Mechanical Men - Why & How

MECHANICAL MEN
One of the most popular units in my Victorian Science Fiction collection is the Mechanical Men. I have been asked about how I made them and also how they are used.
Firstly I will explain the rationale behind them. I wanted a unit of artificial humanoids. I imagined them to be a form of early, clockwork robots. They needed to be almost unstoppable in melee but to have a few design flaws due to being prototypes.

Game Play
In the GASLIGHT rules I use units are ten strong, so for this unit I have eight mechanical men and two mechanics to maintain them. They are also supported by their inventor, Professor McHoots; a character figure from Eureka. He has powered skates which allow him double movement. Each mechanical man is rolled for on each turn to sustain its mechanical function. However if the sustain roll is failed that figure cannot move again until Professor McHoots or a mechanic has fixed it. This can lead to the unit being spread out over a considerable distance as the game unfolds. For this reason the unit cohesion rule is ignored. Anyone controlling(?) this unit has therefore got their work cut out. On the plus side each mechanical man is devastating in melee and will almost always kill a human opponent and has a good chance of damaging vehicles or buildings.

Construction
Now comes the interesting bit – how to build your own unit of Mechanical Men.
The upper and lower body, legs and arms come from plastic Games Workshop Empire infantry sets or Mordheim warband (the same figures repackaged I think). I don't know if they are still available but may be on E-bay.

The weapons need to be removed and the legs detached from the lower torso using a sharp modelling knife. The rest of the parts you need are two sorts of small washers. I used 4mm shake-proof washers and 3.5mm flat washers from my local B&Q store – you need quite a lot of these for the entire unit. For the heads I used metal BB pellets but small ball bearings or plastic pellets should work just as well. I used a thick super glue such as Zap-A-Gap throughout. Remember to take care, no one wants a Mechanical Man attached to your fingers – just think what the doctor might say.

The washers are glued together in pairs, 1 shakeproof onto 1 flat. I originally intended using a flat washer sandwiched between 2 shakeproof but the result was slightly too thick in my opinion, but feel free to experiment. The resulting part will act as a joint between arms and shoulder, legs and hips and in the waist of each Man. The serrated nature of the shakeproof washers is intended to give the impression of a gearing mechanism in each joint.
Now glue a washer pair to each shoulder on the upper torso of the figure, the shakeproof washer should face outward. Similarly glue a pair to each hip of the lower torso, shakeproof washer facing outwards. A better bond is produced if the plastic parts are all roughed up with a small file or sand paper prior to gluing. Once dry attach the legs and arms to the appropriate washers. I tried to keep legs fairly straight as the figures need to stand on the base but arms can be stuck in any position. My intention was to have figures obviously flailing their arms about, attempting to maintain balance as they walked.

The next stage was to glue the lower half to the base. Then the final washer pair was glued to the waist of the lower torso. When all this was dry and secure the upper body was glued onto the waist washer with the upper body turned to maintain that flailing appearance. The final part of the construction was to glue the pellet head onto the neck of the upper torso. It is important to allow each stage to set well before attaching the next part. You may find the a little reshaping of parts, such as legs and arms, will result in a better fit onto the washers. The whole structure can seem a little frail at times but once painted and varnished it will become more robust.

The final Mechanical Man is on the right. The other two were earlier versions which I think failed to give the correct impression. I was trying to avoid cutting the legs from the lower torso but in the end I was pleased that I did take the time to do so.

The Paint Job
All that remains is to paint them.
Spray black undercoat all over. Two coats is usually sufficient but as the black colour is a base for the figures a third coat for luck should do.
I then dry brushed most of the figure with a metallic brass colour and the highlighted with a lighter gold shade. This was used to pick out the “cogs” on the shakeproof washers and the edge of each washer in the pairs at each joint. Some of the bands on the wrists and body of the figure can also be painted in the lighter shade. For the head I painted lines and swirls around the black base colour to give the impression of movement within the round head. I then added a couple of silver lines on the head to show reflections and give it more variety.
The results were simple, quick and, in my opinion, effective.

They can work well in other settings too Pulp, Sci-fi, horror etc.

I look forward to your comments and suggestions for improvements.