Re: Casting your own...

On 22 Oct 99, at 17:10, Michael Petska wrote:

> Got a query for the list. We are rather poor, so I can't
afford fleets of
> cool minis (sorry, jon@gzg :-(   However, I came up with a
great
> alternative, since I don't want to push cardboard counters
around for the
> rest of my life (reminds me WAY to much of SFB ;-). I
bought a variety of
> balsa wood sheets and some pine dowels and I'm gonna build
MY OWN minis.
> HELP, I think I've lost my mind! :-)

You have, yes, no question.

What you may want to try is getting a router or jig saw or
some such, and making a silhouette miniature--"as seen from
above" would probably be most effective, although if you
like NSL ships you may as well just cut a couple of
rectangles and be done.  With this approach, you could make
a jig and knock out as many as you care to.   I haven't any
idea how well balsa would work, but your local plastics
place (see "Plastics" in the yellow pages) will happily sell
you Sintra (or a competing brand like Komatex) sheet.
Sintra is a graphics PVC board, more flexible and easier to
work with than regular PVC, and you should have no trouble
working with it (in a WELL VENTILATED AREA).  3 millimeter
thick should do just fine although it comes in other
thicknesses as well.  If you prefer styrene instead of
Sintra, that should work too, just a bit more fragile--and
you can cannibalize plastic model kits for weapons etc..
Note: plastic distributors generally have an "offcut" bin
where you can pick up leftovers at a low price--usually
acrylic ("Plexiglas") but sometimes other things as well.
If you don't have a plastics distributor locally, try a sign
shop.

Caveat: I haven't tried this myself since a) I have enough
unpainted figures already, and b) I'm not a
woodworker/craftsman type.