Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Press mould, possibly with grey stuff rather than green for a clean sharp edge. I'm telling you, tis the future!

Great suggestion... can you tell me where I can find out about how to make a press mould? I have no idea. Grey stuff? What's grey stuff?

Press the model into putty (greenstuff) and let it set.

Then remove the model, lube up the green stuff and press some fresh putty into the mould. Pull after 10 minutes if you need to bend/shape it further, otherwise let it set.

What do you recommend as lubricant for the mould?

Vaseline. Girly lip-balm tin versions are convenient as (1) you can open them one-handed (2) they're easier to store (3) the pinkish tint means it's easy to tell whether you've completed scrubbed it clean.

My press mould routine is use Grey stuff (Gale Force 9 make some; Hobbycraft over here stock it, I imagine they would in the US also, but standard GS is fine too).

1) Press whatever kneadite you're using into an upside-down small or medium base (not large, I'll explain in a minute).

2) Then lube up the piece you want to make an impression of; place it on the surface of your putty.

3) Get a base one size larger. Put a little film of lube on its top surface; use that to press your original into the kneadite. This ensures its flat and the impression is even.

4) Remove the larger base and leave the gs to cure. To be completely absolutely utterly rock solid green stuff in a standard mix needs 3 days but 24 hrs is usually fine. You could also up the yellow:blue to 2:1 for a quicker set I guess.

If you're only making small pieces, it's worth using standard small slotta bases, then you can set up a mould in either side of the recess.

When doing the actual moulding, rub lube into the mould, add a blob of gs that's roughly the width of your mould, and again, press down with the larger base. It's good to have excess around the piece as it makes it easier to extract. As Horn says, leaving 10 mins or so allows you to peel it out to curve (I've done this with vehicle aquillae on my home-made deathriders; I'll try to get pics up) but watch your gs ratio as it can stretch as you remove it, typically if there's too much yellow in the mix.

One last note: I do this with my 2 1/2 year old, and he loves it, so imagine the fun your Things could have at their advanced stage!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Addendum: it's just occured to me that you could press the toothed edge of a chainsword down into gs to create your point bits. Then you'd be able to mould, maybe leave an hour for extra rigidly, and bend/cut to fit.

Here's an illustrated version:

http://www.librarium-online.com/featured/making-press-molds-3558.html

OK, I think I can do that. It'll be very helpful, not only for the spikey bitz but I'll need to make one techmarine and one apothecary shoulder pad per unit... so this should help me duplicate those easily enough.

Thanks!

Only caveat with that (though pics good) is that, personally, I really dislike cooking oil as a release agent; much harded to control quantities, messy as anything (particularly with a small child!)

I have some fine milliput... is that the same thing as the grey stuff? (I haven't used it yet)

Sorry, just read your post Gits. You might need to use a deeper recess than a base for shoulder pads. Screwtop plastic juice bottle lids are pretty good for that I find. Also, really fine detail is unlikely to come out (press moulding from resin, say, isn't going to produce great detail). On the other hand, if you made a mantis face for your shoulder pads, you could very rapidly and reliably replicate it for press moulding.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Argh! We are posting at the same time! No, Milliput isn't the same as Grey stuff, though some modellers use them to the same ends. Milliput is denser, harder, but also can flake. I'd avoid it for press moulds; a friend who is far more ambitious modeller than me found it really problematic.

Now there's an idea... mold the chapter badge onto a shoulder pad w/ green stuff, then when it dries, use a press mold to duplicate it. I just might be able to do that. I noticed that the symbol in the example wasn't a very detailed copy, but then that might be solved by cutting your compound to be molded as closely to the actual mold's shape as possible, so you're not trying to compress all that extra material.

How difficult is resin casting? Are there kits available for the hobbyist? (Just thinking ahead to my desire to create custom helmets for the chapter.)

I wasn't suggesting necessarily moulding the whole shoulder pad: you could just do the symbol and that would allow you to drape it round corners, curves etc whilst still pliable.

Your note on the detail: this is part of the reason I prefer grey to green for this; it tends to take hard edges better, in my experience.

As for resin casting: it's certainly doable, and there's articles such as
http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Simple_Two-Piece_Mold_for_Casting_with_Resin.

Got it. Actually after I'd written my reply to you I figured out what you meant. My wife actually had a brilliant idea for the spiky bitz this morning... if it work's, I'll share.

Thanks for your help... this project is wayyy beyond anything I've tried before so it's a bit nerve wracking at times (but really satisfying).

Wives are surprisngly helpful in that regard. Mine has total lack of gaming interest but real insight which is most valuable and sometimes remarkably innovative.

One other thought on spikes: carve them. I had a long chat at Conflict to one of the GW sculptors (Gianni?) As well as beautiful work on Empire footsoldiers (I think), he had the master of an Ork Nob (Goff maybe?) with enormous pyramidal spiked shoulder pads. He said that he'd done them with shaped blobs green stuff left to go rock hard (3 days, plus time under a hot bulb) and then shaved them down to the desired with a brand-new scalpel blade. But, perhaps, I'd stick with the moulding option, if only from time's sake.

Actually my wife's idea was to use pieces of jeweler's saw blades... which I have in abundance and are dirt cheap. Just a matter of cutting the hardened steel cleanly. Haven't had a chance to look at my blade assortment yet, but it's worth a try. One blade would easily cover 4 or 5 figures at very little cost... and you know... they're SAW BLADES... can't get much more real than that. Just depends on if the back of the blade (without the teeth) is too thick, making the whole thing stick out too far.

