"to strip or not to strip. That is the question." Topic

I am thinking about repainting my Finns in a better paint scheme. I've painted a few figures from a pack that I had collecting dust and I really like the idea. It looks good to me at least.

But here is my dilemna. Should I start from scratch and buy new miniatures or should I unmount my older ones and repaint them. What has your experience with this been?

I would strip and repaint, it's a bit more effort but you save money, and as a budget gamer that is key for me.

However, it will really come down to what is your time worth.

New…

Could sell the existing and probably get what new ones cost.

Definitely get new ones. Unless you are touching up the old paint scheme with better techniques you have learned it isn't really worth trying to repaint and stripping figs is a total waste of time.

New.

I went through the way of stripping paints on ebay purchased mini. Good experience but the time spent is just not worth it (to me, I have very little time)

Refurbish. Always.

Phil

a lot depend on the figures and the actual amount of work.

Are the figures still available?
Can you just fix the paint job in place?
Do you have funding for a new project?
Is stripping the only solution?

In my own case I had some old Ral Partha Zulu war British. I had one platoon and a few odd figures that added up to second platoon. Some of the odds were painted and some were bare metal, so I stripped the second platoon and reworked the first. I'm very happy with the final results.

Vince

I've got a buddy who pretty much has his own cottage industry stripping down poorly done minis that he gets off of others dirt cheap. I think he uses some kind of solvent that they soak in for days, but whatever it is they come out almost completely "clean." I'll ask him what his technique is and report back here.

My favorite part is when he shows the redone minis to their former owners.

I never find stripping 15mm figs to be worth it.

I appear to be in a serious minority, but I always strip if I am not happy. In fact, happy or not I have set myself a rule that I MUST strip and repaint an army for every army I buy.

I find it pleaurable on three levels;
1- Nice to take a poor, old or simply unsatisfactory army and improve it.
2- fun to experiment with different chemicals and methods.
3- Nice to not have to look for mold lines before I paint something.

And since my self-imposed rule prevent me overspending, it means I have to take more care painting so I don't run out of unpainted figures and thus anger the gods.

Pat

i'd strip. but like others have posted, its about time and budget.

I havev found to my sorrow that stripping a figure does nothing butr take up time that could have been better spent. Ypu are putting in twice the time to paint a figure, basically.

And then there are the ones you cvan never get the paint off anyway.

Put me in a solid "depends" – I've had mixed luck stripping miniatures and often expend more time and effort than it would have been just to buy new and start over.

If you haven't done that many and the figures are easily replacable – I'd just go new.

If you've got some major conversions or OOP figures you want to use, probably worth trying to strip them down.

For me… anything under 20mm will not be stripped. I would sell in a flea market at discount before I tried that. I have very good luck stripping 20 and up, either with chemical or glass bead on low setting.

I sold my american inf to a friend that wanted to play the game and bought new figs with that money. Got better painted figs and a new player for the group.

I've found the after a few days soaking in some diluted Simple Green and then run under a warm tap and lightly brushed, I can strip figs to almost a "new" state. Really minimal effort with great results.

With new manufacturers and models out, you could get some armies for cheaper now than you could before AND better models. On the flip side, sometimes the models you want are OOP or the current sculpts aren't as good or the molds are showing their age.