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Friday, March 30, 2012

Bolting a Large Mini to a Wooden Base

For the Grenadier Death Giant, I did not want the model to be permanently affixed to the wooden base I prepared, so I engineered a method of bolting it, so that it may be removed if need be.

The model itself has a hollow cavity on its cast base, so I had room to install two customized nuts. Slots were cut in with a hacksaw to give a gripping point to some wire anchors, as well as an encasement of resin that would surround them.

The placement of the nuts within the model's cast base came first, marks for the holes were then transcribed to the wooden base using a few measurements and tracing paper.

I realized that the whole figure tilted way too far back, so I started building up a rim of Green Stuff on one edge of the base to level him out.

To fit one of the nuts in properly some metal needed shaving off. A vice and a large file negotiated the deal.

A few bits of brass and some Green Stuff positioned the nuts in the hollow, and strong casting resin was poured in (foamed up a bit but was trimmed flush after curing) to permanently lock the nuts in position. Bolts feed through the bottom of the wooden base, into the nuts, and the connection is quite snug (being careful to not over-torque of course).

Fancy Footwork

1 comment:

  1. That's really impressive workmanship. I just glued mine done to a block of wood with a pile of epoxy, and it's held for 20+ years, although the figure still needs to be reassembled and probably repainted. One of these days.

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