Magnetic Flight Stands (Review)

Magnetized to terrorize.

In my last post regarding the Reavers of the Obsidian Rose (part 3), I talked about magnetizing these jetbikes for easier storage. I wanted something that wouldn't be a customizing nightmare or take an agonizing amount of time. At first I found some customizing tips using a screw, but with some of my models already painted I feel this would be a disaster to attempt. Warfrog has some amazing flight stands that he uses with his Eldar but apparently the company that makes those has stopped producing them.

Shopping around online I found a vender that I thought may do the trick: The Magnet Baron. His catch-phrase is: Your DIY Super Magnetic Home. Seems like a tall claim, but after perusing the site, I was impressed enough to try it out.

"Your DIY Super Magnetic Home."*

The magnets I chose were the Medium ones. It was easy to choose as the Baron, wisely, used GW models for scaling purposes. I ordered 3 sets, enough to do all of my Reavers and with a few left over. And I waited.

My chosen selection.* 

Shipping was fairly quick and the package even arrived sooner than promised, which is always a small victory, yes? And here is what each kit has.

4 ball bearings, rods, and indented magnet and 8 flat magnets.

However no base was provided which is understandable as it is assumed that you are buying this kit to replace the rod for your kit's provided flying stand. But it is something to be aware of. Also, beware that there is no instructions provided, or on his site, so unless you're great at puzzles or just highly intuitive, be ready to correspond with the Baron like I did. I asked his lordship** for instructions and this is what he relayed back to me:

"for every rod there should be 2 flat magnets a ball bearing and a indented magnet. One flat goes on the models base. one goes on the bottom of the rod. the indented magnet goes on the model. The ball bearing goes in the indention on the rod."


I decided that I did not want to glue the two flat magnets to the base as I will not need this for storage purposes. Although in hindsigbt this does give the base a bit more weight so there is an added bonus for doing this other than making the rod detachable from the base. So, let's get to it then: First I glued the rod to the base using plastic cement.

Rod glued to base.

Next I added the ball bearing to the rod. Note that one of the rod is concaved so that the ball bearing fits perfectly when super-glued in.

Ball bearing attached. 

Ran into a slight snag with the concaved magnets as one broke when I attempted to seperate it from it's family. I think I can fix it with superglue but we'll see.

The damaged concave magnet.

Next I glued a concave magnet to the bottom of my model.

Concave magnet attached.

And presto: the model is done!

Done! Stable and balanced.

The ball mount allows you to make model poseable if you choose, which is a really cool bonus. The bikes seem to be a bit higher that I had anticipated, but I am OK with this. Additional bikes may be lowered by just cutting a 1/2" or so off the stand's bottom.

Zooming upward!

I am trying to decide if I want to paint the magnet or not. Since the ball bearing can not be painted after it is mounted, the whole point may be moot.

Angled down to straff ground targets.

Over-all I am pleased. It beats customizing my own and is also faster. I like the added bonus of being able to swivel the models as this was not a goal when I set out on magnetizing these things.  Also I'm pleased with my first purchase from the Magnet Baron and I will likely use him again. My only criticism is the lack of included instructions or guidelines. For that I give him a 'B-' grade instead of an A- grade for this product and for quick communication.

*These images are from Magnetbaron.com, used here for review purposes only.

**Just in case the Baron is truly a Royal (and not just a cool and catchy business name) I felt it safest to address him as such to avoid any disrespect. 

Pods to Drop and Lands to Raid (part four)

It has been a very busy week for me! So what little of my free time that could devote to the Landraider project, was spent trying to figure out how to magnetize the side sponsons. The reasons for doing this is so that I can swap the weapon types for the game, also remove them during play (when they get blown -or ripped- off) and to help get a better look inside of it. In the pic above, you'll see elements of my first attempt to magnetize this. I used really small rare-earth magnets that I drilled and inserted into the 'jam' part of the threshold and door insert. Although these would hold the door panel just fine, when the rest of the sponson (i.e. the guns) was glued on it was just too heavy.

So put a bigger, more powerful magnet on top the jam from under the track-guard (you can see the silvery semi-circle in the pic above), and although this would hold it, it still wasn't stable enough. So, I added another of the bigger magnets on the back of the door itself, and this seems to do the trick rather well.

And here is a snap-shot of both sponsons staying on the sides of the tank. BTW, I had to tear apart and rebuild the first sponson since I last posted due to how stiff the guns moved. It is now no longer an issue!

Ok, since my first blog post (Genesis) I've bought a new cam, and tonight I retook pics of the minis in that post. Here they are:

I intend to show-case more of my miniature collection as this blog continues. Enjoy!
-Joel