Monday 8 October 2018

Cheval de frise


A couple of wargaming buddies started their new c.1706 Great Northern War project and I finally could not resist joining in.  One of the few conflicts I have little knowledge, brief research had me going to collect forces of the Electorate of Saxony which allied itself with WillB’s Russians against KevinA’s Swedes.

Apparently not too confident about defending against the aggressive Swedes, it was common for these early 18th C Saxons to employ these spiky defences along their whole front.
my finished examples on the tabletop

While I have a few of these in metal, I felt I would need more.  Inspiration had me look at the used sprues of the cavalry and plastic toothpicks bought cheaply at the dollar store for a very inexpensive solution as the following photos illustrate.
Metal version (manufacturer unknown)
Pieces of the sprue cut off. The two will be then glued together to form a square post.
Plastic toothpicks. The ends are cut off to length.  I used only the red ones!
All glued together.  The model glue melted the plastic to allow the toothpick ends to remain upright with only a couple moments of being held in place to my surprise
Primered in black, now looking the part
Finished version.  The figure is a Warlord (nee Wargames Factory) plastic WSS era horseman.