Resin Casting to Produce Collectible and Customized Toys

Making Products from Resin Casting

Resin casting can be used to produce collectible as well as customized toys and numbers like designer toys, storage kits and ball-jointed dolls, in addition to scale models, either individual parts or entire types of objects like trains, plane or ships. They are usually produced in small amounts, from the tens to a couple hundred copies, compared to injection-molded plastic figures that are produced in many 1000's. Resin casting is much more labor intensive than shot molding, and the gentle molds used are put on down by each throw. The low initial expense cost of resin casting implies that individual hobbyists can produce small runs for his or her own use, such because customization, while companies may use it to produce small runs for market. The creation of the toy or figure begins with the traditional sculpting process in which the artist designs a clay-based sculpture. Where appropriate, for instance when making a storage kit, the sculpture is actually dissected into several components like head, torso, legs and arms. A flexible mold produced from room temperature vulcanized (RTV) silicone rubber is perfect for each part. After the mold may be made, a synthetic resin, commonly polyurethane or epoxy resin, combined with a curing agent, is actually poured into each mildew cavity. Mixing the 2 liquid parts causes a good exothermic reaction which creates heat and within min causes the material in order to harden, yielding castings or copies within the shape of the mold into which it's been poured. The molds are generally half-divided (like the hollowed dark chocolate Easter eggs with candy inside) along with a release agent enables you to make removal of the hardened/set resin in the mold easier. The hardened resin casting is taken off the flexible mold and permitted to cool. Due to aggressive nature on most compounds used for casting and also the high temperature of the actual reaction the mold progressively degrades and loses little details. Typically, a flexible mold may yield between 25 as well as 100 castings depending upon how big the part, the intensity from the heat generated. Depending on the kind of product it may after that be cut or sanded to get rid of any casting artifacts such as sprues and seams. Some products will also be assembled and painted, although some models and kits that are intended for the consumer to put together are left unfinished. The ability of RTV silicon molds to reproduce even the littlest detail means that several low volume castings are of very good quality. Quality of both unique masters and resin castings varies because of differences in creator's ability, as well as throwing techniques.