My wife also wanted me to mention that the job of household baby mantis wrangling fell largely on HER shoulders. The boys and I were busy releasing what remained of the hatch into the garden. She discovered that little praying mantis' can really jump!

1st - LOL at baby mantis' jumping around
2nd - If you want some variety in the blade size and shape, DE warrior squads have more spikes on em then a batallion of CSM.
3rd - speaking of CSM, remember that their chainswords are double sided, hence, twice the blades!

Serrating could always be done with the spikes from Dark Eldar warriors, available from all good bitz stores, as mentioned above

Hmmmm.... I have a friend that runs DE.... I'll have to follow up with him. I remember that folks mentioned the DE spikey bitz earlier... but in my mind I saw big, over-the-top blades (though, chainsord looking blades WERE the type of blades in the pic as I recall... guess I'm not very bright). Guess I'll have to check it out after all.

May even be able to use some raider/ravager bits on your dreds and rhinos. Mat require some plasticard to SM-ify em. Also, there are some big, over the top blades as well

Some nice ideas there, press molding the badges would be cool.

If I may, even though the fluff discussion is all but over. Will we see some sort of re-purposed praying mantidae? Even though your project deals with the Mantis warriors in their earlier stages of recuperating from their Badab war loses, I think it would be nice to see the mantidae.

I have some DE figure you can just have, someone way back gave them to me in a box of stuff I bought.

If you are thinking of going down the resin casting route for the shoulder pads and mantis head have a look at my tervigon blog, it mostly deals with bigger stuff but I made several shoulderpad molds (deathwatsch and soul drinkers) as somewhere to pour any extra resin.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/276630.page

I might be biased but casting is pretty fun and relatively easy, you could probably knock out a dozen in an evening if you are keen, just make several molds so that you can pour more than one at a time.

your welcome to PM if you have any questions

Whalemusic: Interesting idea... I had a thought about doing some big-a** mantis arms for the CCW... but... that might be a little over the top. Some dread sized spikey bitz that mimic those on the infantry might be a good option though.

Deff: Praying Mantidae? Not sure what you're referring to. Can you explain?

Solar: Thanks man, please bring 'em when you come down. You can see the progress first hand. The fig actually looks better in person (color & blending really pop), and I should have at least a few more done by then.

Blackhand: Thanks... it's always a bit daunting to try new things... but I'm getting kinda cranked up about the molding possibilities now. I'll be sure to check out your blog, things are always easier when you've got something to follow.


I've made molds for jewelry casting quite a bit, and something about those pictures on that one page using the green stuff press mold (not yours Blackhand, from earlier in the thread) have been bothering me. But... let me experiment a little bit at home before I try and articulate my ideas. I think I see some flaws in the mold design and pressing process that if fixed (easily), might result in better mold performance. Big talk from someone whose never tried it. Well, let me 'speriment and if I come up with anything useful, I'll pass it on.

Sorry I most likely should have explained it more, in anyway...

The only other non-Codex troops mentioned are the elite 'praying mantidae'. This elite cadre are selected from the most driven and pious members of the chapter and live for the sole purpose of hunting the Red Corsairs in order to bring honor back to the chapter. They are recognizable by snake-like tattoos covering their body, extending high up their necks.

It is from the warhammer 40k wiki, yet they aren't listed on Lexicanum so I'm not sure if they were part of the fluff. Basically as listed they exist to hunt the Corsairs down, I'd suspect that after coming off their crusade, they wouldn't simply disband these units, as they had valuable knowledge in the field of hunting CSM. Perhaps, they were re-purposed some how.

Unfortunately that's not a lot to go on... I will have two elite squads... the Sternguard (Tranquility Snipers) and the Vanguard (specialized assault troops w/ praying mantis like arm harnesses that function like lightening claws (or power swords if cost is prohibitive). They'd probably be a pretty good approximation of your "mantidae".


With the first normal Mantis Warrior in the bag... I'm going back to working on the Tranquility Snipers, which is the first unit that I'd intended to do in the first place. I should have a decent series of WIP shots either tonight or tomorrow.

Could be, it isn't an idea you have to follow up on, just a thought. It would be interesting to see them though, I do agree that there isn't much fluff to support them though.

Can't wait to see the Tranquility campaign snipers.

Gitsplitta wrote:OK, I think I can do that. It'll be very helpful, not only for the spikey bitz but I'll need to make one techmarine and one apothecary shoulder pad per unit... so this should help me duplicate those easily enough.

Thanks!

Don't know if you've coverd this (didn't read the fluff discussion) or maybe it's not that big a deal, but even in normal chapters techmarines are pretty rare, I just thought it alittle strange that a chapter whos crusaded for 100 years would have one to spare for every unit

I'm using the same basic painting technique that I used with the regular guy, just a different color palate (sp?). I like the conversions I did for these guys. The two kneeling guys especially took a fair amount of work... but I think the results are worth it. I think I'll start with short squads (5 man) of the two vet squads, just so I can experiment and get everyone's feedback, then I can fill them out at my leisure later on.


Limbo: It's not a spare tech marine for every unit, it's that one member of each unit has a certain amount of tech training (though well beyond a normal marine), as well as another with apothecary training. Has to do with their need to survive w/o recruits or re-supply. It's in the fluff section if you're interested. Basically they can perform triage on men and machines that improves their chances of surviving. In game terms it doesn't do anything, just part of my fluff. Something to set the chapter apart.

Oh I got it. It's like 1 person is an amateur engineer and another is an amateur medic.

Don't believe there's no emoticon of a blinking light bulb...

*grin*

Yep, exactly like that... just something to invoke the idea of specialization of some members of each squad in things that would help the chapter as-a-whole survive the ordeal.