"I'm not letting anyone touch my figures."" Topic

One of my pet peeves is the above.

I'm referring to people in clubs or groups. You have people come to a game. One or two of them regularly put on games and haul figures around. Several more don't have figures and don't seem to ever collect any of them, and are content to game with other peoples stuff. That's OK, I can get that. Time, treasure and talent may mitigate against it.

There is a lot of sloth and uncaring attitude among gamers. To me though I find it more galling that people who HAVE figures and collections and armies do not volunteer them. People who never offer their stuff for play are another matter.

Perhaps the ultimate of that attitude is the guy who says "I'm not letting anyone else touch my figures!" To me then the question is not only what did you make them for, but the rather awful fact that you think it's fine to touch and play with my figures but I can't play with yours. It's insulting on so many levels.

As I set here two weeks after a game, doing a bit of touch up from the wear and tear of the game, I realize there is some validity to the aversion to let others touch your figures. Unlike the above though I long ago determined to master the skills required to make the figures more robust. The Oil paints, now using linseed oil which makes them even tougher protects the finish, the use of solder, and soldering the weapons on before painting and reinforcing with epoxy prevents the weapons being knocked out of their hands because of poor tack on paint, and the preventive surgery of steel piano wire mandrels on easily bent figures especially of horses with less than four feet on the ground, creates similar almost indestructible models. It's a lot of work but it pays off and to be candid, I have fingers and am frequently agitated and excited in a game and can knock stuff off with the best of them.

I am reading through your post, checking that I agree with pretty much everything you have put down…then "STOP"….

steel piano wire mandrel…..?!?!?! this is new to me
Drill and pin, solder, linseed oil---All things I use

But, could you possibly go into more detail on your mandrel method? Maybe even a picture or a link?

Dear Random die roll.

No need for a picture. It's very simple.

My favorite figures are the large 28mm (actually 30-32mm Surens (Willies) and Staddens. I also have lots more of various types and makers. One of the the things I like most about them is that they have the most beautiful horses, and their figures, both equine and human, are in correct anatomical proportions. This means that especially the horses, when you get to the ankles of the horses, are weak when they come out of the mold. True, they have some shrubs or tufts of grass to help the structural support of the model, but that doesn't help over time when hands grip the stand and squeeze inward, or just the wear and tear and the sheer weight of metal being born by those narrow ankles. Even other makers whose horses are more robust are prone under use to snap off on one foot or the other and from then it's only a matter of time till the whole thing comes off.

The same thing happens to foot figures, and gain, they can get bent over simply by people grasping them and moving them. Little by little, but it's there. you can bend them back but that only fatigues the metal and eventually they snap off.

OK. The mandrel thing is what I use to prevent this, and I use it on EVERY horse now except those with four feet firmly on the ground.

What it involves is taking a length of .501 piano wire, available from K&S metals and cutting it off to a length that will penetrate about halfway into the body of the horse from below (or into the foot figure from below. Then I drill up from under the base into the body of the figure a hole just large enough to accept the mandrel. If the figure is going to get especially hard use, for example, be on the edges of he stand, or be a lone officer figure, I will make a bend in the mandrell and make a grove UNDER the base to fit this bended shank. Then epoxy he mandrel into the hole, and over the groove in the base. When dry paint it.

With practice I have gotten good at running up the "strut" next to a leg or in an unobtrusive spot, so you can't see it. Then paint as normal. If you don't make a bend to be put into a groove and just leave it straight, cut off the excess under the base and file down with a dremel rotary grinding wheel to flush and epoxy it.

This method make the figures enormously strong and resistant to bending and breakage.

I also use this when there is breakage on the arm or leg. I will use a very fine drill and uise .503 wire to reinforce the arm by drilling the mandrel into the shoulder, then shaping the arm with needle nose pliers or forceps as I wish, then using putty and green stuff to restore the arm. I've even drilled a very fine mandrel into the mouth of a figure and pre-bent it to be a trumpet or bugle, then made the bell out of putty.

Another trick is if you want to put lances on a lancer, especially with lances down, bend about 1/4" of the piano wire at 90 degrees, and drill a short hole through the saddle in the rear, then put this short shank in the drilled hole while feeding the length of the lance through the hole drilled into the hand. Glue in and it will be remarkably strong, or you can use body putty to wrap a new hand around the shank.

To the purist it might look a bit unsightly, but I assure you it's worth the slight bit of loss of aesthetics to not have to constantly repair your figures.

