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Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Cobblestone Streets & Stonework by Vampisol

Recently, while browsing a railway modeling forum I discovered a German terrain supplies manufacturer: Vampisol. The site is in German only so I'll try my best to provide translations in the following to help any interested non-German to find their way around there.

In the "Spur 0" range (see: O Scale) there are two sections with great products for 28mm wargamers: "Kopfsteinpflaster" (cobblestones) and "Mauerplatten" (stonework). Let's look at the cobblestones first:

Cobblestone Streets


"Segmentbogenpflasterplatte" (V3050),
cobblestone street with segmental arch pattern
"Anschlußstück, Kreuzungsbauteil Segmentbogenpflaster" (V3054),
connection/crossing piece for the segmental arch streets

There are two types of cobblestone patterns available:
  • Segmental arch pattern (depicted above)
  • Stretcher bond pattern (see below) [Wikipedia]
For both patterns there are supplemental products available such as kerbs ("Randsteine"), the segmental arch connection piece and a sidewalk.

"Pflasterplatte Großformat Reihenverband" (V3056),
stretcher bond cobblestone street (two pieces shown)

The segmental arch cobbles pieces measure 124mm x 131mm and cost €4,50.
The stretcher bond pieces measure 124mm x 70mm and cost €3,00 a piece.

There is a super useful street planner PDF file available that allows you to get a proper impression of the cobblestone pieces' sizes. This was very helpful and I wish every terrain manufacturer would offer similar guides for their products. Very good service indeed!

Stonework

The other cool section - "Mauerplatten" - consists of three types of stonework, each 118mm x 158mm board is €4,00. I ordered the "Bruchstein" (quarrystone, V3001):

"Bruchstein" (V3001), quarrystone wall

Comparison shot with a Black Scorpion pirate
and a fishwife by Warlord Games

The three available designs are: Ashlar, flagstone and the already mentioned quarrystone.

From left to right: "Bruchstein" (quarrystone), "Werkstein" (ashlar), "Haustein" (flagstone)


All mentioned Vampisol products are made from dental plaster. The stonework boards are available in either white or grey colour. A little word of caution: The cobblestone and stonework pieces are 2mm thin and some of them arrived broken from shipping. This is no big deal though because the breaking edges of the plaster are "clean" and are not visible when putting the pieces together. Also, there's always a small bag of plaster included to fill gaps with when assembling and "building" the final layout.

Verdict: Highly recommended! I have been looking for nice cobblestone and/or flagstone boards to pave my city with for quite a long time. So far I have only found Stronghold Terrain's cobblestone streets and Tabletop World's Town Square to be of acceptable quality. While the Stronghold streets are very nice in detail they are somewhat narrow. The Vampisol street tiles are designed to be extended in both length and width, so they are perfectly suited to build larger places such as market squares. In fact, I'm looking forward to using all three manufacturers' products for my board.


Update (July 17th): The new Vampisol website is up so the links are now fixed. Also, to see the finished cobblestones, check out Part 3 of the Gierburg dock section.


1 comment:

  1. I think I have just stumbled across how to do base board for Empire of the Dead. Thanks for sharing!

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