poorly made miniature assembly

[jonfreeman]

I'm not going to list names so as not to dump on the company (it's not a big studio like Reaper or GW) ... but I got a miniature to assemble and they kinda really botched the process.

 

It's a cheap resin, and the assembly points where it SHOULD fit flush isn't.  every one of those points has a divot.

 

So it's basically like trying to glue 2 jar lids together when the jars aren't the same size.

 

 

My question is - how should I fix this?  Do I employ green stuff?

I don't really want to pin it because some of these fiddly bits aren't even 2 mm wide (lots of little arms without tabs/slots)

 

Advice welcome

[Dr.Bedlam]

When I find myself with a similar problem, I start by drilling and pinning and testfitting, and then dropping a pin in, gluing, and using putty or Zap-A-Gap to fill any obvious space. The medium depends on the size of the gap.

[Bruunwald]

As the Dr. said, the medium (thus the fix) depends on the size of the gap. Any chance you can share a pic of the offending pieces? I don't think anybody will get into any trouble over this.

[Rigel]

Would it disfigure the proportions too much to get a craft knife and slice those divots down flat? If they are fiddly little bits, they shouldn't be hard to cut. (Though of course the brittleness of resin could cause issues with shattering.)

[jonfreeman]

this is a figurine of the support character J4X in Imperial Assault.  I left the crap on my desk to provide a sense of how tiny this thing is.

 

and this is how the robot was advertised on the website

 

Any rate, I'll list off and explain all the details.  had I known that the manufacturer sold it like this I probably wouldn't have bought it.  8\

• this isn't all the fiddly bits, there's more just for this model (lots of other models in the bag with similar design issues, but this one's the worse
• The gun-arms that go on the side of the main body don't really fit.  The inside of it is flat (and an ugly flat that you'd find on a connection side, so there's no question there) ... but it's supposed to connect into that circular divot like a ball-socket joint would go.  8\
• i left that top cannon in view.  while the piece actually would fit flush where it's supposed to, it's barely a mm tall.  With this material i wouldn't want to try pinning it.
• The head-base and the neck-base are the ones I mentioned in the original post.  I tried to angle it so you could see the recess via shadows, but it's a huge divot where the two pieces are supposed to glue-fit together.

So yeah.  kind of a mess.  8\

 

anyhoo, there ya go.  Please provide advice.

 

Edited July 31, 2019 by jonfreeman