"Looks like I can't avoid Finecast anymore!" Topic

Leaving nearly any plastic figures in your car on 100 degree days wouldn't be pretty either.

Plastic will melt, fine cast will melt, don't leave them in a hot car. Simple as that. Fine Cast is also easier to break. It breaks easier than the plastics in most cases.

Yeah, the breaking is in part due to the fact that it is so fine. The plastic stuff holds detail nicely, but because of this they make more fiddly models with very fine details. This means things are skinnier. The actual stuff itself is tougher than the plastic at the same thickness. I played with it when i found a broken fig in a bits box.

Another potential victim of global warming! Don't worry they will probably shatter in some otherwise innocuous accident long before they melt. Your best bet is to resist temptation or face the consequences.

I guess if people boycott the resin, metal will return…..

I have said it before, but it's worth repeating: I have not found, in my experience, Finecast models more fragile than plastics, and they have the advantage over metals of being easier to hold together while gluing them, and easier to clean up the mold lines than with metals.

That, however, is my personal experience. I have not left my armies in a car at 100 degrees, yet.

I thought "Finecast" was a resin, in which case it shouldn't melt.

If it's melting, what the hell is it???

I was going to be buying some of the Easterling Mounted figures to use as Generals for an Easterling Army (With a mounted standard bearer coming out, I can use the unused Standards – since I'll only need one per unit of four to six bases of Cataphracts – for the General Stands for a FoG Easterling Army), and they are all "Finecast."

And I was going to buy two of those Grond Monster things for a Mordor Army (although I wonder if I can modify the Thunderbolt Mountain Goblins to fit in it?), and it is "Finecast."

It doesn't actually melt but some of the thinner pieces can get a little warped. Some guy on youtube did a test on it. And frankly why would you leave miniatures in a car on a 100 degree day anyway?

The biggest problem that I have seen with finecast is that you can get a pretty dodgy model. Missing detail and some pretty bad air bubbles. No idea if this is a quality control thing or what but there are a lot of complaints about this. If you buy finecast I would suggest buying it from GW directly or if you buy it from an FLGS you should open it and inspect it before leaving the store. Just my 2 cents.

The 'melting' incident was way overblown. The only actual picture about a mini being meltdown was a mounted gandalf (IIRC) who had defective horse leg. The guy even pinned the leg with a rod. Later when the internet was in the uproar, he pulled down the post himself and thought that the response was excessive and people started overblowing things. Seems like everybody saw melting minis on store windows back then.

Finecast resin is really unique, it's not anywhere close to FW's more brittle resin.

Just take a REALLY good look when you buy.

I am both a GW LOTR Fanboy and Materials Engineer. I understand that FINECAST is a thermoset resin (think epoxy). That means once it cures, it cannot be remolded (like polystyrene), but is subject to mechanical deformation at high temperature. Thermosets are generally tougher (able to absorb more mechanical stress), have higher Glass Transition Temperature (Tg) and higher Heat Distortion Temperaure. However, as they approach these temperatures and force (in this case plain old gravity) is applied, these materials will deform by a polymeric creep mechanism.

Being the curious Engineer and LOTR fanboy, I went to a GW store a few months back and the store owner demonstrated the implications of these materials properites. He took a large GW WH beast (the size of a Fell Beast) and dropped it from standing height onto a hard table and then to the floor to demostrate its resilincy. It simple bounced. If we had done the same thing with a similar sized metal model it would have deformed on impact or broken. Of course as one poster pointed out one objective of the switch was to allow for more detail and narrower cross-section. That means when a sculpter levarages these properties and makes thin, narrow cross-section items (daggers, swords, bows, and staffs) they are going to be more fragile than the bulky metal piece. So on the mechnical front I am satisfied.

On the temperature tolerance front, I would not encourage anyone to place any painted minaiture in a sustained 120+ degree(Farenheit) environments like a car windshield. The UV absorption and temperatures will degrade the paint and overcoat. Additionally, if it is any kind of polymer, the potential exists to create mechnical degradation in terms of creep.

