So I just lost my FW resin virginity

[mangozac]

I'm feeling all warm and fuzzy. I'll just sit here cuddling it for a bit. Yes, I know that I bought the Model Masterclass book from FW a few months back, but that's not resin

I got me a Ramilies Star Fort (I've always adored the design and decided I would like to buy one, even thought its chance of ever being used is next to zero) and a Grey Knights Strike Cruiser (for a project Vaaish and I are currently working on).

Casting on the Ramilies looks quite good. I'd say it's a low enough volume item that the mould is kept in good condition. The Strike Cruiser could be better (mainly mould tearing around the weapons batteries), but I have the feeling that even if I complained to FW the replacement would not be much better, so will live with it. It will be fine for what I have planned anyway.

I'll take some good pics of the parts and post them on the blog tonight.

[mangozac]

Parts pics for the Ramilies are up:

[Munkey Joe]

Shame it was broken, but FW is USUALLY decent about replacements. Im interested to see how it goes. My BFG orks kinda took a back seat after the campaign my club ran so Ive been slacking on BFG stuff.

I just got my FW order in. Im doing stuff for the Veteran Art project here in Baltimore/DC.

Im doing the FW imperial space marine as a white scar. Now to get my Airbrush skillz up to par!!

[paulson games]

I hadn't seen that model before looks like it'll be a nice build. Sucks on the broken parts though, I've found that the quality of FW pieces is kind of a roll of the dice. Mold splippage is usually the biggest offender.

They are quite good about replacing parts if you contact them, but I do think it's irritating to have to pay that much and have issues with the order. I realize that casting issues do come up, but for the type of money that FW charges you'd think they'd do a bit tighter quality control to make sure the custoemr are happy on the inital order and not having to send out replacements all the time.

I've bought from FW multiple times and I've had to ask for replacement parts on nearly half of the stuff I've gotten. Some of my friends have ordered far more models and never had a single issue, perhaps it's that I'm jinxed?

Outside of that it looks like a cool model and it'll be interesting to see how you paint it up.

[mangozac]

Well I called FW tonight and they're sending me the replacement parts, no questions asked.

I removed all of the sprues and cleaned a few of the parts up tonight. In doing so I have uncovered a few little casting flaws - nothing really catastrophic, just little things.

I don't get their quality assurance policy either. I guess they've done the sums and they get away with the low quality enough times that it's economical to send replacements only to the people who complain. I just hope there's no issues with the replacement parts!

[mangozac]

I hate Forge World.

All of the main parts that make up the Ramilies are skewed, so once you try to glue it all together it just doesn't work. There are lips on some sides but no mating recesses on the parts they join on to.

Every time I pick up a part some little fragile bit breaks off, as they were all weakened during shipping.

I would try hot water to bend parts into the right shape, but I'm not convinced it would work and am sure it would just result in breaking off more greeblies. So yeah, evidently I'm a bit annoyed right now. I'll just pack it all away until the replacement parts arrive I think. I'd say I'll just end up gluing it all together in its warped shape which as a whole shouldn't be too terribly noticeable.

Seriously I would be embarrassed to sell any kits that were this bad quality, especially for that price!

[Munkey Joe]

not to defend FW as there stuff IS crap 75% of the time BUT the hot/boiling water thing does work with their kits. i have had to do it ALOT with their stuff as its warped (to put it nice!!)

now I would be embarressed too to sell what they do for the price. but if your getting replacements anyway try out the hot water trick because it might work and worst case you ruin it until the replacement comes in.

[mangozac]

The replacements are only for a couple of broken parts. If I got them to send replacements for these parts it would be easier for them to send me an entire new kit!

On further analysis I don't think it is a warping issue. It seems like the moulds are just plain incorrect, perhaps to do with the pour sprues. See the picture:

This is the back of one of the four quadrants connected to a pier (pier on the left). This will butt up to an identically assembled pier-quadrant pair, and the same another two times to make up the bulk of the model.

See on the left side of the pier the step along the bottom of the side? See how the quadrant has a similar mating groove where it meets the left side of the pier? Well the side of the quadrant facing the camera doesn't really have such a groove. It has a slight indentation, but nothing even close to what is required. I can get the pieces to align, but that means twisting things so that all four assemblies then won't work together.

I'm getting angry talking about it so I'll stop now.

[mangozac]

Well a month later I finally received my replacement parts. Except they stuffed up and sent one part incorrectly. I'm not going to go through the whole process again and at least I got the main centre towers piece. The quality this time is a bit better (no breaks from shipping either). The piece they sent incorrectly was one of the quadrants and this one seems a little less warped than those I already have. I'll pull off the pour vents tonight and see if it fits any better.

[Munkey Joe]

UHHGGG...

your having a terrible time with FW. Shame because I dont think I have ever had that much problem, and when I did the parts were sent right out and correctly.

Anyway Good luck with it. I suppose I should post up some of my pics then.....

[mangozac]

OK so after a lot of agitation and frustration I finally got my Ramilies assembled. Honestly it was more hassle in its worth and I'm left with a far less than perfect model. In order to get the four quadrants to align what I ended up doing was to glue two quadrants to a single pier and then place the single flat edge down on a belt dander until it was somewhat flat. This was performed for the opposite side quadrants too and then the whole lot glued together after adjusting fitment to the final two piers with a knife.



The centre towers and upper halls went on easily enough, but some sanding of the halls was required to fit them in between parts of the quadrants.

The next step will be painting and honestly I feel that to be a little daunting. I'll probably paint it in the same base colour as the rest of my fleet (a sandy colour) so it will end up very similar to the one on the FW site. The pier roofs I will paint black. For the main colouring I figure I'll break out my new dual action airbrush (it's only a cheapie no-name so don't get too excited) to make things quicker. Probably undercoat black. Basecoat brown, main coat tan and then a brown wash brushed on. Finish up with a tan drybrush and then a light bone drybrush. The big trick will be easily painting the roofs without getting the dark paint on adjacent areas...

Anyway I won't be getting around to painting for a while, I've got too many other things with higher priority.

You can see more pics in the .

[Vaaish]

Congrats on getting it assembled One day I'll be fighting a ramilles myself and I guess I've got a good idea what I'll be going through.

[Seb]

Congrats on the 're' build. Quite shocking you brought in belt sanders etc to complete such a tiny model

FW is great, but boy can they send out some warped stuff at times. Look forward to the paint work in future

- Seb.

[Brianwdunbar]

Just got my fortress and the casting looks good except all the little details on the ridges which were broken off. At least they were in the zip lock bag. Glue I need Glue. How does everyone store this?

[mangozac]

I thought FW had improved their packaging these days. It's unacceptable that something so fragile is allowed to get all broken during shipping!

My unpainted one is just stored in a box with a bunch of other hobby stuff. Painted I'd probably make up something custom with foam to hold it.