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As of a couple of days ago, I have extended the scope of my hobby somewhat. Having seen countless examples on the 'Intrwebz' I decided to have a go at it, and make rubber moulds.



Here is my first ever mould, with the masters still in it. I decides to make a couple of 32mm scenic bases, nothing too fancy, but with a little variation.



Here is the mould, with the masters removed. I noticed that the sand glue to the bases let go, and was attached to the mould. One or two other scenic elements were left behind in the mould as well. but I managed to pick most of it out of the mould.



I decided to just do a first cast, which can be seen here during the hardening of the polyurethane.



Lo, and behold! Most of the sand was gone.



The fist casts. An air bubble here and there, but not many, as I kneaded the mould right after pouring the polyurethane in. And I can see where almost all the sand had gone.



The second cast came out a lot cleaner.



Made a couple of casts. Some varying results with regards to air bubbles, but almost no problems with crisp details. Spray them black, brush them a mid-tone grey (GW Mechanicus Standard Grey).



Funny thing. Sometimes an air bubble is caught in the eye sockets from the skulls, and a fine layer of polyurethane forms what appears to be eyeballs...



Detailing on the masters was done with sand for a rough texture, a plastic skull or two, some pieces of cat litter for bigger rocks, and sprue material cut up to look like crystal formations. The mould took these details and carefully applied them to the casts as expected.



My current state of affairs. 88 bases, 32mm sized, Necron tomb world themed. And no, those eight that seem to be separated are not the first cast. I just have groups of 10, and then some more.



Next up, 40mm bases for those wraiths, and perhaps those Tomb Blades.

Great job.
Looking forward to the next batch.
Can you tell us where you got your materials from & what they're called please?
Cheers

Those are awesome. What did you use, and approximately how much was it to do? I'm almost out of 32mm's and nice basing rocks and bits, and I've been thinking of just making some scenics, rather than gluing rocks/sand/bits to each one.

The materials and where it all came from:

The master model bases:
Plastic 32mm bases. Nothing special.
Sand and PVA glue. Easily found at local playgrounds and any hobby shop respectively.
Cat litter for the bigger rocks. Got this cheap at the supermarket as well in 5kg bags. Can also be used to clean up the cats' litter boxes.
One or two plastic skulls and some cut up sprue material attached to the base with plastic glue. Many GW model kits have these spare parts, and any modelling shop has the plastic glue.

The mould making:
One flat, plastic cheese tub to pour the mould in. Got this in the supermarket and had to eat the cheese first. Usually we toss this away without thinking, as it is disposable packaging material.
Mouldcraft GP-RTV 320 Shore A20 510g Silicone Mould Making Rubber Kit which I bought through Ebay (Quantum Supplies Ebay webshop). The 32mm base mould show used about 400 grams of rubber.
24 hours of patience before pulling the hardened rubber mould from the cheese tub.

The resin bases:
Mouldcraft SG2000 1KG Fast Cast Polyurethane Liquid Plastic Casting Resin kit, also from Quantum Suplies on Ebay. Comes in two bottles with a 1:1 mix ratio.
About an hour of patience per casting, while the resin hardens.

The instructions:
Many, many Youtube videos on mould making. Simply search for terms like "casting resin bases" and you should have hours of educational material. I did as most said, and you saw the results.

As for any financial info... Don't know precisely. My current order is for 1kg of resin (two bottles) at about 17 British pounds. I believe my first order was about half as cheap, as I had smaller bottles just to try this out first. Same for the rubber. The current order is for GBP 12,40, which differs from the bigger tub I ordered last time, just to be able to make a new mould if my attempts didn't work out the way I wanted them to. With the current rubber I want to try and make a couple of smaller moulds to keep next to the current project. If I make too must resin mix, I can use those smaller moulds to not waste the resin (and yes, I can also use my kitchen scales to weight the stuff by the gram) and have something to cast.
Of course, there were also shipping and handling costs, which may vary tremendously, depending on where you live.

Some more progress:



Picked out about half of the bases with the crystal formations on them, and applied GW Xereus Purple.



The other crystal bases had GW Kabalite Green applied.



And the skulls were painted GW Gortor Brown. Note the skull on the right. For some reason the resin mix was a bit off, so it wasn't hardened the way it should have. This led to the skull being weak and hollow, which I managed to turn into a broken skull. There are a couple more bases from that casting which didn't come out quite well, but those now seem like a small puddle of something in a hole in the ground.This turned failure into success.

Next step with these 32mm bases is to highlight the scenic elements. On these.
And yes, this is a painting progress upgrade. I am waiting for a shipment of resin, which is on its way, but hasn't arrived yet. Once it does... On to the 40mm bases.

Nice work. Very professional results.

For something like this, an alternative to resin could be a good plaster like the Merlin's Magic I use in my Hirst Arts molds.

Cheers for the info - they're coming along a treat!

 bubber wrote:
Cheers for the info - they're coming along a treat!

Pictures, or it didn't happen!