The making of the Octopod

For those of you without small children and who don't have to watch CBeebies, the Octonauts are a band of animal characters who come to the rescue of sea creatures using various sub-sea ships, and of course have an underwater base called the Octopod (that's the orange thing in the picture below). Now my son is mad about the show so we recently got him a magazine all about the Octonauts, including toy characters, and in the back of the magazine were instructions on how to make your own Octopod.

So having collected the required parts together - a tub from a shop-bought trifle, some of those yoghurt pots that are almost spherical, tin foil and of course a toilet roll tube, we were ready to start in true "Blue Peter" fashion. The instructions said to paint the pots orange, but of course the food container plastic refused to take paint, so I trundled off to the garage where I happened to have a can of red-oxide primer!

The photo contains evidence of "proper" modelling too, a batch of whitemetal details for Awngate are getting a coat of grey primer in what passes for my spray booth!

My wife gave them a couple of coats of orange poster paint mixed with PVA, the result is still a bit red but never mind, my Son and I were set for a Sunday afternoon of cutting and sticking. I attached the yoghurt pot pods using drinking straws with pipe cleaners inside, which involved a drill and a pair of pliers, they are somewhat wobbly! The printed "windows" from the magazine were stuck in place and the Octopod was ready for the Octonauts to move in!

A bit of a change from "serious" model railways (not that I ever take it too seriously I hope!) but a bit of fun that should encourage a 4-year-old boy to think that making things is fun. Roll-on the Airfix kits ...!