Making the most of Oyomaru

[Evil Eye]

I recently acquired some Oyomaru press-molding compound. This useful stuff is intended for making "3D stamps" to push putty into and replicate simple shapes. The instructions were in French but they basically amounted to putting the stuff in hot water and then making the mold once it was softened.

 

Anyway! I had a go at some basic pressmolds and was quite pleased! The goblin face in particular came out very well...

So I tried getting a bit ambitious and attempted to make a two-part mold, aiming to recreate some Fujimi beetle wings, hoping to preserve the plastic ones for something special whilst having a good supply of copies for Tyranid purposes. Unfortunately...

...Not quite. For a first-ish attempt, not too bad, but not really useable even with the flash trimmed off.

Then I got a burst of inspiration- why not try casting bigger but simple pieces using a box, two pieces and some guiding pins?

Having slain this gelatinous cube with blessed stakes I unveiled my loot, which was surprisingly decent!

Whilst objectively terrible casts, these are actually usable for conversions, so I can't be mad! Also I made a friend in the process, who I rescued from inside the cube and who pledged his loyalty to me!

The Bloblin!

 

Anyway, I have since learned a few things from friends- notably that you shouldn't lubricate your molds as it's unnecessary and only worsens the cast, and also that Milliput + Greenstuff actually works better for it than my usual blend of Apoxie Sculpt + Greenstuff. I was wondering, however; for the purposes of recreating simple 3D parts (either self-made or OOP/rare, not talking about model piracy here, bloblin was just a test run!) is there anything else that can be done to improve results, or would I be better off just investing in resin and silicone?

[pawl]

I've only played a tiny bit, but I found that LEGO helped.

 

I made a square wall on a flat base, pressed the first half down in the middle with a lego cube, then pushed the part in and added guide holes.

 

I then repeated the same for the second half, again using pressure from a lego cube to ensure as close a cast as possible.

 

The combination of solid base/sides and even pressure from above seemed to give better moulds and casts, though I haven't tested it extensively.

[jaxom]

Seconding Lego. You can use whatever box you want, but building a Lego plunger to press down the mold material is clutch. The other thing that I've picked up, and I think it was one of the prodigious converters in WiP who talked about with press-molding Death Guard plasma guns, was using a mix of green stuff and milliput. Green stuff was too pliant in the mold and a bit of milliput gave it some hardness without the brittleness of working in pure milliput.

[Bryan Blaire]

BCK had a tutorial on using Lego with Oyomaru/Blue Stuff for two part molds here: 

 

 

You may still be able to follow along without the images, but it was better when he still had them up.

[Brother-Chaplain Kage]

I can see about getting the pics back in there since they're saved on the host site. 

[jaxom]

1 hour ago, Bryan Blaire said:

BCK had a tutorial on using Lego with Oyomaru/Blue Stuff for two part molds here: 

 

 

You may still be able to follow along without the images, but it was better when he still had them up.

 

This! This is the one I was thinking of! BCK, you are a rockstar.

[Brother-Chaplain Kage]

Pics are replaced and should be working in that now. I also updated my method to put pressure on the mold from my original idea of "stepping on it" to using some plywood bits and a c-clamp.