Calm, guys... I think we can all agree, that delivering a product in (such) a bad quality is far from acceptable. There is no defending that. You pay money for a produkt that has quality standart A then you deserve quality standart A, nothing less. It´s not like CB sells second hand products and wish-level of quality per default. CB advertises with high to highest quality. That´s what every costumer deserves. And there is nothing to debate about. That CB is replacing damaged/misscasted/missing parts without any problem is a nice thing (there are other companies that fight very hard to avoid replacing bad products) but that´s nothing outstanding. It´s delivering the product you actually paid for, but with extra steps. As I mentioned before: every extra step a costumer has to do to recive the product they already paid for is one too much. There is nothing to whitewash. That is, what QC has to prevent. Bad products don´t have to be delivered. fin! Comparing it to other bad products does not make anything better, as @Camo Token already explained in a very colorful example. I don´t think anyone disagrees with that. Don´t get me wrong, faults can happen. No one is angry about that if it does not happen regulary. That´s how a company can see were the weak points in the system are if communicated properly. That´s what this forum is for.
Oh, faults will happen. Having a history working for a production company as Quality Assurance / Quality Management guy at one point of my life, I'd tell you: it is absolutely normal for faults to happen. Yes, it would be great if they didn't. Or if they were never leaving the factory floor. But it is not a given. It is a matter of how effective your Quality Control is. And, which I've seen many people find shocking, it is a matter of a balance between cost of said QC and its effectiveness. Yes, it is a cost, for someone (or some automated system, though I have no idea how could that work for a miniature-casting company. I'm not an engineer though) has to check the product. Either a sample from every batch, or every piece. Which socts you in personnel costs. From what I see, CB does that by the person who is putting together miniature components in those little plastic bags. If they notice something wrong with a cast, they, I guess, toss the model / part into a bin for messed up models (to be melted and re-cast. These days, they surely have another such bin for messed up Siocast). However, if the person fails to notice a problem on a part, we end up with a miscast. Can that be improved? Sure. Have that person spend more time packaging every model, and visually inspecting it for mold shift / mold lines / miscasted elements (well, or anything mispacked). Or get an another person to inspect the model. The con? Time to do the inspection slows down the packaging. You'll need more employees to do that. And a larger facility to house them. Meaning money. Meaning the models would've been more expensive. Meaning, likely, there would be less people buying them. Apparently CB considers the QC cost to be acceptable - at the current level of the cost (and current level of QC effectiveness). Obviously it is cheaper for them to replace any part the customers place a complaint about (inc. keeping a department in their main facility to handle the claims, and paying postage to wherever it needs to be posted to!) than to make it 110% sure there is never any claim to be made. There are a number of tools and rules used in QA, but the one I'd like to call in here is the famous Pareto Principle, that says (roughly): 80% of your results are achieved with the 20% of your efforts. The remaining 20% of the result takes the remaining 80% of your efforts. Personally, I place much more value on a company's handling of a claim. I have had my share of mispacks or questionable quality casts from CB over the years - and given the volume of my collection, I find that share to be acceptable. Irritating, obviously, but acceptable. However, it is claim response where CB does ace: I have received replacement parts in every case, and without unnecessary hassle. Yes, in one case for a model that was by that time long out of production (1ed Ahl Faseed BSG), and which the store had delivered to me without a QC code.
I just got my roadbot in today. It looks just as bad as the previous examples. I really hope CB doesn't continue with Sciocast; it has to be the worst material I've ever worked with. It reminds me of those high plastic Japanese erasers that come in all kinds of shapes. Dollar store plastic toys are better than this.
Friends gave me Fiddler not long time ago. Little bots was terrible and broke in the box. Now I understand, why siocast isnt used for a small miniatures. (but bigger isnt better)
Every time my zond falls to the floor it ends up like this. If bear falls few more time he will have a leg entirely made of superglue. I believe there is some chemical reaction between some primers and thermoplastic that makes it behave more like hard plastic. I wish someone could test different primers on it.
I find these breakings particular strange, first time I hear someone hypothesizing about primer affecting the material but never the less, what primer you used? also what was the colour of the Siocast?
