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Pretty much as the title asks, does anyone have any experience working with older Forge World resin? I got an old Shadowsword second hand and it seems to be legitimate. The lower hull was still shrink wrapped (in fact too tight as it had cracked on one side due to shrinkage), most of the resin is a darker grey/slightly tinted green color with tan tracks.

Now if any of the above sounds wrong then then I guess I could have fallen victim to an illegitimate copy, but if not then I noticed while cleaning my new tank that alot of the thin parts are very fragile- I broke off some of the engine vents just using my dedicated resin tooth brush in warm soapy water. Also various handles to hatches tended to be equally fragile. Granted it's nothing that can't be fixed but this made me curious. My only other forgeworld tank is the much newer Macharius Vulcan, and I had no problems with the finer detail on it when i did the same treatment (Warm soapy water, wait a few minutes, brush, let sit for a while before disposing and rinsing). So if anyone else has worked with older Forgeworld resin did you experience similar (or different) problems?

Yes, some of the very old kits had a more brittle resin and there used to be a lot more variation in color. There's no real solution besides using extreme care in handling the delicate parts.

Ok, and thanks for the response! I kind of figured it would just come down to being careful but it's interesting it was a general pattern, I'll probably end up remodeling the details that broke in their entirety as a bit of preemptive work then.

Forge World's resin seems to be more consistent (at least for the Necromunda characters) nowadays than it used to. Perhaps they've got better suppliers now, or are better at consistently mixing the stuff. They definitely used beige resin. I don't remember getting kits where some parts were grey and some beige, but it wouldn't surprise me. the colour is just a matter of adding a pigment while mixing it anyway, so it's not important.

You might be better off using a saw to remove excess material, especially if you're cutting away a part that's connected at both ends (for example, a runner from a component to the "sprue" block). I've frequently had parts snap as using a knife or clippers can bend the component.

It should be noted that one of the issues with ALL resins is they are not stable materials.. at least in the sense that we are accustomed to in Plastics and Metals.

Over time Resins continue to change. In fact usually they are undergoing constant chemical change during the first few years, after that they start to age..which means break down.. which means become brittle.

In time all of the Forge World Resins.. and other Resin Models will become hard and brittle, some will even start to crumble on their own. It will probably take 10+ years.. but it will happen.

meatybtz wrote:
It should be noted that one of the issues with ALL resins is they are not stable materials.. at least in the sense that we are accustomed to in Plastics and Metals.

Over time Resins continue to change. In fact usually they are undergoing constant chemical change during the first few years, after that they start to age..which means break down.. which means become brittle.

In time all of the Forge World Resins.. and other Resin Models will become hard and brittle, some will even start to crumble on their own. It will probably take 10+ years.. but it will happen.

So this is 100% a factual claim? Because I keep getting contrarion opinions from other community sources when I was presenting this quote to them. This is important to know for me as I've invested a considerable amount of resources in collecting these armies only for them to crumble apart within a decade is an extremely unappealing caveat.

My Armorcast stuff from the 90s has not crumbled to dust nor yet gone really brittle.

meatybtz wrote:
It should be noted that one of the issues with ALL resins is they are not stable materials.. at least in the sense that we are accustomed to in Plastics and Metals.

Over time Resins continue to change. In fact usually they are undergoing constant chemical change during the first few years, after that they start to age..which means break down.. which means become brittle.

In time all of the Forge World Resins.. and other Resin Models will become hard and brittle, some will even start to crumble on their own. It will probably take 10+ years.. but it will happen.

Huh interesting, out of curiosity do you have a source that goes into detail about this (or about resin aging in general as my 30 minute search didn’t really find me what I was looking for).

Neverwinter27 I’d be curious as to what others told you since it’s always good to see multiple opinions.

Also thanks Ingtaer for responding, it’s good to know that practically speaking I don’t need to worry too much.

The only place I have heard anything about resin not aging well was from one of GWs old sculptors Bob Neismith I think who absolutely hated the stuff and had a bit of a rant about metal being better.

As for the crumble in 10yrs while I am no scientist I would call bollocks on that just due to the fact I'm 40 and have been collecting miniatures since I was 13 and I remember picking up resin garage kits when I was 16-17 that are still fine.

I even have some early FW stuff that has got to be well over 10yrs old now that is still fine both built and still on the sprue.

Now I believe if resin is badly cast or mixed it can cause issues with curing so it could be hard on the out side but still soft in the middle but I have no idea if that could cause issues further down the line.

R0bcrt wrote:

meatybtz wrote:
It should be noted that one of the issues with ALL resins is they are not stable materials.. at least in the sense that we are accustomed to in Plastics and Metals.

Over time Resins continue to change. In fact usually they are undergoing constant chemical change during the first few years, after that they start to age..which means break down.. which means become brittle.

In time all of the Forge World Resins.. and other Resin Models will become hard and brittle, some will even start to crumble on their own. It will probably take 10+ years.. but it will happen.

Huh interesting, out of curiosity do you have a source that goes into detail about this (or about resin aging in general as my 30 minute search didn’t really find me what I was looking for).

Neverwinter27 I’d be curious as to what others told you since it’s always good to see multiple opinions.

Also thanks Ingtaer for responding, it’s good to know that practically speaking I don’t need to worry too much.

Yeah, I just checked around my 40k Discord and Reddit communities last week and practically no one has ever heard of this happening with resin models.