"Strong & Flexible on Shapeways" Topic

How much do you know about our Strong & Flexible plastic material? Do you know how it's made? Where it got its name? Ok, that one is pretty easy, but what about what the 3D printing process used to print it is called?

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More importantly, how to paint it and what glues work on it?

You can also apply more primer coats than usual to limit the porosity.

Yeah…I just keep spraying coats of enamel clear gloss coat until all the pores are filled in and I have a glossy surface. THEN I prime the model.

In the middle of priming another batch of Black Strong and Flexible / White Strong and Flexible right now. Might finish the surface prep phase by tomorrow night.

Got a few 1/144 FE 8 fighters in Frosted Ultra Detail as well. They may be too fragile to use for gaming. Already snapped a couple of struts on one model.

If prints are fragile that's a huge negative for gaming models.

The Frosted Ultra Detail (FUD) ones can be fragile. I have several that are serviceable for tabletop gaming. It varies from print to print based on the design. My W.12 models are fine. The FE 8 should be fine, but does require a little more care.

The Strong and Flexible is exactly what the name implies, which makes it ideal for tabletop gaming models. The downside is the surface prep time and the slight tradeoff in detail you get with the FUD.

I've gotten good results with the Strong and Flexible product for 1/600 ironclads and 1/144 airplanes for tabletop gaming.

You can find assorted examples of these models discussed on my blog

skilllevelzero.blogspot.com

There's also a lot of discussion of printing materials over on the aerodrome forums at wingsofwar.org

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- TGD

Strong and flexible is extremely strong and very flexible. It is much, much stronger than gray "hard" plastic used in 28mm kits. I have thousands of 2mm pieces laying around my house now and I haven't had a break yet. I created a 2mm lancer unit for the Napoleonic era, with over 400 individually modeled, free standing lances, and not one broke in transit, nor since. Ultra detail plastic is a bit fragile, but I wouldn't use it for gaming myself. It might be good for making masters.

Painting wise, I don't even base coat my figures. The porous nature of the plastic has some awesome traits that can save time and money. You can skip the spray-painting step. The plastic will readily take on whatever color wash you apply to it straight out of the bag. The darker the wash, the stronger the wash has to be. For my line of figures I use a light wash of the main uniform color to tint the entire figure, then apply washes to darken it, then highlight.

The plastic also has really incredible teeth, so you can paint fine detail with rich paint. This is a life saver when trying to paint around recessed windows and doors on my buildings. It makes what could be a very frustrating process quite easy.

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Here's a preview of my new blog for my 2mm figure range. Not one figure in any of these pictures has been base-coated, and the paint holds up fine to handling.