One thing. I put my minis on LARGE stands. So for example, a Regiment of infantry in the 18th century is 36 figures, privates, NCO's musicians and officers on ONE stand about 4" by 8" in three ranks, The stands are about 1/4" thick so you can grip them at the base easily, but most important all the figures in the interior of the stand are protected and saved from excessive wear and tear.'

It's not hard and you can get some good stuff out of this method, but that's essentially it.

As I said, for horse regiments EVERY ONE gets the reinforcing mandrel unless they have four feet on the ground.

Otto

I've done the same thing as Otto for years, particularly with Minifigs horses from the late 1970s or 1980s, when they used a very soft alloy. In extreme cases, I have put one wire between the front legs and one between the rear legs. When painted flat black, they are not noticeable on a wargame table.

I would only caution that since I live in an area with high humidity, I use brass wire instead of steel, to avoid issues with corrosion. I have never seen a problem with brass wire bending in these applications.

Rick

Anyone can use my figures. It happens a lot … there is very little damage as a consequence (and I can repair it anyway).

I find my fellow enthusiasts very generous and equally quite careful. I do over 20 or so shows and events a year and it doesn't peeve me. The again I use pretty much normal basing.

Phil

@Florida Tony.
Might be worth taking a look at this, you can get metal to metal corrosion between pairs of metals, including brass and tin/lead alloys.

PDF link

The trick is to get two metals which are close together, so your brass is not bad, but nickel might be better still. Keeping them dry is a big help, of course. I would imagine that some glues will help as well, because they form an insulating layer (but avoid those likely to contain acetates, especially in humid/ damp environments)

Nice!!

I have a set of "share" western minis that I use when it is a Gutshot gaming day. While they are not the most pricy of minis---fixing horses is a bit of hobby time I would rather not spend.

This is for sure going to be part of my workbench from now on.

Dear Florida Tory

Brass will work just as well. I don't have a problem with corrosion, but I live in New Jersey. Of course I also paint with oil paints which I am sure makes a good moisture barrier.

I have no problem permitting others to play with my miniatures as long as they agree to do one thing before touching the bases or miniatures:

Clean their hands.

We usually have a feast and then game. Everyone takes care to wash their hands thoroughly before gaming. Common sense, really, and any thoughtless gamer is not fussed at, just not invited back.

I've not had many problems with wear and tear with others using my figures because, in wargaming, the players I know only touch the figures when they move them and then usually pick them up or shove them from the base, not the head or weapon.

One game which is the exception is the car racing game Formule De (or Formula Dice in English; it's a French game). I was in a league at one club and one player got into the habit of picking up the model car he was using (which was mine and painted by me) and, whilst considering his move options, started to absent-mindedly grind the miniature between his fingers as he thought. Another couple of players (who were on the same team) would bang the miniatures down on each space hard as they moved and counted out loud. Normally I would have to touch up the paint on the miniatures at the end of each season but those three, I would have to repaint and re-varnish 3 times a season. In the end I said that a condition of using my miniatures was that they could only be touched when moving the pieces, and then not hard.

It's unrealistic to expect wargame figures not to be handled. Their function is after all playing pieces in a game, just like chess pieces.

Aren't there endless discussions on this site about appropriate varnishing techniques? Adequately varnished figures should be impervious to the effects of regular handling, mere grease being the least of our concerns.

It's another argument in favour of double-varnishing: gloss followed by matt. Urethane is extremely tough.

If my figures start looking greasy and/or grimy a simple wash in warm water with a little detergent added restores their original finish.

I don't know any gamers that won't let others play with their figs. Are these folks common?

"I'm not letting anyone touch my figures.""

So don't go to a club. Don't expect to be welcome at a club. Simple as.

Club members who allow such an attitude from another member are pussies.

Of course I respect your sentiment. Just move those 100 figures up to the fence in a line. 97, 98, 99 … oh, wait, I failed my command roll. Scatter into a loose line abreast. 97, 98, 99 … what? oh, for that roll they stay in a line, but just fall 2" short on their advance? OK. shift them again. 95, 96, 97 … Hey, ref? If the last figure isn't moved yet, can I change my mind?

I have loaner units. And I have my own units that nobody uses but me. If you have enough loaner figures nobody needs to touch your favorite figures….

I've always thought you're supposed to handle miniatures by their bases. Easier to repaint any wear and tear on bases, plus easiest to varnish without risking problems?

As for the Formula de car, how about mounting them onto bases?

The spaces on the board weren't very big and I rejected it because I didn't think it would look good. The rough handling players would still pick up the models with or without bases; it might have cut down on the wear by hammering them down on the board but that grinder guy just had a nervous way of rubbing the varnish and the paint off as he was deep in thought.

So he gets to use the Monopoly car with no finish on it… :-)