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Silicone Putty


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A simple tutorial for using Silicone Putty as a mold for greenstuff castings (ie: small details rather than whole models).

 

Silicone putty is great for this because it's extremely fast setting (about a minute), captures detail really well and greenstuff won't stick to it at all. In this example I made a very long purity seal from greenstuff (it'll be used on my Grey Knight conversions), sculpting it on a piece of plasticard.

 

So here I sculpted a long flowing seal onto a piece of plasticard.

http://www.masteroftheforge.com/files/images/siliconetutorial/purityseal.jpg

The silicone putty comes in two parts, both of which are of, well a putty consistency (obviously).

http://www.masteroftheforge.com/files/images/siliconetutorial/sp1.jpg

Take two small equal sized amounts. They are very easily mixed just using fingertips and takes probably no more than 20-30 seconds. It's not exactly messy, but you'll want to wash your hands afterwards.

http://www.masteroftheforge.com/files/images/siliconetutorial/sp2.jpg

It hardens very quickly, so as soon as it's mixed into one colour, press it onto whatever it is you are molding, being careful to sort of spread it over the piece so as not to capture air bubbles.

http://www.masteroftheforge.com/files/images/siliconetutorial/sp3.jpg

Give it a minute to set, and pull it off. It captures details very nicely (you can see my fingerprints on the putty in the photo above). Whilst normally on larger objects the mold has some flexibility, on small pieces like this there really is none. It's very easy to cut and will break if you use too much force, but the beauty of this material is that Greenstuff will not stick to it at all, so there's no need for any kind of release agent.

http://www.masteroftheforge.com/files/images/siliconetutorial/sp4.jpg

When making the cast a soft mix of greenstuff is highly recommended (ie: at least twice as much yellow as blue) and you'll need to press it into the mold with a wet (and preferably rubber) tool, otherwise it'll stick to the tool and be pulled right out of the mold.

 

Pretty simple to use and easily found in online stores or on ebay. I paid about £20/$30 for 500g but most people won't need this much unless molding a lot of stuff.

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How long is the drying time on this kind of epoxy?

 

I found a vendor here who sells it in bulk and I'm wondering if its feasible to use this as a GS replacement.

 

Silicone putty is not an epoxy. It never cures rock hard. It retains flexibility, so it would make an absolutely terrible Greenstuff replacement. It's for making molds.

Is this stuff good to make molds for whole models? And if not can you link to something that does please? :D

 

no not really. The small size if the molds means there isn't enough flexibilty and also the drying/curing time is so quick it's not possible to really work on cleaning up the shape of the mold.

 

For molding whole figures I'd suggest silicone rubber which starts as a two part liquid. There are lots of guides out there on how to use this stuff, though I'll post my results when I make my own casts soon enough.

  • 2 weeks later...
  • 3 weeks later...
Could resin be poured into this mould? Is the silicon flexible? Flexibility would make pressing the green stuff into the mould more difficult wouldn't it?

Very cool regardless!

 

I see no reason you couldn't use resin, but there's no flexibility in molds on the such a small scale.

Could resin be poured into this mould? Is the silicon flexible? Flexibility would make pressing the green stuff into the mould more difficult wouldn't it?

Very cool regardless!

 

I see no reason you couldn't use resin, but there's no flexibility in molds on the such a small scale.

Awesome. This is too cool to NOT try out.

I've been trying to make greenstuff molds of my old metal legion of the damned shoulder pads and haven't had any luck. Do you think the silicone would be a bit better for this? Would it stick to the metal shoulder pads if I skipped the greenstuff part?

 

Thanks for the tutorial!

I've been trying to make greenstuff molds of my old metal legion of the damned shoulder pads and haven't had any luck. Do you think the silicone would be a bit better for this? Would it stick to the metal shoulder pads if I skipped the greenstuff part?

 

I doubt the silicone will stick to pretty much anything, certainly not pewter/white metal.

I've been trying to make greenstuff molds of my old metal legion of the damned shoulder pads and haven't had any luck. Do you think the silicone would be a bit better for this? Would it stick to the metal shoulder pads if I skipped the greenstuff part?

 

I doubt the silicone will stick to pretty much anything, certainly not pewter/white metal.

 

 

Awesome, I'm giving this a try.

 

Thanks again!

  • 1 year later...

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