Making a Percheron - part 2

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From drawing board to workshop

To construct a model horse with a flesh like finish, to complement other scale models. The finished display was to be in a "working" gait, complete with appropriate harness, a driver and a cart or a plough. However, these complementary models do not form any part of this article.

From the drawing, we lined-in the basic shape of the head and bodypiece, and completed the same for the legs. From these drawing shapes we traced the outlines and transferred them to a stiff piece of card. We cut around the outline on the card thus forming patterns for the bodypiece and for the legs. By drawing around these patterns when they were placed upon a piece of suitable plywood, we had moved from the two-dimensional to the start of the three-dimensional model and so our modelling skills took on a new form. Interestingly, a husband and wife team develop skills that neither knew they had, but proves what we DID know, i.e. "many hands make light work".

The workshop tools we used were those typically found in the home, DIY and craftwork enthusiasts' workshop. This model could be constructed by the use of hand tools alone. But, our use of power tools bandsaw, drill, belt-sander, power chisel and so on, eased our workload and speeded the completion of the model. Having transferred the patterns to the plywood, we cut out the required shape. We used a bandsaw with a quarter inch blade for this type of work, and we now had a bodypiece and four legs cut to basic shape.

The plywood parts	Assembled

Next, we set about positioning the legs relative to the bodypiece. This we did by clamping the bodypiece upright at 16" above the workbench. We used wood scrap and as many clamps as we could muster. We find that model making of this class demands many clamps of many sizes. We now had the bodypiece upright and securely clamped in a position that agreed with the drawing. Next we drilled a 1/8th-clearance hole at the top centre of the nearside hind and nearside fore leg to act as the pivot point from which the gait was to be determined. We clamped these to the bodypiece in the desired positions and using the pivot hole in the legs as the guide, we drilled through the bodypiece. Next we clamped the undrilled offside legs in their respective positions and using the nearside legs' pivot holes as the guide, we drilled through to hold the offside legs also in their pivot positions. Then with two nuts and bolts, temporarily, we secured the legs to the bodypiece.

Removing all the clamps, we stood the "model" on the bench and it remained upright after some adjustments. Without the nut and bolt assembly to fit the legs, the adjustment would not have been nearly so easy. However, the model was definitely herring gutted (too narrow), and the legs had to be set away from the bodypiece by means of wooden spacing blocks. Again we removed the bolts and by trial and error shaped suitable spacers. From our sketched plan we thought that a maximum width of 5 inches was suitable, but the body padding was to add a little to this dimension and we did reduce it by reducing the size of the spacers. Once the body width and leg positions had been established to our liking, a second bolt was inserted just below the leg pivot positions to ensure that the legs remained securely in position.

The next procedure was to mark out where the series of holes were needed to enable the rib cage wires to be inserted, and we removed the legs to drill the series.
We next turned to the facemask. To give it width, we screwed a piece of wood at right angles to the face end of the bodypiece, inserted the facemask to align with the nose, and glued additional pieces of wood to the head areas to obtain shape, and to form the cheek bones.
Returning to each leg, we glued additional blocks of straight grained wood to both sides at the hoof areas, making sure that the grain was vertical with the upright leg. These blocks were roughly carved to shape the hooves, but left unfinished. We now had the basic skeleton, complete with rudimentary hooves in the assembled position.

The elementary shape of the head was obtained by using self-hardening (S.H.) modelling clay worked to the size and shape required. Again this was a trial and error process which tested our skills to the limit. Glass eyes obtained from soft toy suppliers were fitted at this stage. We found the pupils of these eyes were more circular than those of a horse and a compromise was obtained by using clear glass eyes, which we painted to give an oval slit, equine appearance. The positions for the ears were made and we shaped the ears from folded felt to be glued later into their respective places. The final position of the ears was important to the look of the finished model and we spent much time and care on this detail. Now we decided that the head required "turning" to a more realistic working position. This we did bycutting off the head section from the bodypiece and refitting it, using a metal plate to make the joint. This plate could be bent to shape by trial and error, then bolted back into position and covered later by filling in the neck.

Padding out the horse

We next replaced the legs, tightened all the bolt assemblies and cut off excess length, and oil pained any exposed metal to prevent rusting. Next we turned our attention to the body or "barrel". We threaded plated wire through the predrilled holes to form the ribs and filled in between them with newsprint. The rib positions were not critical, as they would be covered subsequently, but at this point we were at the stage of filling in details which were to give the final appearance. We used a number of materials, including papier mache and the modelling clay. We also needed to carve off parts of the plywood skeleton to obtain the required shape, particularly at the rear end. The general rule was to apply little and often, and compare drawings and photographs. Before attempting to contour the materials we allowed them to harden. Then we used rasps, chisels, saws and anything that "cut." A super fine finish was not required at this stage, but the general conformation was important. We found papier mache good for filling in the larger areas and modelling clay for the finer shapes.

We next carved and painted the hooves to suit the leg detail, but in the end rejected making metal shoes and carved and painted in the nail details. Next the batting was sewed, tacked and glued to all the basic body parts, while the face and parts of the legs were covered with felt. We used special fabric glue for this task. Care and skill were required to fix the felt so that a good life like finish was obtained and also to get the felt seam lines in such a position that they hugged the body shape and where possible, could be covered by the harness. We next sewed together a felt "coat" that could be draped over the model and "fitted" to the body shape. There was a join-line down the backbone and the remainder was stretched down and fitted round the legs, where other join lines were required. The felt was dampened at the positions which required stretching to match the leg form, or where darts were required. We cut the felt at these areas to form a butt joint, pushing the felt edges into close contact to give a neat join line.

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