 John the OFM  | 20 Sep 2009 5:31 p.m. PST |
Frankly, I have yet to find a satisfactory method. For chariots, I have drilled a hole up the keister and impaled the poor guy on a brass rod. I then drill a hole in the chariot platform. Meh. Elephant tower crews…same thing. Now I am doing a load of halftracks, both Hun and Yank. I want to apint them separately, but now I am faced with the task of gluing the crew into them. What method(s) do YOU use? I think the wire idea is out, since the size of 15mm figures means I will ruin more guys than I really want to while drilling Ideas? |
| Pictors Studio | 20 Sep 2009 5:46 p.m. PST |
Very carefully. And with odorless CA so they don't frost. They will stay with CA. With other crew I do the same thing only try to find as many attachment sites as possible. I rarely pin them in there. |
| John the OFM | 20 Sep 2009 6:00 p.m. PST |
Do you scrape the paint off where they stand? |
aecurtis  | 20 Sep 2009 6:19 p.m. PST |
Pins still work best. Just use finer drills and finer rod. You know what Mr. Natural sez. Allen |
 McKinstry | 20 Sep 2009 6:25 p.m. PST |
I just glue them with CA type glue carefully applied. So far, no problems with the little fellows jumping ship. |
| JamesonFirefox | 20 Sep 2009 6:35 p.m. PST |
Most crew don't take too much stress, so I find CA works fine. I glue them in place before priming and just paint the whole shebang. I black prime my WW2 so what i can't reach with the brush is shadowed. |
| TWhitley | 20 Sep 2009 6:50 p.m. PST |
Five minute, two-part epoxy. I do not scrape down to the metal. You have to drop figures/vehicles in order to break an epoxy bond. [And it doesn't glue your fingers together, unless you move really, really slowly!] |
| elsyrsyn | 20 Sep 2009 7:13 p.m. PST |
Since we're talking about CA and pins – have you guys had difficulty getting white metal to bond with steel using CA (odorless or stinkum variety)? I don't like to mix epoxy for such small jobs, as I always end up wasting 90% of it, but I'm not seeming to get a good bond. This is stainless steel, by the way – seems to be OK with galvanized bases, just not with stainless pins. Doug |
| Ditto Tango 2 1 | 20 Sep 2009 8:03 p.m. PST |
Why is this posted to naval boards? I use plastic so my experience is probably not as practical for you, but I very often have to trim figures to fit. It's not because the figures are too big, but because they are rigid – just thing of how you would have to get into yout friver's seat if you did not change position from a seated driver! 
--
Tim |
| John the OFM | 20 Sep 2009 8:19 p.m. PST |
It's posted to naval? <heh heh> PT boat crews?
My bad. I meant WW2 Land or something like that. |
| AndrewGPaul | 21 Sep 2009 3:40 a.m. PST |
I just glue 'em in once they're done. A small daud of glue so it doesn't frost up, and Bob's your uncle. I never bothered with pinnig or scraping off the paint since there's hardly any stress on the join – it doesn't need it IMO. Mind you, that's for seated guys. For guys on foot, I'd probably at least scrape back to metal. Although, usually, there's a second point of contact where they're leaning on or gripping the side of the vehicle. |
| Patrick R | 21 Sep 2009 3:50 a.m. PST |
Our good friend epoxy usually does the trick, no pinning no CA acrobatics and the bond is much tougher. |
| coopman | 21 Sep 2009 4:58 a.m. PST |
I use the two part epoxy glue as well. |
| Martin Rapier | 21 Sep 2009 7:27 a.m. PST |
I just stick them in with either CA for metals or polystyrene cement for plastics. I don't bother pinning or scraping off paint and I've not had any problems with the crew figures falling off. The commander of an Airfix Panzer IV which I'd converted from an Airfix Sdkfz 234 crewman fell out of the turret once. I stuck him back in again. I did attempt to make a Gaul run up the chariot harness (using the Airfix chariot and the guy with arrow in him as a base), but that defeated me. |
