Resin *USED* to be a pain to clean

 While trolling through my pictures on my phone I realized I have something useful to share! I generally try and avoid resin as I find the cleaning process both annoying, toothbrush scrubs in hot water in every nook and cranny, but also a bit fraught; I have some resin terrain that obviously wasn't cleaned properly and the paint flaked off in a heart breaking way. I DEFINITIVELY don't want to waste my time painting and have it drift off the fig when gently rubbed.

 I have, however, slowly built up a collection of cool minis that just don't come in plastic or metal. Winter usually spells the time when I pull out my stash and realize I need to do the soapy hot water bath, lay out tons of dishtowels for drying, and suffer some serious sore back and feet from the poor ergonomics involved. UNTIL NOW!

Somehow I stumbled on a youtube video talking about the magic of ultrasonic cleaners for resin. Now ultrasonic cleaners are getting cheaper and more accessible and are marketed usually for cleaning jewellery, glasses and other things with small hard to access nooks and crannies. The video was largely about the revelation, communicated to the host by others, about using one to clean forge world minis. Now I don't own forge world stuff because I don't poop golden eggs, but I do have a bunch of resin I don't want to use elbow grease on. 

A short bit of research and crossing my finger that my amazon purchase doesn't suck and I now own an ultrasonic cleaner. Work flow generally involves an electric kettle to bring up the temp on the water faster (the cleaner has a built in heater which is a bit weak sauce), lots of detergent, about 3-4 minutes of buzzing, and trying not to lose any bits down the sink as I rinse the final product. HUGE time and effort savings. My hands and fingers usually end up a bit scorched as I try to fish out bits that slip out of the gaps in the basket but I'm most happy with the results. 

I've also earned points with the wifey by being able to clean her jewellry. Win.

6MMRPC Week 13: Ainsty baggage....packing up

A fairly meagre offering this week. I finished off my resin furniture from Ainsty and a load of shipping loads.

I'm not entirely pleased with all the material on the shelves, especially as the markings are noticeable inconsistent between 'similar' boxes. Presumably it will be better a couple feet away. Otherwise everything looks just fine enough.

The topic is fairly apropos, as I am moving at the end of the month. I'll be re-locating (via a ferry!) to Nanaimo, BC (located on Vancouver Island/West coast of Canada). Already much of my hobby material has disappeared into boxes, and the hassle of organizing a move and changing jobs is taking a big bite out of time and energy. I suspect I'll drop silent for a number of weeks, but not quite yet.
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6MMRPC Week 4: Bones Aina, plaster rocks, pinning the jabberwock

We are rounding out the first month of the challenge. It's been very impressive seeing the volumes of figures some people have managed to finish weekly. I keep telling myself that 6 months is a long time, and if I can continue to reliably finish at least 2 a week, I'll be making a sizeable dent in the collection. It's a bit of a lie, if I only achieve 52 figs, but I have hopes for some large project completions as well.

This week I finished off Aina, yet another Bones figure. She was in my painting queue in the intersession, but I fell off the painting wagon. I finally finished her, and was quite happy with the result. I was vaguely inspired by recently re-reading Lloyd Alexanders Prydain chronicles, and wanted a 'Eilonwy' type character. She struck me as a fairly strong female character, although I'm not entirely sure my wife would agree.

The free handed shield is not quite symmetrical, and the hair isn't *quite* as red/copper as I'd wish, but otherwise I'm very happy. Unfortunately in a true bones fashion, her sword is bent, and despite being bent back with hot water, I don't think I 'quenched' it well in cold water, so it migrated back to the bent shape. Boo.

Pirates: Ainsty pirate ship battle damage

Another Port from the Old blog. I did a massive Ainsty order (to receive maximum discount and free shipping) around Dec 2011. I received the full package early in 2012. I must say early that Andy Lyon over in the UK (of Ainsty castings) is a princely individual. He was very good about keeping in touch with me. The first set of packages got bounced from Canadian customs for some weird reason, so he had to sent them again (these were 2 very large boxes). When they arrived (the second attempt) this is what I found.....

Shipping damage to a wonderful pirate ship fig. Everything was well packed, but transit across the atlantic can be rough, and it's easy to blame the monkeys who deal with the mail (FedEx in this case).

I'm hoping to get some advice on the best way to proceed with repairs.....afterall this looks like a clean break and it's not comminuted at all (I'm sure anyone familiary with broken ones will appreciate this comment).

I emailed Andy to ask what the best way to repair this was, not really wanting to cost the guy MORE of his margin on shipping, instead I got this message:

Hi David

Jeez thats really frustrating. I will send another Hull over to you next week. Fortunately this doesn’t happen too often but thats no joy to you. At least I guess it got through customs this time.

Will get one packed up early in the week

Apologies

Regards,

Andy Lyon

The final (Third!) package arrived very quickly and was a whole other hull! I basically have 2 whole ships (minus one set metal fittings and mast). Like a said, I was very impressed with Ainsty. I'll try and review of the stuff I got and have finally been getting around to washing up (oh resin....sigh).