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Erudog wrote:Recently bought a Finecast Space Marine Librarian in Terminator Armor. I was quite pleasantly surprised - no major flaws at all. A few flash marks here and there, but nothing a hobby knife can't take care of.

I sincerely apologize if this has been addressed in a different thread or perhaps if this is a question that doesn't belong here - but has anyone tried filing Finecast? It seems like it would be a bad idea at first glance. Are we just hoping we can clean these figures up with hobby knives? Just curious what others' thoughts/experiences are on this.

That is one of the disadvantages of finecast. If you try to file it, the file bites too hard...you tear up the material.

Every finecast model I've seen has had some issue :-/. I don't know if this is true of metal, too, and it's just harder to see due to the lack of contrast... but it's discouraging.

I also don't like working with resin, as I don't have a space other than a spare room to hobby, and I don't feel comfortable making resin dust in there from my converting impulses, which come on strongly and without warning and are often acted out with a dremel in hand.

Given that the flaws, even small one, call for converting to fix or account for... well, I am less positive about finecast than I was at first.

I just bought a vampire model for Kanluwen, and had to choose between one with the bats on the base blurred out, and another with a bent sword... I know it can be bent back, but it's a bummer to have to choose between 2 models with problems.

If that's par for the course for resin... well, count me out of resin models...




Automatically Appended Next Post:
As to filing- I have the same issue I mentioned above (not wanting to create dust) and also, it is really, really fragile... so a file does a lot of damage quickly, and I agree that it seems hard to get smooth... again, a bummer of an issue to have when there are many defects to smooth out / deal with.

you don't need a file. you can use a hobby knife to clean it. It's hard to explain. Drag the knife along the mold line lightly with the blade directed away from the direction you're going.

As far as using something more file like. Maybe emory board? (like what you use on your fingernails). Haven't tried that yet. Might have to dig one out and test it on a piece of FC sprue.

I just use a dull(ish) hobby knife blade.

A hobby knife is definitely all you need for cleaning finecast models. Files are terrible on the material.

A hobby knife will cut through it like butter though, so be careful, but things like resin tubes and flash just scrape right off.

I am not inclined to worry about the resin dust, now correct me if I am wrong but there are no warnings on the packaging.

Naturally breathing in particulates is not ideal but the lack of warnings would indicate that it is not a hazardous material.

Slightly OT but I'm working on FoW minis at the moment and their resin stinks (I hate it). I would have thought that if anything is going to crook me that would be the stuff but the the only warning you get on FoW packaging is that metal components may contain lead.

Man up and get conveting RiTides!

Heh . I guess I have a lack of trust? In the late '90s I was working at a carwash during high school (just dated myself). One day they switched the color of the cleaning spray. We asked why. Oh, nothing, just that the first one had been found to be a carcinogen...

I did extensively convert the two finecast models I've bought for myself- i.e. chopped them both up and made them into one . But it made me a bit uncomfortable doing so... and I had to hunt to find decent models in the store due to all the defects.

One was an orc painboy- the syringe was nonexistent on one of the models. The other was a black orc big boss- on the one I got the shield came out really ragged, and one tab of it wasn't there at all...

So, yeah, less enthused than I was :-/. I don't know about these new-fangled materials... I'm not happy with the (plastic/resin?) combination or whatever it is that Privateer Press is using, either, but for the opposite reason- it's much too stiff

Naturally breathing in particulates is not ideal but the lack of warnings would indicate that it is not a hazardous material.

Tobacco products had no warnings for about the first four hundred years they were commonly in use in these colonies and country.

I've bought the emperors champion, Inquisitor Cotaez, a terminator librarian, the marneus calgar boxed set. I've had a lot of forge world stuff in the past though so when finecast came out i EXPECTED a huge amount of problems with these models as i bought them. I hadn't really spoken to anyone about the stuff besides one kid when i was buying them said "careful you don't leave those in the sun." Well thats a moot point, i take care of my hyper expensive toy soldiers.
But i digress, the only problems i had were with the librarian, he had bit of detailing on his armour, one of the tiny strips which segment the back of terminator armour hadn't come out very well and i had to green stuff it in, he also had a chunk of the mould stuck in his armpit which took about an hour to pick out with a clothes pin.

