geek.

As you can see there were other areas of filler added to the sawdust covered board. these were where the surface had been damaged or I wanted to smooth out any deep ruts.

Once the new surface had been added I painted the whole board in muted browns and pale greens. I used both a large paintbrush and my airbrush for this.

Later I searched through my many part bags of flock and ground foam and mixed them all together to produce a more natural looking, multi-coloured mix and applied this over a patchwork of PVA glue.

The final steps were to 'blend' different areas my Paasche H model airbrush and add some areas of ground foam. Here you can see the finished board with the edges painted satin black - the image was taken in strong sunlight.

The gaming table or table topper gaming board is 1700mm long x 990mm wide. It is extremely light, being built from just strip-wood and plain white expanded polystyrene.

I have yet to game of the new board and don't look forward to re-flocking my terrain pieces (they are all edged in plain dyed sawdust to blend in with the old gaming surface - they will need to be updated and I will do this as and when they are needed or I have time). I hope you like the new gaming surface - I do. But for now - stay safe and

Keep Calm and Carry On Modelling

Tony