By Matt Plonski
Currently, the top items on my hobby to-do list are all resin Eldar kits from Forge World. I am working hard to get a Phantom Titan, Revenant Titan, and standard Phoenix Bomber (already have a Void Dragon Phoenix). Knowing that this was coming I picked up a couple of new tools from Games Workshop: the paint pot, some liquid green stuff, and the clean-up kit.
When I started work on the Phantom, I knew I was going to be doing tons of cleanup. As usual, Forge World kits have a lot of resin in the vents and pouring channels so even perfect casts have excess material. I was totally blown away with how useful the Mouldline Scraping Tool (MST) was. So blow away that I decided to grab my camera and write this article.
When scraping mold lines or removing excess plastic/resin using a knife I usually hold the material in my left hand and the knife in my right fingers with the blade facing towards me. I then brace the piece with my thumb and scrape from out to in. Most of the time the knife will break through the material and cut my thumb. It is so frequent that I have my own box of band-aids that I only use to serve as sort-of a thimble to protect my thumb, not to mention the inevitable cuts afterwards.
The MST completely eliminates that issue. It is stamped out of some thick metal and covered with a very comfortable foam grip. The sharp part of the tool is simply the edge created from creating the metal tool itself. When scraping towards your thumb if the tool breaks through the material it is the flat of the blade that touches your thumb.
Here is a shot of one of the tail pieces of the Eldar Phoenix. I used my clippers to remove the majority of the casting artifacts, but you can see that there are still three points where there is extra resin.
Currently, the top items on my hobby to-do list are all resin Eldar kits from Forge World. I am working hard to get a Phantom Titan, Revenant Titan, and standard Phoenix Bomber (already have a Void Dragon Phoenix). Knowing that this was coming I picked up a couple of new tools from Games Workshop: the paint pot, some liquid green stuff, and the clean-up kit.
When I started work on the Phantom, I knew I was going to be doing tons of cleanup. As usual, Forge World kits have a lot of resin in the vents and pouring channels so even perfect casts have excess material. I was totally blown away with how useful the Mouldline Scraping Tool (MST) was. So blow away that I decided to grab my camera and write this article.
When scraping mold lines or removing excess plastic/resin using a knife I usually hold the material in my left hand and the knife in my right fingers with the blade facing towards me. I then brace the piece with my thumb and scrape from out to in. Most of the time the knife will break through the material and cut my thumb. It is so frequent that I have my own box of band-aids that I only use to serve as sort-of a thimble to protect my thumb, not to mention the inevitable cuts afterwards.
The MST completely eliminates that issue. It is stamped out of some thick metal and covered with a very comfortable foam grip. The sharp part of the tool is simply the edge created from creating the metal tool itself. When scraping towards your thumb if the tool breaks through the material it is the flat of the blade that touches your thumb.
Here is a shot of one of the tail pieces of the Eldar Phoenix. I used my clippers to remove the majority of the casting artifacts, but you can see that there are still three points where there is extra resin.
Next is a shot of how I use the tool. Normally, I'd be holding the piece in my left hand, but for the picture my left hand held the camera. It is easiest to scrape a little further away from my thumb, but you get the idea.
Here's a shot of the almost-finished tail. After taking the picture I cleaned it up a little more and used my smallest file like a saw blade to cut notches in the end to make the control surface more obvious.
In conclusion I have to give the Mouldline Scraping Tool a very high recommendation. If you are working with a lot of resin models I really don't think there is a better alternative. On the other side, I haven't found a good use for the brush. While I still haven't purchased a Finecast model yet I find it a little hard to believe that the brush will be very useful in dealing with them.
Thank you very much!
Matt Plonski
1 comments:
I've only bought one finecast, but the ones I've also seen have a decent amount of flaky filmy thin flash along the mold lines. I can see a soft brush being useful to take some of it off without risking bending/breaking some of the other actual pieces.
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