By Keith Magee

A lot of people come to our site' and while Jim owns and sweats all the details, the very nature of our user- driven content, camaraderie, and faithfulness to armorama.com really does make it 'our site'. At the same time, Jim has had to take huge amounts of time, effort, and yes - money to make this happen for all of us. I thought it would be a nice gesture to give something back, and give you something in return.

With this in mind, 24 hours ago, I - like many of you, pledged Jim $10 through his Paypal account to help fund new upgrades to the server for the benefit of all users. Then I thought, 'Hang on, this may darn take forever at this rate, we need to find a way to raise more funds faster.'

So I make you this offer.

Below is an opportunity for a few folks to make a more substantial contribution to ARMORAMA.COM, while benefiting immediately yourself. As many of you know, I build dioramas professionally. I have pieces in corporations, private collections, libraries, and even a few in VFW halls and museums. Each piece is original and one-of-a-kind. Prices for finished pieces go anywhere from $100 to $2,300. You can see much of my work here on the website, just by clicking on the FEATURES tab, and looking at the Hall of Fame. Caen ’44 is the number one viewed feature article on the site, and has been for the better part of a year. Overall, I have about 20 or more published articles on the site. My work is an open book to you.

With all this said, I have decided to create a piece available ONLY to registered users of Armorama.com, and will split the profits from each unit sold, directly to Jim to be used as he sees fit for the betterment of the site. In fact, I want you to pay Jim via his Paypal account, and he can simply forward to me my share. This offer is good for now until April 30th, after which I will no longer sell the piece at these prices.

Realizing not everyone has the same interests, I am further making this actually two offers, 'The Wall' which is a building block for all sorts of possibilities, and the complete plaster set 'Le Armorama' (loosely an 'The Armor warehouse'). Take a look at the images below, and decide if you would like to have a kit for yourself, while building a better website for us all in the process.

The Wall
$12.95 per wall, with $5.00 donated to Armorama.com

I have hand-carved and cast a 1:35 to 1:32 scale brick wall piece that is intended to serve as a variation unit. You can take the single wall shown below, and create several types of ruins. Or you can use it as an undamaged section in your own works. The piece ss roughly 9' long, 6 inches high, and about 3/8 inches thick. Perfect for a two story warehouse, an office, alley sidewall, or a host of other projects.

The image on below (left) is the actual 'wall' casting' while the image below-right, modified electronically, shows how you might further cusomize the piece for your own purposes.

Use "The Wall" to augment your own work, or create an unusual and never duplicated stand-alone diorama. Buy 2 or more wall pieces to create larger settings, or to use in future projects. $12.95 ea, plus S/H. Texas residents at 8.25% tax. $5 per unit is donated to ARMORAMA.

General concept behind 'The Wall'

I created this piece, as I do many of the pieces you see in my work, by first creating a master, and then casting it in RTV. As many of you know, the cost of RTV is quite expensive (about $25-30 per lb.), and the mold on this piece weighs in at over 4 lbs. It isn’t practical to cast an RTV mold unless you are sure you can get your money’s worth out of the final mold. This is why I always try to create and mold pieces that are widely useful. As you can see, each brick was cut in 'one at a time', creating over 1,000 individual bricks, each one realistic in shape, dimension, and proportion to the type of hand-made brick found all over Europe and some sections of North America from the 1700’s onward. You will get good mileage from this piece!

By slicing off various sections of the wall (figure 3), and using NO OTHER PIECES, I was able to create the following possible designs (4,5,6), for use as a stand-alone diorama setting (red lines indicate a CUT).

Le Armorama
$40 per piece, with $12 going towards Armorama.com

I basically took an older piece I had cast a while back (the Warehouse) and integrated it with one 'wall'. The Warehouse is a very difficult piece to cast correctly' there is a lot of fine detail and filigree work that can easily break' plus, it is just darn BIG and this accounts for the price. The original was cast using a Grandt Line door, cut and modified to 1:35 scale. Sheets of thin wood and Plastruct 'finished brick veneer were used to create the exterior texture, which runs inside the depth of the bay opening, and under the actual archway itself. While not an exact match to the bricks in 'The Wall', you will see from the work in progress (shown in color below) that they do go together fairly well.

I made the rolling door from corrugated paper, and the metal 'rafters' are simply off-the-shelf pieces from my local hobby dealer’s Plastruct selection. Please note that the kit at this price only includes the PLASTER PIECES and ONE SHEET of the stiff corrugated paper - the Plastruct styrene pieces are NOT included in this price. Also, you will have to decide how & if you want to break up your 'wall' to look like the work in progress below.

HOW TO ORDER

1) First come, first served. See #2.

2) Be aware that I can only make about 2 or 3 pieces per day' it is a slow process to make sure that the quality of the plaster is right in consistency, and that it is baked to the right hardness. I use a high quality mix of plaster of Paris and dental plaster, which , while very strong and sturdy, is also about 5 times more expensive than normal plaster. It also cures more slowly.

3) To place an order, click on the link below, for either The WALL or Le ARMORAMA' This will send an email message to both Jim and myself. Indicate the number of pieces of each you would like to order and the exact physical shipping address where you want the packages sent' sorry NO PO BOXES' you must provide a street address!

4) I will calculate the weight charges from Dallas, TX, USA to your address, shipped via UPS GROUND, and will email this information to Jim, who will send you an electronic invoice via Paypal. If you have never used Paypal before, simply go to their site, and register your credit card (Visa, AMEX, Mastercard, etc.) or set up a draft account from your checking account. International funds are accepted, and the site uses a very secure server. (Paypal is owned by Ebay, the famous online auction house' their technical support is quite good if you have questions about the process).

5) Once you have paid Jim via Paypal, he will forward to me your confirmation of payment, and I will send out your order.

I will pack your order to commercial standards, but be aware that plaster IS BREAKABLE' and there is a chance that there may be minor damage to your piece in shipping. Usually, this is easily repaired by even the newest modeler, using plaster or dry-wall paste ('spackle). If you receive a piece that is shattered beyond repair, please notify me directly ([email protected]), and I will replace the piece at no additional charge, except the cost of re-shipping you a new unit.

Order The Wall ($12.95 ea. + shipping)

Order Le Armorama ($40.00 ea. + shipping)