I will stick up for HaT: Illness, lack of staff and greatly increased costs, sourcing injection moulding factories, obtaining new sculptors and artists has resulted in a 'slowing up' of production. The few people at HaT are still working on all the figures that they have announced, over the years on their website, plus many more.

The differences with Injection moulding as opposed to the types of moulds that Strelets use are quite extensive and very expensive.
The die for the sprue alone runs into many Thousands of Dollars. (that is why it is called 'Investment Moulding')
One major problem with the investment moulding is that the process requires the die to be cut with figure shaped cavities at the correct scale. This is achieved by using a pantograph apparatus that can reduce the original sculpture (approximately 1/24th scale or bigger; depending on the sculptor; down to 1/72nd). Communications, nowadays, has an important role; especially when the Company, the sculptors and the factories are in different countries, are on different continents and the people speak different languages.

With so many factors involved it is amazing how well HaT have performed.

I mean in no way to demean Strelets accomplishments; I think they are astonishing.
Even 'Plastic Soldier Review' are now in agreement With 10's for sculpture as well.

I believe that Strelets process uses copper dies and a 1 to 1 ratio for 'cutting dies'?
That would rule out the need for 'pantographing' ( a major source of error with scale.)

I wonder; would Strelets like to tell us some of principles of there manufacturing process?



To join in with the moaning, Caesar tend to announce one thing and make something else; unannounced; Mostly WWII Germans. (I would like the goose-stepping band though)

But no manufacturer can beat IMEX; Pancho Villa's sombrero-wearing Mexicans, Promised in 2000

Well I think the principles of Short Run tooling is pretty well known, essentially the object is to produce an injection tool that will produce a given number of shots/sprues before it breaks down, the length of the run required determines the materials used and the better the materials the longer lasting..
Its an economic method for producing items in quantity but in 1000s rather then 100s of 1000s....

For example Strelets have told us in the past a normal run for Minibox is 3000 sets so this would be 12000 shots/sprues for the tool as a minimum, there are though obvious disadvantages in this....

Short Run: Strelets, Redbox, Orion etc, Probarbly reinforced Resin tool.

Middle: maybe* Caesar? metal tool but not steel.

Long: Hät, Airfix, Revell, Emhar, Italeri, Zvezda, *waterloo 1815 etc, steel tools.

It should be remembered though there are a lot of factors in producing good tools by whatever method used, having good craftsmen available is one of them!

Thanks ironsides. It's what I expected, number-wise, but I would be very interested in seeing more technical details of the process. I was involved in the Investment Casting process for a number of years in my capacity as a metallurgist. I still like to see how others do things. It's the 'perpetual student' in me.
So any information from Strelets would be like a good wine to a hedonist.

I understand that entirely I've experimented with casting from time to time in white metal and bronze and am interested in the process myself, but generally prefer to give it to a specialist, some injection toolmaking companys do however detail the process on their sites

Dear Murat,
I think Strelets Team use a bench-top injection molding machine similar to
this:

http://www.injectionmolder.net/index.html

I agree it would be fascinating to see a You-tube video of the sculpting and
casting of miniatures from Strelets.

Paul K.

Thanks, Paul K,
Interesting equipment. like Ironsides, As a hobby, I use White-metal casting (including Centrifugal) and resin casting. I leave the real stuff to the experts like HaT and Strelets.
You are right It would be a great to see a video of Strelets process.

The owner of Oxford Diecast, Lyndon "Taff" Davies, is a rare beast as he knows all about the processes and owns production plants in China and started off in the UK toy industry (Mettoy/Triang)in Swansea.
In his blog he has outlined production processes (important - scroll half way down):

https://www.oxforddiecast.co.uk/blogs/news?page=2

You will notice Zinc alloy/mazak metal, abs and polystyrene use the same basic injection moulding process. Temperature and viscosity are obvious differences between the materials.

The tools/dies/moulds are hollowed out using a milling machine you can see some of the marks on the tools/dies/etc.


It is not common for people involved in developing, designing kits, models, figures and so on to know about the production in any detail especially when they are produced in China. A person with Taff's skill and experience can advise on all parts of the process from idea to finished product and means he basically gets what he asks for and therefore few mistakes. Dragon and Zvezda also seem to be close to all parts of the process of producing miniatures.

Thank you David,

Taff of Oxford Castings is just the sort of chap one admires. Someone who gets into and on with the job.
That's just the sort of injection process and projects that I used at Rolls-Royce, Bristol and Derby. I designed one die that has a thick polycarbonate lid/front so that you could watch the way that wax/plastic flow into die. it is quite surprising how certain points fill first.

I would still like to see how Strelets make and use their copper dies.

Best regards
Murach

Here you go took me a while to remember the actual terms, this article is pretty old now and things have moved on somewhat since...

https://www.moldmakingtechnology.com/articles/rapid-tooling-cast-resin-and-sprayed-metal-tooling

I totally agree that It would be very interesting to know more about Strelets production methods. I think that could help us to understand how they manage to release so many new sets per year (much more than Hat and other companies). I am convinced that the key factor is the matherial employed to make the moulds, but it would be great to know more about.