"Heroclix conversions: the feet??" Topic

Say, how are you clever people doing those repaintings and conversions of Heroclix figures and removing them from their bases without destroying their feet? I see these figures pictured here on TMP boards on what are patently not the original bases. I would be scared to try to cut them off so I've always left the bases alone, just covered them with flocking or paint or some such. Is it possible to pop them off without a lot of difficult knife work?

Here's a Starman (? or Starboy) Heroclix I turned into classic campy Bat-villain Mister Polka-Dot (aka Polka-Dot Man). But left him on his normal base.

Use a sprue cutter to cut vertically around the circumference of the foot. Then just nip off as much as you like to make his shoes thick or thin.

I have done that with about 50 or more Heroclix and it works just fine.

Mike Bunkermeister Creek
Bunker Talk blog

Put them in the freezer for a while. It makes the glue brittle and in most cases they pop right off with little effort.

Great ideas! Thanks!

Bunkermeister's technique is what I do as well.

On most of them wedging an x-acto blade under the foot will just pop it off the base.
Some are glued really, really well, so I use the clipping with cutters method mentioned above.

I usually use the X-acto wedge without problems (well, I did slice into the table once--don't tell my wife).

Rob

<Put them in the freezer for a while. It makes the glue brittle and in most cases they pop right off with little effort.?>

I swear by this.

BTW: Love the conversion.

No reason you can't try both techniques.

When I used to de-base them (that sounds morally questionable…) I froze them overnight first then pried them off the plastic layer/snipped them with an old blade.

The newer (larger) masses of plastic under the last figures I re-based seemed like they had some form of grav boards under their shoes, very distracting. You had to pop the platform of plastic off the click/dial base then snip the very noticeable platform off the feet. It seemed there was less plastic under the feet in early Heroclix/Horrorclix.

I'd use the exacto shallow angle chisel or strait blade (in the medium or large size handle) pushing downward onto a cutting mat to remove the clix from it's base. It's remarkable easy and MUCH safer than the side-cutting motion of the standard exacto blade.

I've unbased hundreds of clix figures with this method. After they're off, if they have the blob of plastic around the bottom of the boot just clip it off around the foot, It's then easy to use your knife to cut it to the level of the bottom of the boot.

X-Acto wedge technique for me and the 1000's I have done. Occasionally I take a toe off or round a heel, in which case a small bit of putty when you glue it to the new base should cover it.

Ordinary bass, thank you, I may need to look into the chisel thing.

Last year I had a narrow blade break (no injury but bounced off something on the table and flew past my eye) and a second incident when I couldn't get a figure to break free easily late in the evening before bedtime I foolishly let my hand move into a bad angle and impaled a thumb very neatly (completely in line with the distal phalange) with most of a #11 (?) blade when it broke free.

Have not un-based a Clix figure since… which is okay because I am moving to 15/6/3 mm figures for new projects.

Ouch!
I never use a standard blade for heavy cutting it's just too dangerous.

Luckily, the heavier handles and chisel blades are quite common and cheap. I usually buy mine from Hobby Lobby under the "Excell" brand (compatible with Xacto)…
link
…though there are many other exacto compatible brands and even Menards has the heavier duty handles and blades sometimes.

"…I never use a standard blade for heavy cutting it's just too dangerous…"

Yeah, I can attest to that. Ihave this "nice and straight" scar as physical evidence.

Whenever I cut anything, I lay it down on a little piece of 2x4 as a cutting board. For liberating 'Clix, I lay it down so the base hangs over the edge of the board and cut down into the board.

That said, I have plenty of rips and cuts from being in a hurry and/or not doing things properly. Also stupid. Stupid is a big player in my injury history.