But i wouldn't have even bought the calgar box if it hadn't been for finecast, i wanted it for a conversion project and finecast is an absolute joy to work with for my purposes.

i've got to admit though, i did laugh a lot when i saw that parody finecast logo on someones post on here.

Bought some Incubi just after the changeover, and wasn't impressed.

I had a painboy get swapped a dozen times to get a decent cast also.

That said i just picked up a Lhamean, and the model is absolutely perfect.

Perhaps models designed for finecast, like the Lhamean, will come out better than the earlier models designed for metal and then changed over?

I got the 4 Court models and another Haemonculus yesterday, the Lhamean and Sslyth were perfect. The body of the Medusae was fine but one of the faces had a bubble in, I was lucky that the second head option was okay, so I coud still make the model. The Ur-Ghul needs replacing though. It has bubbles all over his neck and shoulders and one in both of the two head options. I've not had time to check the Haemy yet, but he looks to be okay through the box.

My current fine cast record:
Fine: 5
slight issues, but useable: 10
Unusable: 12

I got the Ogre Firebelly and Bragg the Gutsman.
I left one Bragg on the rack, since I could see some bubbles on his hook blade thru the blister.

The knife on Bragg's base snapped off in the package. I glued it back on but I am sure it will break again. It's just too thin.
The staff was quite warped, but I heated it back into shape. It seems to be gradually bending again.
The rest of him appears to be good. A couple bubbles on the under-surface of the feet/base.

The Firebelly had one big flaw, but I can make it work.
The neck join of the head was missing. You could see the shiny bubble edge where it was supposed to fill more.
The horns around his gutplate were in bad shape, misaligned, and bubbled. I shaved them into smaller horn shapes.
A big issue I can see in the future was the Arm/Head/Flame is one piece.
But when assembled, you need to twist it a bit to get it in place, so once glued, it is under tension.

The biggest flaw I find in the new material is you cannot get the minute adjustments to shape you could get with metal.
the slight twist of the arm, or a rope piece. And any long shaft sections will be warped and return to the warped state.

I haven't been burned by Finecast, but I will be extremely cautious about what I buy.

Stealing from Gorechild, my Finecast record:
Fine: 1
Slight issues but useable: 2
Passed on the model purely because it is Finecast: many (Incubi, Grotesques, Archon's Court, Hive Guard, Hive Tyrant, etc.)

Got both a Vampire Counts Vampire Lord (Lady actually), which had airbubbles all round and missed a few fingers and a Dark Eldar poison lady, which was of superb quality, hardly any flash and no airbubbles or holes. 50-50 for me.

What's more concerning IMO, is that people are reporting flaws in recent batches (which if this were down to a simple lack of experience of the manufacturing process, one would have expected the quality to increase) and people are also reporting flaws in brand new models (see the chap above with the Firebelly).

Theoretically, these new models should have been sculpted and designed for the Finecast medium and so one would expect them to be problem free. The fact that there are flaws being reported shows that both GW's QA still isn't up to scratch and that the Finecast process itself would appear to have inherent flaws.

Something i'm sort of worried about is how, they're going to use the finecast re-release of some older models as an excuse not to update them.

i was going to start a vampire counts army until i saw that bloodknights were being redone in finecast, rather than as would make sense to me, a plastic box like the chaos knights and other heavy cavalry models in the game. And at £65 for 5, thats bassically made me not want to bother with the army at all.

Gorechild wrote:The Ur-Ghul needs replacing though. It has bubbles all over his neck and shoulders and one in both of the two head options.

I went to the shop yesterday to sort out a replacement, the manager opened all 3 of the remaining Ur-Ghul models that they had in stock and they all had the same problem! He said they should be getting a delivery on Thursday, so I'll be going back this weekend to see if any of them are in a better state.

