Soft plastic help needed

[rumacara]

Hello all

I´ve received some soft plastic fantasy figures from a girlfriend (she doesnt know 28mm metals yet  ) and i have to glue some knights on their horses.

What is the best glue for soft plastic that doesnt break easy when gaming?
Is revell plastic glue enough?

Also is there any product that i can use after painting that strenghtens the miniatures so that weapons and small parts dont bend much?

Thank you all for your help

Cheers

Rui

[Major_Gilbear]

A pin and some superglue - the glue keeps the pin into each of the two components, and the pin gives the joint both strength and a little flexibility.

And yeas, I realise that pinning soft plastics is not a usual method! However, I really do think it's the best and easiest method without needing to get anything new (like a fancy glue or such).

[Hu Rhu]

I think it depends on the actual makeup of the plastic.  I used gorilla superglue when I was putting together some Pegasus gladiators wheich are a softer plastic.  As for painting them, I found a good undercoat with Halfords Grey primer worked a treat.  As for bendy spears/swords etc I would recommend replacing them with metal variants.

[rumacara]

Thank you both for the tips.
Using a pin its certainly a good point and it Works strenghtening the miniatures.
About the superglue in soft plastic i´m not convinced. I used twice and it breaks with handling the miniatures.
I will try the pin and revell plastic glue and check the resistance.
The miniatures plastic is more like Strelets so its not so soft.
Spears are easy to replace but swords arent. The miniatures are from Miniknight (Uruk Hai mounted and dismounted).

Gary, you have a point in stating the diferent plastics. Between Italeri and Strelets for exemple, the same glue doesnt work the same way for both. Strelets holds better than Italeri using revell for both.

[Major_Gilbear]

About the superglue in soft plastic i´m not convinced. I used twice and it breaks with handling the miniatures.

On it's own, the superglue isn't very good - if there is flex in the joint, then the superglue just cracks.

However, the pin fits tightly into the holes drilled, and so the superglue holds the pin very securely into each part (and not the parts to each other). Thus the glue holds the pin into each part of the model, and the pin is what provides the strength and flex to the actual joint between the two plastic parts.

If the models are merely a softer form of hard styrene (as opposed to PVC-based plastics), then plastic glue should be suitable. If you're still worried about the plastic glue being enough, you can always make a "pin" out of a piece of plastic sprue to add strength.

Finally, there is always the old superglue-greenstuff-superglue "sandwich" trick. This works quite well, and might be easier/quicker than pinning.

[dadlamassu]

For my many thousands of soft plastic figures I have found clear UHU glue (yellow tube) to be about the best and the point about using pins is well made. 

For painting I wash the figures in warm water with a little washing up liquid added.  This removes mould release agent. 
The best undercoat is diluted PVA (white) glue.  This coats the figure with a layer of thin plastic that seals iy and also helps secure any conversion work.  Incidentally some of the cheaper acrylic paints are based on a PVA/pigment mix I am told by an artist. 

Spears are best replaced by pins (careful how you pick them up).  You can also use soft flower arranging wire and hammer the end to make spear points, glaives, bills etc. Swords are best left alone and carry a pot of silver paint to touch them up! 

[SotF]

Yeah, pinning is a pretty necessary thing for the softer plastics, and it's far easier to do than with metals or normal plastics. Though hot glue can work if you're careful.

When priming, make sure it's one that works right with plastics, otherwise you tend to end up with it improperly curing and remains tacky.