Plastic bases: Best way to attach to the ships

Starfury · Post by **Starfury** » Thu Apr 05, 2007 11:48 pm

I have a border box I've (finally) started painting. I've finished the Klingons and am going to base them...and the plastic posts are too small for the ships. I hadn't planned on gluing them in place and cutting off the tip of the stand and trimming it down is a pain.

I was thinking about either filling the hole in and re-drilling or just drilling a small hole next to the existing one. Any opinions on which is best? This way when I go to the next batch of ships I'll pre-do the bases and not worry about messing up the paint.

striker8 · Post by **striker8** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 1:13 am

you could try putting a tiny bit of green stuff in the hole wetting the post and preesing it into the green stuff to make a better fit. If you let the green stuff sit for a bit before you press the post in it will be less sticky and you should be ablt to form fit it with less chance of the post sticking to the green stuff. Once you have the hole fittied let the green stuff harden and you can trim it using an exacto wieled very carefully.

jpat · Post by **jpat** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 1:17 am

We covered some of this in "my" thread:
http://www.federationcommander.com/phpB ... .php?t=214

You may already have seen that, though.

Starfury · Post by **Starfury** » Fri Apr 06, 2007 2:15 am

I did see the other thread. What I did was take out my drill bits and compare them to the posts. I then took the 2 smallest and drilled test holes. One was way too big, the other very snug. I'm just going to re-drill the holes on this batch, the next ones I may try the putty idea or just drill those too.

Paul B · Post by **Paul B** » Sun Apr 22, 2007 10:07 pm

I'm not sure if it's allowed to post about potential competitor's products, but one of the best ways I've found is with some new "magnetic adaptors" available for another game which is still in development. They consist of two pieces, one that's glued to the flight stand, and another to the miniature. It makes storage and transportation much more easy I've found as you simply slip the mini into the flight stand to play, and then pull them apart for transportation. I think the nub of the small piece (meant to go into the whole) is roughly the same dimensions as a standard flight stand, so you'd probably still have the same problem with the too-large hole.

They also seem to work best with the half-height stands, which I don't think is an ADB standard. Though I think a person could just cut a normal stand in two, and still glue it on. I was thinking about picking up some more to go with some Gorn minis I picked up. I hate hauling ships to a game only to find out that one of the plastic stands has broken and the small pieces is still stuck in the mini!

5 of the adaptors are round 6 bucks. You can also buy the smaller pieces, about 10 of them for the same price. So you can have multiple miniatures use only a few stands.

Bolo_MK_XL · Post by **Bolo_MK_XL** » Sun Apr 22, 2007 10:12 pm

When SFB minis first came out in the 80s, the smaller ships came with a small metal adapter you could glue to the mini and leave the base free for transport -- only downside I recall is the height it made those minis vs those with the adapters --
There have been discussions about producing them again -- something Im totally for --

Starfury · Post by **Starfury** » Mon Apr 23, 2007 3:14 am

After drilling the 6 Klingons (and one of the D7 has battle damage due to me going all they way through) I decided the best thing was to order a bunch of metal stands from ADB.

I do have 2 of the Romulan Snipes that have the extenders in the "to do" box along with about 30+ other ships. Once if finish the 4 Kzinti I'm working on I may start the Romulans or do some Kryomek monsters. Only got 60 of those....

TJolley · Post by **TJolley** » Mon Apr 23, 2007 2:38 pm

Magnetic Adapters:
http://www.rattleheadgames.com/catalog/NJM1100.html

(I use these a lot. They are a little expensive, but they don't break like plastic, and are a breeze to install - almost no time)

The metal stands from ADB are also good if you are cash strapped.

My next favorite method is here:
http://www.star-ranger.com/BasingMinis.htm

This is somewhat time consuming, but very cost-effective. It is only usable really down to NCL and some frigates though, as it entails drilling out the hole in the mini

Again the metal stands from ADB are good if your craft skills are lacking.

Paul B · Post by **Paul B** » Mon Apr 23, 2007 8:25 pm

TJolley wrote:Magnetic Adapters:
http://www.rattleheadgames.com/catalog/NJM1100.html

(I use these a lot. They are a little expensive, but they don't break like plastic, and are a breeze to install - almost no time)

Those are precisely the ones I was referring to, but I wasn't sure if it was okay to post a link or not.

mjwest · Post by **mjwest** » Mon Apr 23, 2007 9:37 pm

Paul B wrote:Those are precisely the ones I was referring to, but I wasn't sure if it was okay to post a link or not.

Posting informative links to specific, useful products isn't a problem.

It becomes a problem if it is to a product irrelevant to the topic (or outright SPAM), or is to a copyright infringer.

These links were all good.