Instructions

 Here is a pic of the layout of the parts on the building kit for 28mm.  Think of this as more a suggestion than a rigid set of rules.

   I had a friend draw this up for me. I hope it helps things along. And answers any questions.

  Otherwise, things are going along as usual. The Novakon got a little FUBAR  ( that is "Fouled Up Beyond All Repair" for you civilians out there. Fouled is sometimes replaced with a stronger word in extreme situations if no ladies are present) and the setback left me watching Netflix for a bit. BBC makes some pretty good television it turns out, if you have the time to watch 30 episodes back to back.  It strangley began working just as inexplicably as it stopped.  I have to find an exorcist someday.
  Things are a bit quieter than usual because new methods are being tinkered with in addition to making a pile of widgets. More on that if it works, quietly forgotten if it goes the more likely path. 
   No matter the result, will keep posting the good, the bad, and the ugly. 
  

More how to info

    I saw a mention on The Miniatures Page about the whole process of making things. It has been one of my goals to sort of pull back the curtain on the process and let folks see what goes on. So here is another post of semi-factual knowledge.  I think it is factual but it could be wrong.

  This book is a good starting point to learn the basics.

"Cutting costs in short-run plastics injection molding"

  I tried to add an Amazon link but they claim it is out of print. Try contacting the producer directly;

http://www.morganindustriesinc.com/plastic-molding-guide.htm

  Really helpful and explodes a lot of myths about the process.
  I worked at Harley Davidson Motor Company for 19 years. (until the evil one came and darkness fell across the land. Might be why I am so opposed to greed. )  It was supposed to be a major company, but if you got right down to it most of the time we were flying by the seat of our pants. It always amazed me that anything ever got done. The slap dash manner of making things was hidden behind a veneer of chrome and leather. I could tell you stories.......

  The shop has become a nice refuge from the normal work environment. It has all the things the big factories have. A warehouse space;

Mold storage;

And machines;

   This last machine keeps you on your toes. I have spoken before about its seemingly sentient manner and ability to malfunction at just the wrong time. Lately it has been doing better. It has an auto oiling system that REALLY takes its job seriously. So seriously that it seems determined to lubricate everything in its path. If you get a base with a bit of oil on it this is the reason why. It is hard to find equipment this dedicated.
  The fastest I ever tried to run it was an amazing 14.7 seconds per sprue. This caused a bit of stress and it kept blowing the breaker. It has several cycles: cooling time, open time, close time, injection time. If you overlap the cycles and 2 timers are triggered at one time, sparks fly out of the bottom and it shuts down. A more reliable time is about 30 seconds per sprue.

  Currently on the to do list is a couple more widgets for some folks. This means the girls got bumped again. There is a logic to this. Widgets allow me to eat food and spend money on things like this GTO slot car I just built.

  Making odd plastic bits that I want to put on my table is more of a hobbythan a business. You need some smart people analyzing the market and figuring out what to make if you expect to break even..

  This building, which I really like, has not proven too popular. In spite of repeated requests to make 28mm stuff I have to say the demand is a bit underwhelming. So underwhelming, I have completely scrapped plans to make a 28mm tank.

So there is a bit of insight into making your own plastic shop.

  To sum up;

 1. Keep the machine spirit happy.
 2. Find someone smart to tell you what needs made.
 3. Buy a book to get started.
 4. Have a back up plan.

  And have fun.


 Back in the shop there is one more thing that I have been reluctant to address.

    About the time my beloved ducklings vanished I was thinking maybe they just flew away. Not sure why when I gave them plenty of food. Then I spotted 2 red foxes right out back scrounging around. It all made sense then.  These loathsome creatures murdered my ducks.  It is hard not to want to kill them.  These foxes are unaware of advances made in the area of firearms over the past hundred years.  Your average American can single handedly throw more lead than the entire 20th Maine regiment at Round Top.  While this could be curtailed by new legislation, at the current time it is not a good idea to randomly eat ducks if you are a fox. And an even worse idea when your skin has a monetary value. Although I guess numerous holes could lessen the price.  Have not seen them in weeks so maybe they left the area.

  In any event,  have a good week.  Spring time is on the way.   :)




 

The problem with blow up objects

 

OK, more nonsense from the asylum.

 

 It has become some what a of a windmill for sure, but I am going to try another organic. The issue with "plumpness" Has been somewhat resolved. If he were alive Frazetta would take one look at this girl's butt and say it was overdone. And if that gun were real it would weigh more than a Mopar 4 speed. And I mean the old ones that even a hemi could not break.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 And that creates a bit of a physics problem. Namely 2 objects can not occupy the same space. I was playing around with a rifle and it sorts of tucks in the pit of your arm and is somewhat hidden.  This would not be possible if I was made of plastic and the gun was 5 times larger. So it is going to be tough to make something plausible. It could simply be explained that it is sci-fi. But it would be nice if it was slightly convincing.