The last area that plastics and resin miniatures are more worrisome is long term durability. The Lead/Tin based metals have the dread lead-rot issue (good pewter doesn't but still will develop a patina), but all plastics will gradually mechanically deteriate as time progresses (they become brittle, craze, crack, loss surface gloss, etc.). Hardly any plastic miniature will be as durable over decades as a nice pewter figure.

All that said, if the Engineer sets aside his technical concerns, the new Gandalf the White miniature is mighty nice looking (better IMHO than a previous pewter could achieve) and this Fanboy will undoubtedly snap him up so that he can lead my horde of Thermoplastic Rohan Horse and Warrior of Minas Tirith into battle against the pewter might of Mordor.

Lost Pict

Thermoplastic Rohan Horse and Warrior of Minas Tirith into battle against the pewter might of Mordor

I'm not sure that's canon…

Anyone got a link to pictures of the new LOTR figures? I'm having a GW LOTR revival myself…

There's a photo of most of the New Releases here. They look pretty cool…..

link

That is why Sauron used Cold Drakes, a blast of frosty breath lowered the temperature of his opponents to the ductile/brittle transition so that they would crack and sink like liberty ships! :-)

Pictures of evil minions (not broken liberty ships):

link

Lost Pict

Who says we're a bunch of geeks…

"And frankly why would you leave miniatures in a car on a 100 degree day anyway?"

You don't have a choice sometimes when you live in Florida like me and lots of other gamers.

8(

I saw from the images lotr collector shared some of the WOTR command packs with the 3 current sculpts and one bonus figure.

Has anyone heard rumors as to whether these are Finecast or pewter?

I've heard they are going to be Finecast….

Thanks lotr collector.

@LostPict,

Thanks for the detailed analysis and shared GW store demo story.

I'm not sure I fully understand your concern about long term durability.

This is my concern.

I buy a Finecast Balrog. I drop it. It has enough elasticity and strength to bounce and survive. If I do break a wing off, I am able to use the old pin-and-epoxy repair trick we know and love. Initially the material is super, strong, elastic and has the nice casting qualities.

However over time the crystals in the resin continue to set and cure. After 5-10 years the Balrog no longer bounces when dropped. Elasticity is lost with time. It shatters or breaks into 3 or 4 pieces. If I try to drill for a repair to the piece, the Finecast resin behaves more similar to low grade resin I may have experienced before. As I drill, the resin crumbles and I am unable to pin the piece. I have a fragile piece that is hard to repair effectively.

Do we share the same concern?

^
Finecast is cheap resin with minimum quality control. I had to replace a model 5 times due to bubbles giant hunks of mold sticking to the miniature, and miscast with the rep saying that "I should use whatever bits are not miscast to make a whole model". It is not an isolated incident either, I recommend you never order these online and carefully inspect the model before purchase.

This is an example of the sort of thing you can expect

link

Fine Cast is a plastic resin, flexible to some degree, the fine parts are very fine – in some cases so fine they are nearly paper thin. The models are easier to clean in some cases, but in many other cases the castings are poor as when the mold is misaligned by even 1 degree the details are bodged something fierce.

Religion,

Same concern.

Lost Pict

But why do they cost more than metal…?

But why do they cost more than metal…?

It can be best explained by the trickle down, labor theory of supply and screw the pooch.

@LostPict,
Thanks for helping a chronic class cutter of Materials Science 201.

Religion, I taught MAT201 – '83/'84 at the esteemed school of lower learning…

As a working Materials Engineer, polymers come in too categories, CPS and EPS, Cheap / Expensive Plastic Scatalogical susbstitution required. Thus, this must be the EPS.

Lost Pict

I received my first fine cast figure for Christmas 'ogre firebelly' I'd broken the weapon before I'd finished painting it.

"But why do they cost more than metal…?".

GW marketing 101, "prices can only go up"!