Hobby Lab: Winterdale Watchtower 3, Prepping the Parts
June 26, 2019 by johnlyons
Time to get the parts ready for paint. We have some excess material to remove as well as some flaws that we will tackle after getting the basics sorted.
The first thing is getting rid of the fine, stringly material left from the print head moving from place to place across the model. This is easily solved by passing over the parts with a heat gun. Remember to be very careful during this step as the plastic of the model will retain the heat for a long period and will become rubbery if heated too much, so a quick pass works best.
And as you can see, a quick pass tidies up the areas perfectly, ready to move on to the next step.
Other areas crop up where the material from the printer has had a limited area to hold on to and can form these loops. Some careful work with a craft knife will clear these away.
In some cases, a more heavy hand may be needed, so using a rotary tool with a, 100 grade, sanding drum to remove more awkward excess material. Remember to run the rotary tool at it's maximum speed to make this cleaner and easier to do.
The rotary tool will not entirely removed the material, but another quick pass with a craft knife will clean this up in no time at all.
And with the prepping complete, we can move on.
