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So I recently bought ten Death Company from a mate. However, he's given half of them normal backpacks and half of them jump packs, whereas I want to give them all jump packs.

I don't suppose there's some clever way of removing the backpacks in a way that won't damage the other parts of the models?

He says he has used poly cement rather than super glue.

Poly cement will have melted the plastic and caused it to reform as a solid lump.

Personally, I'd probably be inclinded to use a very fine saw and carefully cut it off, IF you want to preserve the current backpacks.

If you don't care, you could probably try cutting and carefully trimming it away instead.

I remember being told to freeze my plastic models to get the cement to go brittle.
But also, poly cement is meant to melt the parts of the model it touches, to melt into the same on the other piece. Freezing won't fix that. I must be thinking of super glue.

Cutting is the only option I know of that will work.

But, if you are cutting them, think about magnetising them to get them back on. You can choose which packs to give them after that. You'll have cut the right bits to get them apart anyway, so instead on smoothing to glue back onto, keep cutting/drilling, and make them better.

I've been doing a lot of hacking around trying different things for my Exodite conversions and I've found that while poly0cement does melt the two surfaces together, the area is actually weaker than the surrounding plastic. It melts it together, but there are 'bubbles' in the melted part that makes it not as strong as the solid plastic.

If you've got a pair of small wire cutters (for electrical work) you might be able to fit the jaws either side of the backpack inbetween the backpack and the body (with the angled side pointed towards the body) and squeeze. That should get the backpack off, but there is a risk it could damage other bits, especially the backpack itself. Seeing as you'd be gluing a big ol' jump pack on there though any damage should be well hidden.

Other than that, a thin sawblade should do quite nicely as well. You can get replacement hacksaw blades from Halfords or B&Q for not much at all. A metal one would be better than wood as the teeth are smaller.