  That leaves me with a few options.

1. Mold the gun INTO the arms and torso, losing the multi pose.
2. Keep it multi pose and just have an awkard stance constantly.
3. Make everyone standing around like this.

It seems there are a lot of compromises along the way.

Will keep you posted, but some sort of big ass female with a big ass gun is going to fall out of that press in a couple of weeks. Not sure if it will be a pile of crap or not.

Keeping my fingers crossed on this one.

Playing in the slums

  Well I keep getting a little healthier day by day.  I am not sure when NyQuil becomes an addiction but I think I am going to find out.

I made this double wide slum habitat for some city in the corner of the galaxy.  I am not sure who this mini is from. I got it off e-bay some time ago. He just blasted threw the door.
   I like the flats and think they are somewhat useful. It is nice to have an unlimited supply for sure.

  I am going to ponder some odds and ends.

  First off, the hobby in general.  I got to admit that wargaming has become confusing for me. There is so much coming so fast that it seems impossible to be part of all of it. So it seems easier to be part of none of it. Lately I can muster no enthusiasm for the latest new product line. And my finances could not do it if I wanted to.

  Kickstarter is running amok. Every few seconds there is a new product to pre-purchase. There are new rules to learn, new fluff to read and new armies to collect and paint. This is a golden time to be in the hobby for sure.

  Unless you already have a huge collection of models and rules you still like from the bygone era.

  I just realized how long it has been since I played Squad Leader. Or Fantasy Rules! by Chipco. And why did I make an Army Builder file for Warhamer 3rd edition? Just to throw it aside along with years of painting so I can run out like some easily manipulated consumer?

  So expect a few posts about crap most people could care less about. I simply can not muster enough enthusiasm to tweet all my friends about some all new Gate of Antares or whatever.  I do fondly remember playing Red Barricades and a host of other old gems that deserve to be dusted off once in a while.

  My current wargaming project is to base up a lot of 1/72 scale WW2 models, scan and massively enlarge my Squad Leader maps, and then combine the best of both worlds. If possible I am going to make a couple of sc-fi models to go along with them.

  Once my Reaper kickstarter pile of goodies arrive,  ( I know, I was weak and it was just that one time)  I am going to run some games of Chipco Fantasy Rules! at a local shop. It is the finest fantasy rule set ever. It only needs a couple of tweaks to be perfect. There is a strong likelihood I am going to make a few models of a generic nature for Chipco or other games. Whatever I happen to feel like throwing in to the collection.

  In the meantime there is still slot car racing. This hobby has been soaking up most of my attention.

  I plan to make a few more products for it someday. Here is my new track upgraded to 1/24 scale. It is digital and can run 6 cars at a time. Mostly 2 lanes wide but one section is opened up to 4 lanes wide.  I am tinkering around with converting static models to slot cars.

 These are some of my latest projects.  I find it the ultimate walk down memory lane because I have driven both of these cars at one time.

  And with a lucky lottery ticket will once again.

  Have a great weekend folks. And maybe take a moment to revisit an old favorite.

Pre-fab building woes

  OK, I glued together some of the new sprues and slapped them with a little paint. I left the roof loose so it can be lifted off to see inside.

  It makes a neat little sci-fi shack. I have some concerns, like I always do.  ( I got a bad feeling about this drop!)

 The rivets are not exactly the same size. This irritates me quite a bit but it took me some time to notice. I showed a friend and he spent a lot of time looking for an error and could not find it without me telling him.  It makes me want to start over, but then again it is not that bad and I got a lot of other things to make. I am going to let it go and if I get a lot of complaints I will have to find time to re-make the entire one mold just to make a rivet .002" smaller.  Damn the littlest problems can cause the strangest headaches. If you buy one be warned.

  But on the other hand, there is some neat stuff in here.

 

 

This is the outside. Corrugated metal with rivets. There is a roof sprue, a plain wall sprue, and a door/window sprue. There is also a "molding" sprue to fill in the corners. It has a solar panel and vent fan on it also. 

 

 

This is the inside. Plainer walls. You can reverse it if you want.

 

It is possible to glue a couple together and make a larger structure. It is not battle damaged but you could take a nippers to it and hack it up if you wanted to. I plan on doing that to mine. The doors and window are pretty thin and can be cut out for open doors.

 

  I am currently in the throes of fighting the mightiest virus ever to plague mankind. As soon as I stop being toxic I plan on getting some of these out to a friend for some proper painting and will post better pics then.