CrimsonHammer wrote:Something i'm sort of worried about is how, they're going to use the finecast re-release of some older models as an excuse not to update them.

i was going to start a vampire counts army until i saw that Blood Knights were being redone in finecast, rather than as would make sense to me, a plastic box like the chaos knights and other heavy cavalry models in the game. And at £65 for 5, that's basically made me not want to bother with the army at all.

Them putting something into Finecast does not prevent them from actually redoing the model in plastic. Finecast is using the existing sculpts and masters to make the molds, not them turning out a whole new set of sculpts of old models. I would be kind of surprised if we do not see redone cavalry for the Vampire Counts whenever a new book comes out, because the Black Knights are older than some of the posters on this forum and the Blood Knights, while new, have always been prohibitively expensive(both cash and points wise).

I should also add that Blood Knights have always been the odd cavalry out, as they were one of the few all-metal cavalry. The horses were all metal(as opposed to the hybrid plastic/metal that we saw in the Dragon Princes and Chaos Knights) and the riders were metal too.

This is kind of my follow-up to my post about Vlad. After the replacement model arrived, it became fairly clear that Vlad is a model that will cause problems in Finecast. The hand was intact(which is of course a Good Thing), but the detail on his sword's hilt(which is done as a kind of wirework basket hilt) was obscuring the hand grasping it. I supplied photos to GW, and they offered me a full refund or a metal Vlad. I took the metal option.

The Konrad that RiTides mentioned was in pretty damn good shape, and it wasn't until I started painting it that I noticed one of the blood drops he has going from his sword is seemingly broken. Doesn't matter though, as it looks fine without it.
Konrad is another model that I predict we'll see a lot of issues with. The way the swords are cast(they link together to form a single piece) makes them awkward as hell to unbend.

I've only brought a Farseer/Warlock box in finecast. Minor bubbles in all and mold lines of a Warlock was notably worse than metal models I've brought (others were about the same as metal models). Farseer is missing the end of his witchblade (has about 1/3rd of the lower hand, everything below that is gone). Also had a couple of the standard bent sword problem. Oh and one of the blades were as thick as they were wide, but as I don't have any metal Warlocks I can't say if this is a finecast flaw or just a flaw in the sculpt (would actually be interested to know which it is).

It will be a while yet until I try my luck with finecast again, but that's more because what I want/need are vehicles, still metal, or I intend to get he forgeworld equivalent.

Yeah, the Warlock sword blades are pretty thick, even on the metals.
I had to file the hell out of one just to get it around 1/8" thick

Glad to hear, and thanks for letting me know.

Just thought i'd bump this thread instead of starting my own...

I bought my first Finecast with the new Newcrons - 2x Crypteks, 1x Trazyn.

I opened the first Cryptek and his right hand (the one carrying the orb, and even the one not carrying anything) was completely melded together, all of the fingers were joined. I took my knife and tried cutting between the fingers thinking maybe its just flashing but nope, its a solid meld with 2 distinguishable fingers sticking out of this blob.

The second Cryptek looked okay, then i opened it up and looked closer at all the fine grooves after i removed the flashing, and there is this red/pink dried out goo in them, i've tried cutting it out but it seems to be actually part of the mould now.

Now on to Trazyn, the most disappointing.

The staff looked a bit warped so I took the sprue and cut it out and low and behold it fell in front of me in two pieces... thinking "I can just glue this..." then thinking "...even though I shouldnt have too..." I cut out Trazyn and started to remove the flashing, and his shoulder moulds were so thin there were transparent holes that you could literally see through... do you remember that episode of the Simpsons where homer is trying to get fat and the doctor said the "grease test" was to wipe something on a solid surface and if it turned see through, it was greasy enough to eat - this is what it looked like, like a soiled mcdonalds hamburger wraper - it looked like it WAS there, but just transparent.

