Saturday, April 16, 2011

Product review

Instant mold

two words

WIN and AWESOME!!!!



This is a godsend to the dark eldar army.
Unlike other armies who have every option included in a single box I ran into a dilemma recently trying to make some trueborn. I needed 12 blasters. Hmm the box only comes with one. So GW expects me to trade with other DE players to get the blasters.... But they are using every one they can get their hands on too. So lets check the bitz sites... $3 each. Nope not going to do it.
Fortunately I had purchased 2 packages of this instant mold and hadn't used it yet since I didn't have anything I needed that badly. Wallah! problem solved.
now to start the actual review.
Instant mold is about $12 for us Americans and it is worth about three times as much. Its a breeze to use. All you need is the instant mold and some hot water. If you don't have a water boiler I found out that a coffee pot set to 11 will have the sufficient heat to start the process.
To make a 2 part mold just drop the bit you need in the middle of the now molten mass and wrap it. Squeeze tight to get the bubbles out. They are easy to see because the material is clear.
Then wait about 5 minutes. When it hardens it has about the same qualities of hot glue except i have not found a single material that this stuff sticks to. (and I have tried allot) Take a sharp exacto blade and simply cut the bit out. GW models are easy since they use a 2 part mold with their designs so if you remember where they are just cut along the original mold lines. If you think you will have trouble getting the mold to match up again just slant the blade and cut a few angles here and there so you have some guide pins.
Pop the bit out and your ready to go. Mix up your filler material, be it green stuff, brown, grey, miliput, hell i even tried a 2 part automotive epoxy. (just to see if it would stick) The trick is as long as the material doesn't heat up to over 170 degrees when it cures it wont obscure the details.
Lay a approximate sized bead of the material in the center of the mold, stretch it out to the approximate size of the bit. Don't use too much because you will have a thick flash line. Then use pressure to get the material into all the gaps. (I just set it on the table and lean an elbow into it.
Wait for the time on the material packaging for the material to cure fully. What I do while I wait is I start making a mold of other bitz that I need (hence why i bought 2 packages)
When its ready just take the mold apart and the instant mold is flexible so you can bend it (within reason) and it will return to its mold shape.
Congratulations you now have a copy of that precious bit you need.
And I have 3 4 man trueborn squads.
Now there I know there are allot of bitz you need to have duplicates of so go google it and purchase yourself some. It is popping up in a few online stores recently.
There is no reason you cant make whole models using this stuff. If i ever do start a grey knight army I'm going to need to make allot of custom pieces and this will save you time money and sanity when trying to make 30 or 40 of the same type of model.
Now back to my Dark Eldar though. Whats a decent unit that I wouldn't mind having if the unit wasn't so damned expensive.... *ponder*
over a dollar per point and all it consists of is 4 small metal pieces and a base. I think i might get to field a web way beast swarm army after all.

3 comments:

  1. Actually, I got the instant mold to do the same thing, and was NOT satisfied whatsoever with the molding abilities with green stuff. There is just to much small detail on blasters, shredders and the like to get a good cast off of it. I am going to try a liquid resin and see how well that works. I'll let you know how it goes....

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  2. Green stuff is not ideal for instant mold. Brown or White stuff holds ALL fine detail well. I've been cranking out Deathwatch Shoulderpads in brown kneaditite and even the Latin inscriptions on the shoulder guard are crystal clear.

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  3. I have been going the crap as hell route and useing the tube of watertight epoxy putty from ACE hardware. $5 for about a pound of the stuff. I can crank out some stuff with that, the only issue now is that I need to get my hands on a razorwing flock to begin the evil cloning process *cue evil laughter* MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

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