Federation Commander

Scoutdad wrote:Jeff,

If you
re willing to pay the postage, you can mail them to me.
I'll drill them out to accept a metal stand and then throw a couple of metal stands in the return package as well.

Ah, so tempting....

I'll try a couple more things here before I give up on my end, though...

Update: I think the Condor is workable enough now. We did it! Fleet looks so much better with the KR and Condor back in it....

I usually use a drill bit in a pin vise to drill out the broken piece

Usually took a bic and an exacto knife to get pin out of the holes, but haven't had to deal with that issue in quite a while --

Bic or match, flame dealt with the glue and melted off some of the pin, but everyone has their own way to take care of issues like that ---

I found that a Fairburne-Sykes commando dagger does a good job of drilling out stand holes.

An actual drill would do better but is harder to use and control. I had not thought of locking a drill bit in a vice and rotating the ship by hand.

Argh!

I was admiring my models... and stupidly dropped my Condor.

The plastic base snapped at the top!

I know exactly what to do to fix this, but I'm darn peeved.

(Someone please tell me that the Mongoose ships and stands are sturdy enough to handle light abuse-- my son has his heart set on a Gorn Fleet Box for Christmas!)

Minis being minis, the Mongoose ships are about the same.

The resin ones were pretty resilient, since resin has a bit of "give" before it breaks. The resin they used also absolutely loves simple cyanoacrylate superglues and bonds wonderfully using it.

The switch to metal was good and bad for durability.

Good, in that they are big minis and that means a lot of metal which gives them some stiff bodies. Being cast in pewter and not soft lead helps too. They won't dent or bend the way lead minis can.

Bad, in that the minis were designed to be cast in slightly porous, superglue-loving resin.

Certain joints that worked fine in resin (the thin Klingon wing/engine strut connection, etc.) don't have the surface area to be optimal in metal. It's not a major problem, and one the older Starline minis have had for 30 years in some cases, but requires some different techniques to create a glue-joint that will be durable for the game table over the long-term.

Mongoose's stands are molded in clear styrene plastic. Clear styrene is always somewhat brittle, so a degree of care is always in order. A good thing about them is the ball-joint at the top. This can act as a "breakaway" joint, potentially saving the stand from breaking. Some folks also intentionally pull the ball joint apart to store the minis separate from the stands. A lot of damage happens during transportation and this helps avoid that.

I am apprehensive of the mongoose stands (I have not tried them in a game yet) but I was having problems connecting/disconnecting even without a ship attached. I went with the CorSec Engineering omni-stand system. The connections for the ship, stand and base are metal screw connections. I attached their flat connectors to the bottom of most of my ships using an epoxy specifically designed for metal from the hardware store. I drilled a hole in my C8 and used a cylinder connector. You can see them in the "klingons with weathering" thead in the 2500 section. I will use only 2" bases in games for maximum stability.

For my Klingon ships I first very carefully attach the engines one at a time with superglue. Once the superglue dries I use the special metal to metal exoxy to reinforce by applying it liberally to the underside of the hull engine connections. You can see the exoxy "bubbles" when looking at the bottom of the ship but I consider this an acceptable trade off. The engines are still not as secure as I like but it is the best solution I know of.

marcus_aurelius wrote: For my Klingon ships I first very carefully attach the engines one at a time with superglue. Once the superglue dries I use the special metal to metal exoxy to reinforce by applying it liberally to the underside of the hull engine connections. You can see the exoxy "bubbles" when looking at the bottom of the ship but I consider this an acceptable trade off. The engines are still not as secure as I like but it is the best solution I know of.

I do much the same thing, though it's not always possible to get the wings on with superglue gel first. Sometimes I have to resort to the epoxy from the get-go (maybe 20-25% of the time).

Scoutdad is fond of using both superglue and epoxy glue for small but vulnerable joints like that. I'll let him detail the method.

I do that too, but also reinforce the underside with a layer of 2-part epoxy putty. In rare cases, I've even laminated on a thin sheet of brass and then puttied over that.

djdood wrote:Scoutdad is fond of using both superglue and epoxy glue for small but vulnerable joints like that. I'll let him detail the method.

The "two-glue" method is actually quite simple, and works really well on the ST2500 Klingons.

Sand, clean, prep both sides of joint...
Mix a high-strength, slow-set, 2-part epoxy...
Apply epoxy to middle 75 - 80% of joint...
Using a toothpick, apply superglue to the outer 10% of each side of joint...
Assemble and hold in place...

The super glue will set relatively quickly, allowing you to set the piece aside and move onto another miniature. This enables the epoxy to slowly cure out and form a high-strength bond.

The epoxy/superglue method is the best way to go. I have some old (mid 90's) dragons that were glued this way and they're still together. Of course I'm not taking them out and moving them around like the gaming pieces.

Starfury wrote:The epoxy/superglue method is the best way to go. I have some old (mid 90's) dragons that were glued this way and they're still together. Of course I'm not taking them out and moving them around like the gaming pieces.

Branthadon!!!

Where's Gary when you set him up for a perfect segueue???