I didn't take any photos of the crypteks, but here is trazyn... sorry for the shoulder pic quality, my camera kept focusing on the carpet lol

Needless to say, all 3 models are being returned/exchanged... I can't imagine them making ANY profit from this if there are THIS many issues with the finecast and people constantly returning/exchanging them.

My own story: I bought a box of Plague Marines for a very specific reason. If they were totally miscast who would know? They should look melted, bubbled, ect. The ones that were cast right were wonderful, the two that weren't were so bad I got replacements for them. Also there was one entire arm/shoulder missing from the box. What I can't understand is someone is putting these items in a box, they didn't notice parts were missing, or how badly some of the units looked? It wasn't a total loss and they are nice but come on, look at what you are doing.

Other than slightly warped staff, my Cryptek was okay, Stormlord was worse, badly warped staff, and lots, (about thirty) little holes across his cloak. First I thought it was supposed to be cloth damage, then I realised his cloak is made of gemstones.

Nothing to send back over mind, I'll just fill them with glue and straighten the staff.

That sucks. I just got a 2nd cockatrice(using them as stand in great eagles) Other than some gnarly mould lines on the edges of the wings and a lot of loose flash it was a solid product.

Overall about the same as the last one, except with the loose flash.

I almost bought Stormlord this weekend, but all the copies I saw had bubble issues.
The coffin symbols had bubbles in the corners, and the bottom edge of the ribcage was a long bubble.
Holes through the loincloth were another consistent flaw on the ones I looked at.

@Cryage - your second photo is too blurry to make anything out other than the threads in the carpet. Don't you check your camera work when you take pictures?

Breotan wrote:@Cryage - your second photo is too blurry to make anything out other than the threads in the carpet. Don't you check your camera work when you take pictures?

Cryage wrote:Just thought i'd bump this thread instead of starting my own...


I didn't take any photos of the crypteks, but here is trazyn... sorry for the shoulder pic quality, my camera kept focusing on the carpet lol

It was with my iPhone, not my Nikon D90, so forgive me for the quality! :p

I editted my original post with another photo where I circled the defects so you can somewhat make them out , or at least know where to look.

Those photos are thoroughly useless.

Go back, take them again with your actual camera and something other than the carpet as a background.

Kanluwen wrote:Those photos are thoroughly useless.

Go back, take them again with your actual camera and something other than the carpet as a background.

Wow, nerd rage personified.

I'll take better photos with my camera tonight, but I at least posted photos which is what 90% of the people in this thread didn't do. I understand politeness in today's world is a bit difficult, but just try harder next time And the picture of the broken staff isn't difficult to make out, unless you're blind...

Cryage wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:Those photos are thoroughly useless.

Go back, take them again with your actual camera and something other than the carpet as a background.

Wow, nerd rage personified.

hah!

Yeah no need for that like Kan, you sounded like an irate school teacher. "go and do it again foolish boy!"

The funny thing is that humans respond better to carrots that whips. If you said "thats a bad picture mate, can you shoot a better one?" I would say "Oh yeah sorry mate, hang on ill do it"

If you said..well, what you said. Id say ...

Well.. second words off.

Cryage wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:Those photos are thoroughly useless.

Go back, take them again with your actual camera and something other than the carpet as a background.

Wow, nerd rage personified.

I'll take better photos with my camera tonight, but I at least posted photos which is what 90% of the people in this thread didn't do. I understand politeness in today's world is a bit difficult, but just try harder next time And the picture of the broken staff isn't difficult to make out, unless you're blind...

The point here is to report flaws.

It's not simply to "have pictures". If you're going to have pictures, don't post camera phone pictures taken on your carpet. While yes, it's quite easy to see the broken staff(which I might add is likely a case of it was broken when it was cast somehow, as I've seen similar stuff with FW's small resin bits)--circling "defects" doesn't help when the "defects" are completely blurry and incapable of being seen, outside of what looks to be a small hole in the shoulderpads.

Just don't use carpets as a background. Seriously. You can compose the best photos ever, but cameras macro on the carpet as the background.