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Heya guys so some of you may know me from the hobby blog part of dakka, but I have recently been starting to sculpt some of my own stuff that I want to cast in resin, At first I just used simple insta-mould and have progressed to some lovely silicone moulds which work fantastically well so that half of the process I am fairly happy with, the issue I have is my actual casting material:

So I have principally been using liquid plastic or polyurethane this sort of stuff:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Polycraft-SG2000-2kg-Fast-Cast-Polyurethane-Liquid-Plastic-Casting-Resin-Kit-/221188559120?pt=UK_Crafts_Other_Crafts_EH&hash=item337fdd9110


However I have been finding that although my casts are almost perfect the material is incredibly brittle and almost impossible to cut, it tends to 'shear' quite a lot,
I think what I am after is after some very similar material for casting that when finished is a bit easier to work with, can be cut etc, more like the properties of forgeworld resin?

If anyone has any idea what sort of thing I should be looking for it would be amazingly appreciated, thanks again.

I, too, would like to find what Forgeworld use for their resin.

That said - I have the same (albeit under a different name) casting resin as you. I've found it very workable

A vital step in ensuring the cast is pliable and not prone to snapping and shearing is in the 1:1 mix. Do not mix by volume but by weight as the two parts have very different densities. I use some digital pocket scales.

Shore D 72 is pretty hard. If you want something with a bit more give to it - look at that number on the specs. Something like a Shore D50 starts to get rubbery. I use Smooth-Cast 60D for some of my castings - and it passes the drop test just fine, even for big items.

You can get resins which range in final hardness from somewhere around a gummy worm (used for Fx casting and fishing lures) all the way up to glass (used to cast "fake glass" breakable props).

Determining where you actually want to be on the hardness scales is probably a good place to start. If you can figure out what Shore hardness you would like your final casts to be, you can then look at that number in the technical specifications for the different products to find one that fits your needs.

I use easy flo 60, never used anything else since I discovered this stuff.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/EasyFlo-60-1-Litre-Fast-Cast-Polyurethane-Liquid-Plastic-Kit-/251058054409?pt=UK_Crafts_Other_Crafts_EH&hash=item3a7439e509

Mostly for casting my own bases and terrain parts but I have used it for some custom pre-heresy style rhino side panels. I've found the material easy to drill, trim, sand and cut without too many problems. It has quite a high viscosity too so it flows into molds easy enough.

Wow thanks guys this is exactly the sort of info I was after, so you guys have had much better experience with shore D values around 60, I will have a look around and see if I can find something, I may well just copy you hereticdave, that seems like a good compromise between 'soft-ish 50' and hard 72. (seems a very odd scale though I must say!)

Just out of curiosity does anyone know a shore D value for forgeworld resin? or even GW plastic or metal for that matter?

You can also experiment with the amount of hardener in the mix...(I forget which part is the hardner).

Every once in a while I mess up the mix, and get a resin that is somewhat softer....