It is no secret that many miniature painters have a "jar of shame"....a jar filled with some sort of solvent to remove the paint from various metal minis when they screw up the paint job. I have 6 of these so called jars in my garage in solvents ranging from nail polish remover to Simple Green. Tonight, I opened one of those jars that I've had for about 15 years and was filled with a mixture of nail polish remover and Testor's ELO (Easy Lift Off) Solution.
Nowadays, I use Pine Sol (or the generic equivalent) as nail polish remover has some seriously nasty fumes, evaporates incredibly fast, and dissolves the stiff bristle toothbrushes I use to clean the crud off the minis.
Anyway, back to the "Jar of Despair"...it was filled with a plethora of surprises and delights that were caked in old paint from where the nail polish remover evaporated and deposited the "remains" back onto the models. With a jar of Pine Sol, a stiff bristle toothbrush, and stainless steel kitchen sink (important) I set to the task of getting the old paint off. I knew going in, none of the models were going to come clean right out of the jar so my main objective was to scrub off the bulk of the built up paint and then put them into the Pine Sol to let the process continue for three days. I managed to find the first 40k mini I ever bought which was an Eldar Harlequin (don't laugh, that was all I could find in Valdosta GA in 1989...I won't even go into how much a pain in the ass it was to get Judge Dredd comics). I also found all of my Chaos Marine Havocs, assorted GWAR minis, a Rat Ogre that I have no idea where it came from, a ton of old Epic models, my first Confrontation purchases, and a boatload of Reaper minis. I managed to save all but about 10 of them...some of the older Partha models had started to dissolve.
Now, I'm going to go wash my hands for an eighth time as they still reek of Pine Sol.
No comments:
Post a Comment