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Hey All I’m a long time lurker and just recently joined and started posting, I recently made a SW’s army and its almost complete that being said I was looking into casing options for my new list and I have to be honest I’m a cheap SOB and so I started trying to think of a good case that was cheap effective and safe. So here’s what I came up with, a good case for about $30. It starts with a product called “Snap Ware” (this is my first tutorial it’s a bit rough, so bear with me!) see attached pics, ive given the whole case a good shake while holding it vertical and had 0 minis fall.

Materials you will need:
Snap ware case (11.99)
Steel Shingles (.98c ea.)
Liquid nails (4 bucks)
Magnets (15.99 for 50)

STEPS:
1. Get materials.
2. WASH OFF the inside of the snap ware with warm water and dish soap. Dry completely.
3. WASH OFF galvanized Shingles. Dry completely
4. Evenly spread out the liquid nails glue on BOTH the container and the bottom of the steel shingle.
5. Lay shingle glue side down in the case and weight it down (I used large books)
6. let dry for 24hours.
7 magnetize minis (this is personal preference I used n40 magnets and they work great)

Here’s a LINK for the snap ware: http://www.target.com/p/Snapware-2-Layer-Blue-10x14-Food-Storage-Container/-/A-13248390
Now this product is cool cause its CHEAP and MODULAR and its 10”w x14”l x 3.2”d so each layer has plenty of room for stuff , I have 35 infantry in a layer with room to spare and 5 tanks in a layer ( could squeeze in 6 I think)

Then I went to Home Depot and got some 8x12 Galvanized steel roofing shingles these are .98c ea and fit perfectly in the bottom of ea layer of the case. LINK: http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-202221060/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053

And while I was there I got some Liquid Nails Perfect Glue this stuff is awesome strong, and bonds to pretty much anything. Link http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1v/R-100142872/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053

That is pretty awesome I would have never thought of anything like that. I might just have to give that a go!

I might give this GREAT idea a shot. thanks!

I've seen things similar to this before. It always looks fun. What size of n40's did you use? I normally magnetize everything with n52s, so I assume you're using larger disc or cylinder magnets to actually secure them?

great minds think alike.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/406712.page

at the 6's mark of the first video you can see the one I put together.

Instead of using liquid nail I used cheap epoxy.

the N40s i used were 1/8 x 1/16th for the tanks and 3/32" x 1/32" for the infantry, but really you can use any size magnet that will fit. my one word of advice about magnetizing the bottom is to make sure your magnet sits flush!! the hold is considerably stronger when the magnet is in full contact with the steel sheet, if there's a gap it will still hold but not as well. Also i use resin bases sometimes so i drill right into those but for my hollow bases i use a nickle to fill and then glue the magnet to that. As far as n52 goes i would totally use those on tanks but i tend to avoid them on infantry.. I've seen some tragic results of limbs/legs/weapons,etc pulled off or snapped from too strong of magnets. this can mostly be avoided with common sense and care but the N40s hold quite well so i thought id use those.

Also I've actually added a 3rd layer to that case since then ... had to hold all my dice/templates etc :p

And TY all, for the kind replies I'm happy to have made some small contribution to a great resource like dakkadakka, Ive gotten so many great ideas and good info from here !

Good idea.. but a little more protection may be used.. unless the case is safe :p

Ingenius idea. It has been done before a few times that I have heard of though.

What does BluTac's chances stand anyway? Or whatever they use where-ever you are. I think Germany has a reusable adhesive putty? It might be a little weak to be safe, though. Unless you used a lot of it anyway.

Oh ya its absolutely been done many times, and ways, i only posted my little version of it since it was some materials i haven't seen used before in this particular way

Great job. I've seen alot of magnetized cases, but the use of steel shingles is a great idea.

I have a friend who magnetizes all his figure storage but in his case, he just bases all his figs on metal washers and then lines the case with a magnetic sheet.