I had no idea that there are other Siocast colours than grey. I used army painter (bear) and citadel (zonds and Vostok) primers. I've tested flexibility of Siocast before priming and Bear was great, Vostok and zonds were fine too. After priming one of zonds hit the ground and one of it's legs broke. Then I started testing flexibility again and I realized that elements break easily just like it happens with hard plastic minis (I've painted more than 300 of those in Shadows of Brimstone). Bear weapons and legs were still fine but I was afraid of testing it with same strength that I used before priming. Maybe I had a bad luck with zonds/Vostok siocast? I'll test same citadel primer on my Gator next week.
That was spray primer, I understand? Some of the accelerants and propellants can really affect such materials. Spray cans often contain acetone as part of the propellant, it'd definitely make something like Siocast or resins really brittle. I guess that's another mark against Siocast if you can't spray it.
There is a well known issue with army painter spray used on some miniatures ("Gears of War board game" and "War of the ring board game"). It makes them sticky after priming and even after varnishing with few coats they became sticky again over time. There is always a chance for chemical reaction with certain materials. Not everyone is painting miniatures with airbrush.
There are to my knowledge 3 different colours of Siocast CB uses, light grey, dark grey and a gray that looks more yellow.
I think zonds and Vostok was dark grey and bear light grey. I wish I could just pay more for a good quality metal...
Are there any promo/review pics for the new O-Yoroi out yet? I'm hoping that one comes without issues.
This right here. I'm already paying $70 for the Lobos+Diablos box, may as well sell metal rems and TAGs too...
And from your previous question, I understand these three have different mixes / qualities. Which is hilariously never communicated to the customer.
I’ve seen primer affecting material before. I sprayed a GW plastic mini with a primer from army painter and it started to melt the miniature. It is odd that it occurs but it can happen. Some sort of reaction with the composition of that particular siocast perhaps? It could all depend on the propellant/accelerant used in the primer versus the chemical makeup of the siocast. I have no qualms about paying whatever the cost for my toys, as long as I get my toys. So if the charge is already sufficiently high for a material that is proving sub par then I don’t mind paying extra for a proven material which all but guarantees I can have my toy. I’m sorry so many of you are having bad experiences with siocast. I had high hopes for it. My Vostok (now gifted to a friend for his nomads), bearpode and fiddlers jackbots were all fine with me. A little mould lining on the Vostok but it cleaned up nicely. I had hoped it would be better and issues would be fixed quickly meaning better sculpts would be put out faster in the new material. I seem to be having the same luck I’ve had with GW finecast, even now I recently bought an Urien Rakarth and some Mandrakes on made to order and they’re great. The upsetting thing though is that this is clearly happening as so many of you have shown. It’s distressing to see and though the customer service at CB is incredible, it can be frustrating to wait for a replacement when there’s no guarantee the replacement will be any better. Whatever the Ayyar is made from seems to work well, it’s crisp, clean and the material seems easy to work with. Hopefully this will be the norm moving forward and siocast will be replaced with this method instead. If not then perhaps plastic is the future? I know it’s very expensive to do but the current costs of siocast in comparison to replacing so many bad casts can’t be that advantageous, can it? Oh well. Whatever the material is I’ll buy the new toys. I’ll just hope my luck continues to hold out and I don’t see the issues so many of you are seeing.
Yes, something along those lines. The customer service stated that it was likely to have been a higher concentration of the butyl-acetate used as propellant in the can. The spray smelled quite acrid so that should have been an indicator. I got a replacement can and mini in the post anyways. It’s quite odd that the siocast is having issues with primers in that respect though it is certainly possible that the chemical composition of said material is having an adverse reaction to something in the primer. It’s interesting from a scientific standpoint but annoying from the perspectives of people who want their toys.
Tell me what primer do you use? I don't believe primer is the reason, siocast seems to occasionally just be brittle, but I'm eager to look into the chemical composition of that primer and potentially drop a piece of siocast into the suspected chemicals, unless they are something too toxic or exotic.
Several well known brands of model cement (polystyrene cements) HAVE switched to an n-butyl-acetate solvent (from the Toluene they used to use (n-butyl acetate is a compound found naturally in pears and apples, and smells "fruity"). Toluene is on the ROHS list for the EU, for example.) so it's conceivable that other products using that solvent (or similar) would swap it for another butyl acetate. Since it will also soften HIPS and chemically weld them.
Oooh, isn't it too much worries now? It becomes too complicated... I just thought, I could use any primer if it marked as for plastic. Now we should check what's in the jar In details... Modeling becomes harder that I thought x) Fine, may be this thing isn’t only siocast problem, but it’s problem also.