 

  There are definitely a few of these going out on my next city battle field. Some simple dwellings for the commoners.

 

 



  Here is an AT-43 trooper for size comparison.   I am going to have little fun with these for sure.

  Not sure what will pop up next. I got 2 more widgets to make and I am working with a few folks to make some other terrain stuff.

  But, the real issue is that I have to cross the hurdle and make minis. So far I keep playing it safe with nice and simple stuff. But what I really want to make is lots of plastic figures at a reasonable price for people like me. While this building took 4 double sided molds to make a small model, I could be producing 4 28mm figures per sprue. The press is perfect for figures, and I keep avoiding it because of the enormous complexity involved.
  The problem with figures is it take so many hours to design and program the CNC machine. There are so many steps. One error in any step and you have rivets that are the wrong size. With a ramshackle building it makes little difference. With a model figure it might make the entire mold worthless.

  After these couple of widgets I am going to begin having another go at some plastic figures. I will try and refrain from profanity laced posts when things go wrong, but I might show a render or 2 and a pic of a block of metal becoming a mold.

 I am in a race against kick starter. I think this is going to be interesting.

Have a nice weekend folks.

News flash-story in a little while......

 Ok, I have been laying low and plotting global domination. Word has reached the U.N. and they have thwarted me with a global conspiracy.
 The result  is I must announce that I have stopped shipping international packages. In case you do not know this, the cost to ship overseas has gotten very costly. Overnight the price shot up more than 50% in many cases.
 My web-store is supposed to calculate the weight and give a price bases on location. It is not even close right now. I am getting killed and have essentially been giving stuff away. The webstore charges $11 and the post office hits me for $20+. 
  I stopped accepting E-bay bidders except for US and have disabled international shipping in the store until I can sort this out. Today I posted 2 of my lightest packs of bases in a bubble wrap mailer weighing a grand total of 3.8 ounces and it cost $9.45  to get to Europe.  I like selling stuff, but the shipping was more than the contents. And they were the lightest things I make!
   Once the online shipping calculator starts getting its act together I will resume international shipping. However, I honestly do not know how many people are going to want to pay that kind of cost.
  In the meantime work continues on various odds and ends. It is my goal to try to put something new out for my store every month of 2013. So far I put 2 new base sizes in the store in January and just missed getting the new building done.   I will make another run at an organic people mold soon, and this time it might be workable. The 28mm tank is going to take a LOT of work because this press is so small. It might be delayed until I can round up another scrap metal press that is a little larger. Regarding this,  I have to learn to keep my mouth shut a bit more.
     It seems that a few friends of mine have had some ideas poached by openly talking about their plans on forums and next thing you know- BAM! that idea is out there and they were SOA.
I am a bit more chapped than usual because my Holy Grail of models I have been wanting to make, ( and talking about to bored people every where) now has a kickstarter. And it is not my kickstarter. Talk about a real bummer. Well my girls are going to be making an appearance regardless someday. When, I can not say.
But I have been working on them.

In the next day or so I will have the final part to a new product ready to sell. I have been working on a 28mm building kit and so far it looks OK. I squeezed it in between little odds and ends I have been making.


  Ok, that is it for now. Going to assemble and paint a new building or 2 and take some pics before I put them in the store.

   Look for a post shortly.

  PS. Please understand I am going to get international shipping fixed someday, just right now it is crazy. Sorry if you are put off by this decision, I do not set shipping rates or run the online calculator. Will be back ASAP.

Happy Holidays to All!

  Hello again everyone. It has been sometime since I posted anything of use. Mostly because I had nothing really to report.  :(  

  Actually it has been a pretty good year, and I got a lot to be cheerful about. I know some people have had horrible times and I hope they can dig out and have a better one next year. Keep plugging away and it all works itself out.  Sometimes it seems like it never will, but it does.



  I am almost bursting with news that I wish to spill but I have to wait till it works out before I can post it.  Good things are on the way folks, and I thank those who have been supporting me.

 I was really planning on my next post being a release of something new, but I have been so busy making piles of plastic parts I have not had time to run anything new on the mill. That is going to change because I plan on getting some help in the shop. That's right-employees! OK, they are also my 2 teenage daughters who are pretty reluctant. But since I can cut off their cell phone service at any time, I think I can motivate them.

   So have a very Happy Holiday everyone. It is really a great time to be alive and a pretty nice planet to hang out on. The rest of the ones in our solar system are crappy, so we lucked out! And those Mayans were wrong. So we got until the next apocolypse to set back and relax.


Merry Christmas world.   And "Mr. Claus", thanks for all the orders. I am working on them right now!