Do you reckon this method would cope well with heavy minatures, for example Privateer press Warnouns?

i think it could, it depends on the n rating of the magnets as well as the location. my friend put some mags on the bottom of one of his metal minis to test it, (more to see if the magnet would hold metal to metal or if there would be some fighting of magnetic field) but it was a damn heavy mini and it stood just fine. also you can buy large diameter but thin magnets that would give more surface area. and TBH magnets are about 1/2 the cost of this whole system ... i mean the case the metal sheet and the glue to hold is like 15$... then whatever magnets you use. my lgs sells 50pk of n40 mags for 15 so it was about 30 total for me.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Dreadnought96 wrote:Good idea.. but a little more protection may be used.. unless the case is safe :p

heh, the case is pretty safe as far as i can tell i take my army on the road twice a week every week and its been standing up well for quite some time now. the plastic clasps on that brand of container seem really solid, i haven't noticed any reduction in the clasping power yet. however i have a friend who really liked this idea and made his own, but took it a bit farther, he added soft foam strips around the interior of the layers to make a sort of soft surrounding wall "just in case" and he also uses a small belt around the whole case when its all clasped up so there is no way it can "pop" open in his words. but i personally haven't had any problems at all.

Oh, btw that's a great sig. I'm stealing it to stick on the wall of my classroom.

Ty kind sir! can't take credit though... high school football coach, Coach Shockley! (and im sure he plagiarized it from someone before him )

This is a great idea, just what i need! Can you explain how you magnetized the vehicles? Where did you place the magnets?

i did my magnets with a 1/16" drill bit in the tank track. i made sure to drill where there was a wheel behind the track so the magnet would have a solid surface under it to sit on/glue to. the trickier part is actually UNDER drilling the holes from what most hobbyists are used too. you want the magnet to actually sit slightly out from the surface so it makes full contact with the metal sheet. this will give you the best "grab" with your magnets. hope that helps!

Soon as I start a guard army I'm doing this...

This is pretty much how I've been transporting my latest armies. Magnets aren't that expensive either, You can easily pick up 100 of them for about €10 on ebay or at maelstrom.

I don't use a snapbox though. I bought a good old steel toolbox at the local DIY store for €50. Even the sides are full steel and the rare earth magnets are strong enough to attack models to the sides in case you have to transport really big armies around.

And for my WHFB miniatures, I made the movement trays out of cut steel sheet (of 0.6 mm thick). The models are magnetised on their movement trays and then the movement trays themselves are attached to the toolblox via big magnets. I deploy my fantasy army in roughly 2 minutes if need be.

Hmmmm. I bet you could do this pretty easily with shelves too...

Pretty awesome!!

I did that once with blue-tack but magnets would be even better. Still wouldnt be ideal for the new dark eldar raiders but fine for everything else!

Best way Ive found for the raiders is a large tool box layered with foam postal sheets and filled with polystyrene chips.

That is an insanely good idea. Consider it stolen No but thank you, that is great. I have been carrying around a toolbox full ofmy guys for the past 8 months now and tons of mini have been breaking cuz of it. I need somehting like this so bad. I am sooo ogoing to do it.

Assume idea and pretty cheap to, I've had same problem as post above

I just did the same thing. If you search for the coupon for them ($3.00 off) I was able to get three of them for around $5.00 a piece. (found mine at our local Failmart for 8.37-3.00 coupon made them around 5.37 a piece!) I ended up using some foam liners we had at work and was able to line the bottom and top to give them some more security when tranported. I love the fact that I can pack up 2500 points of WOC into 4 of these and my books and dice and be on the road for under $20.00. I am in the process of magnitizing all of my bottems for some great flanged steel trays from Shogun Minatures and am going to try the steel shingles to keep them safe and sound!

What dimension of magnets did you use? Im trying to get some but im not exactly sure what size

the N40 strength magnets i used were 1/8 x 1/16th for the tanks and 3/32" x 1/32" for the infantry, but really you can use any size magnet that will fit. my one word of advice about magnetizing the bottom is to make sure your magnet sits flush!! the hold is considerably stronger when the magnet is in full contact with the steel sheet, if there's a gap it will still hold but not as well. a good way to do this on standard GW bases is a small ball of GS. you roll it up tack it to the bottom of the base, tack the magnet to it and push it down against the sheet metal, this gives you a nice flat ,flush magnet contact.

dang looks like a pretty good idea! also must be MUCH easier to store models away than the usual stuff

working on my 2nd version of this case. pics soon !

Waiting for the update!

nice tutorial. don't know how much good it'll do my dark elder vehicles, but should help with the infantry. most cases don't like dark elder infantry (especially scourges). being able to stand them up will help

Theres actually quite a few different cases you can use of varying sizes. my buddy uses a case made by the same snapware co. its 12x12 but 5" deep so it fits land raiders and what not. if you go to the containerstore.com you can find some neat sizes and shapes im currently working on a pretty awesome one for my newest army.. should have pics up in the near future.