Product Review: Ironheart Artisans Paint Brush Rack

As some of you know I have friends all over the country, and recently one of my friends from MD, Dameon, asked if I wanted a Brush rack that he had one of his friends (Alex from Ironheart Artisans) to make. After looking how sad my Coffee Mug full of brushes looked I gladly said yes.

Not knowing exactly what to expect I soon got a package in the mail....That package that had 5 MDF laser cut parts in it that was SO WONDERFUL smelling It took me back in time to when I could smell wood burning stoves and fireplaces. Being in South East Alabama now I dont get the opportunity to smell those anymore. Anyway I quickly assembled the brush rack (5 mins tops) and started putting it to use. When I had finished and saw how awesome this thing was I asked myself... "this thing is ONLY $10??". Its an amazing deal.

The Following pictures were taken from Ironheart Artisans WEBSITE and are used without their knowledge or permission:

My rack was a "MK1" test model so mine looked a bit different:

SO I needed to make mine a little more..... "Munkey". So I started up and set out to make it Hot rod!!! I got busy with the Airbrush and made some cool effects and then went to my Vinyl Plotter and whipped up some custom Flaming dice Stencils and airbrushed them to a piece of black poster board that I then  glued to the supports. Here is what it looked like when I was done:

Yea... Something I was happy to put my brushes on!!! Anyway Back to the review, Here is the cut and dry of it...

Pros:

1. Price- At $10 you almost cant go wrong. Its a great deal.
2. Design- its made to be easily loaded and unloaded and there is room on the "hooks" for multiple brushes OR for bigger brushes like terrain brushes or the like.
3. Assembly- Its 5 parts and almost go together by themselves.... Easy to put together!!
4. Sturdiness- Its Laser cut MDF and its built to last a while. I did put 6 drops of superglue on mine to lock the joins but they may not be needed.
5. Smell- Laser cut MDF smells GREAT to me as I like the smell of a campfire and the great outdoors. This pleased me almost more than anything else...

Cons:

Long term storage- Someone mentioned that storing brushes horizontal for extended periods of time will cause the bristles to "bend"... While I don't know about this I will list it as a "con" because it was something someone on the internet wasn't happy with... and I needed ONE THING in the con section. ;) if you put your sheaths back on your brushes and actually use brush soap with them and take care of your brushes it should not be a problem

Overall I Love this holder and plan to purchase 2-3 more for other brushes I have I need to put up. Its a home run in my opinion and I am happy I got one. Its a great product and its easy on the wallet to boot.

Till next time 

Munkey!!

PS here are 2 more reviews from some of my buddies who recieved this product. check them out too if your not sold on what Im saying!!

My buddy Dameon who sent me mine- Khepri's Eternal Legion Blog

And my buddy Larry who had a good idea for an Alt use!! Djinn24 Youtube

Dark Hunters Razorback....Errr Predator.

Well I got the tracks DONE!!!

these were pieced together from the old tracks and surprisingly I was able to do alot of cheating and reused most of the broken links. Im not terribly worried about the detailed lok as much as I am about "Table Top" look. I used "Framers Matting" as my stock to fill in the missing parts and only cut a rectangle. you can detail it if you wish with cutouts on the sides for the indv links and use a ballpoint pen to make a divot to look like links but I dont care enough with this tank to do that.

Next will be spraypaint and then to the paintbooth!! Im painting it with Navy (Dark Blue) Krylon American classics because thats what I have here and can find close to the color I was painting them before. from there I will Airbrush highlights and such on it then details, and final step will be weathering!!! Huzzah for the long weekend!!

WIP Dark hunters Razorback

OK Well an UPDATE to the WIP Dark Hunters Razorback. After a Super Clean soak (tut here) of about 6 hours (I let it soak while I slept) I woke up and took a toothbrush to the parts. they came mostly apart and some of the superglue had released and broken apart. Here is a quick pic of what it looked like after the strip:

Now as you can see it did really well in the strip bath. I then strained out the liquid and tossed in the red rhino pictured in the group shot in the last post. It seems to still be working fine and the red rhino was crazy with thick paint so it wont hurt to leave it in for a while!!! Anyway I went to town breaking apart the model so I can ensure good joints and proper placement. I used my tool kit and made pretty quick work of the joins.  Trouble areas on this model were the tracks (plastic glued in place) and the floor (also plastic glued). the tracks will have to be spliced together and such to look good but its not too bad. The floor was a pain in the neck... I had to cut out some of the floor to get it to set correct (It was plastic glued in wrong and I had to break and hack it to fit somewhat correct!!) and did some gluing with plastic glue to get a strong bond on some not so stable body parts. Its pretty strong now but it was a bear to fit it correct!! Anyway I got it glued back together and am working on the tracks now... here are pics of how it looks now

Turret and sponson weapons glued

the body sub assembled. I had to do this to ensure correct placement as a unit, so top was glued into one side and bottom was to the other. when that was dry I then fitted them together to make it a whole body.

together and banded to hold

Well this is coming together nicely and I hope it looks nice when we are done!! Till next time Serve the Emperor well!!!

Munkey

WIP Dark hunters Razorback!!

I started out to do the WGC painting challenge and pledged to paint a rhino.... BUT.....
Change of PLAN!!! it is not a Rhino Its a Razorback!!! Here is why.... I laid out my Rhinos for this project and I chose from the ones that needed some work

I found this wreck of a rhino chassis that I got from Ebay some time ago.... so I thought it was time to make some magic on it and breath some life into it!! Here is a pic overall...

and some detail shots

As you can see this is a wreck..... Its a mix of superglue, plastic glue and hot glue, and there was an attempt to magnetize parts SO I might properly attach some magnets for the sponsons. the tracks need to be redone, as well as alot of glue work.... But first it goes to the Purple Pond for a soak to clean up some paint!!!