GoB: Magnetizing the Movement Trays

As mentioned back in October, I set about making some movement trays for use with Formed Units in God of Battles. In the meantime, I have made a small selection out of thick cardboard, and today I set about getting some of them magnetized.

With the Tomb Kings job lot I purchased late summer, I got some resin movement trays with self-adhesive magnetic sheets, and some extra sheets, and from the magnetic sheets I use in my figure storage boxes, I had some strips that I have to cut away for the sheets to fit.

As you can see, I just mix and match the pieces I have, to fill as many of the trays as possible with magnetic sheeting - and as the magnets are going to be mostly covered by figure bases when in use, the rag-tag appearance does not really matter.

Some of the extra sheets are of the same thickness as the cardboard I use for the trays, so I shall have to put another layer of rim on the ones I used those for.

Future builds will consist of the full bottom of the bases covered in magnetic sheeting, and the rims glued on top of that, but the existing trays are all going to have the inside of the rims covered like this. I shall have to build a couple more of the 9x9cm trays, as I like to have some of those for 12-man units that have a Character and/or Unit Enhancements attached (otherwise one or more of the figures will have to be placed outside the tray), and it is also nice to be able to place Activation Tokens and/or Miracle Effect Tokens on the bases of the units they affect.

'Magnetizing' some Stuff.

Not exactly adding magnets, but iron to make these models adhere to magnetic sheets.

Two buckets of 'Fire of Isengard', and 3 series of re-roll counters I made for use with the LotR:SBG Battle Companies rules, but can be used for various purposes.

Some of the bases are of the 'slot-less' type, and those were augmented by two 20 mm steel washers instead of the thin iron rod (2.06 mm wire for electric fence).

I was happy to get these off my workspace yesterday evening before leaving for my first night shift/watch in the new job.

DreadBall: Magnetic Ball!

As all my DreadBall players are going to be based on steel washers (evenually), I thought it would be reasonable to use magnets to make the balls stick to the bases.

My first take on this is to simply remove the ball's base, and glue the ball to a 1 mm thick disc neodyne magnet, using Loc-Tite Powerglue gel.

If the magnet proves too strong, making the ball flip onto the base of other players, I can remove it and drill a hole for a smaller one to be embedded in the ball instead.

The steel washer is just there to keep the magnet in place for gluing.

To Magnet or Not to Magnet...

When I  began storing my painted minis in A4 printer paper boxes some years ago, it soon became apparent that the minis - especially those of a metallic disposition - needed sometning to hold them in place when moved around.

At the time, I almost exclusively based my minis on slottas (silly me!), and the logical solution seemed to be magnets.

Neodynium magnets, AKA rare earth magnets, AKA super magnets, come in all sizes and shapes, and I found that 2 mm thick discs fit nicely in a standard 25mm slotta.

In the beginning, I then started switching to metal cookie bins for storage, as the minis with magnets in the base would cling nicely to the bottom (or side, or lid, for all that matters). Soon I realized that this was impractical, due to the shape of the bins (round), and the fact that they are very smooth on the outside, and easily slip - causing stacks to topple over.... NOT good.

Instead, I switched back to the paper boxes, now buying A4 magnetic sheets to put in them. This works a treat, and the boxes stack neatly and safely.

Since then, I have begun basing all minis with integral bases on steel washers, and they adhere nicely  to the magnetic sheets, too, and I happily kept buying expensive magnets to glue into the slotta-based minis.

Until it struck me: I do not need morto magnetize the minis, as long as the base is either steel/iron, or contains sufficiently of it for the magnetic sheet to attract!

I then remembered, that when making chainmail hauberks for LARP, I used iron thread (for fences) 2,04 mm thick. Cut into pieces, it can be glued into the slottas, on top of thin cereal package material (to make it touch the surface of the magnetic sheet.

To the left you can see an example of a slotta with a magnet, and one with pieces of iron thread.


The iron thread comes in rolls of about 200 meters, and such a roll will last me for years, even as I'm going to put iron in the bases of all my painted LotR minis before using them for SAGA in tyhe near future.

The head? I don't know, found it in the wreckage after the storm, lately... ;o)

I have started using Locktite Power Glue gel to glue minis to bases (and stuff under the base), btw... This method results in a much stronger join (and a tighter fit) than using thin super glue.