There's been a lot of talk about using the quad gun provided in the Aegis Defense Line for converting a Chimera into a Hydra Flak Tank. The Forge World version of the Hydra has a huge quad autocannon mounted onto the back of a Basilisk chassis. The quad autocannon in the Aegis box is only about half as big. This actually makes for an even easier conversion, although it doesn't look at all like the Forge World version. I'm calling it the Aegis pattern Hydra Flak Tank.
You start with the current Chimera kit, fully assembled, and an assembled quad autocannon from the Aegis kit. This assumes that you haven't somehow permanently attached either the turret on the Chimera or the quad gun to its Aegis base.
You're also going to need the bit of sprue from a flying stand, a 40mm, or a 60mm round base. The small cylindrical piece on the side that you have to clip off before using the base. Cut it from the base and use a file to make the piece entirely cylindrical, then glue it to the bottom of the round base of the quad gun. That's it.
Now you can simply remove the Chimera turret and replace it with the quad gun, and you can still put the quad gun back in its original base for use in the defense line, and the turret back on the Chimera for use as a regular Chimera.
Edit: I noticed shortly after posting this that I'd foolishly followed the directions in the box and assembled the barrels upside down. Fortunately, the glue hadn't set, so I was able to take the ammo canisters off and assemble it correctly. Something to be aware of in assembling the gun, but it has no bearing on the conversion.
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Cool! I'm more interested in this Imperial Guard army I've never heard about. Got any more models painted?
I've assembled a test model for my pig iron headed Cadians that I eventually plan to use for the bulk of my infantry, but I'm still in the planning stages as far as what my paint scheme is going to be.
I'm also undecided as to whether or not I'm going to stick to that gray and ochre camo scheme or not.
IG has slid into tertiary status at the moment as I continue to work on my terrain, with a little time being spent on my Eldar as well.
There are a couple of pictures of my old IG models in my flickr 40K album.
Lookin' good. Nice smooth color transitions.
Question: do 40k tanks have something like rails instead of treads? I'm seeing rollers where I expect treads but then there's an edge there and I wonder if that's like some sort of chain/rail type tread or something.
Nope, they have treads, the model simply isn't finished yet. The tanks are a lot easier to paint if you hold off on assembling the treads until the last. The camo work is a result of my first attempts at using an air brush which I just recently purchased.
hi there, i like the enthusiasm for the aegis quads, but i do have a couple of nit picky observations, theres no sensor array for the hydras "auto-targetting system" special rule, and i'm not sure if the aegis autocannons are long-barrelled to count for the 72" range of the hydra guns.
in my eyes theres nothing wrong in a friendly game, but you could find yourself up against a player who is a bit miffed about the lack of WYSIWYG in just mounting an aegis on a chimera.
@ TSINI
Let's look at these "issues" that you raise.
1) An "auto-targeting system" could easily be a computer controlled system that wouldn't be outwardly visible, since it would be inside the armor.
2) The autocannon barrels are about an inch long. When we convert the scale, that makes them five or six feet long.
Let's convert the 72" game range to real world ranges, and we have them firing out to distances of less than 1,000 yards.
Weapons with barrels much shorter than five feet are capable of firing projectiles accurately to ranges of over 1,000 yards.
Any player that raised a stink about the conversion would shortly find themselves back in their mom's basement, all alone, with nobody to play toys soldiers with.
Rex Here,
Hey,
there is a targeter bit that comes with that kit. Just throw it on the top and you have a targeting system. Also, the long barrel rule is only in the Imperial Armour books, and VDR, not in the regular 40k 5ed rules. So, if someone says, "waaaa, your model doesn't look like the pretty pictures in the book." tell them to get stuffed.
I appreciate everyone's feedback, but I have to agree with the majority here concerning the longer barrel issue. These kinds of conversions are going to be extremely common, so tournaments better be prepared to rule on it ahead of time if they feel otherwise. Not that I'm a tournament player anyway. In anything outside of a tournament I'd have to take Joe and Rex's advice to heart.
The targeter bit will go on eventually, it's not on in the picture because of the issue with the upside down barrels: I couldn't figure out how it went on. Once I got the barrels on the right way it became obvious how it was supposed to work. First thing I'll do when I get back to the model is to attach it, but I'm too busy with my Eldar right now to worry about it.
This is what i do to but i did not bother mounting a pin under the guns since i found it fits nice and snugs all on its own.
I agree that the pin is not completely necessary, but it does add some extra stability to the piece.
Very nice work, I went ahead and made my own conversion. One thing i noticed is the chimera turret mount in your post has a single hole in it, perfect for the pin to fit into. The Chimera i bought has different slot, much larger with 2 tabs on the side. Unfortunately that made the pin useless in my conversion.
They redid the sprues about a year or so after I did this conversion. They must have changed the mounting on the Chimera turret at that time.
As someone else commented earlier, the pin isn't essential, so the conversion should still work without the pin.
If you want more stability there's probably a way to use the new slot, but as I've been away from the game for a while now I haven't seen the new mounting, so I can't give any concrete suggestions.
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