Hey, not a Joe specific question, but for years I cleaned and sealed canopies for joe vehicles with Future Floor Wax. Lately I've been working on an army of WWII army men for my son. I paint each one, and then knowing they needed to withstand tough play, remembered my Future Floor Wax bottle. I tried most of them last night and they seem pretty good - gonna hit em with dullcote to get em unglossy, but anyone ever have any experience using FFW for this? Joes would be tricky because of joints, but vehicles might work...

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Future's been used in the miniatures community for years.

Here's every little tiny detail about it.

http://www.swannysmodels.com/TheCompleteFuture.html

It's not a wax, it's a self leveling acrylic finish. If you use a lot of it, you can really gum up a joint, and it can be subjected to joint rub. So it's not perfect - but if you don't mind a really glossy finish, it's pretty good at keeping the paint on the plastic.

Not sure about how it works with the new plastics on 25th+ joes. I've only tried it on ARAH, and for that it works well - but no idea if there will be bonding issues. I ran out of it a while ago and haven't tried it since.

- R

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Sounds like it's perfect for my use then. On painted, jointless army men it seems good. I'm going to use some Krylon matte finish to degloss them so they don't all look like Nazis fresh off the assembly line.

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Oh yes, for that it should be perfect. I've seen minis dipped in it that could take a spill off the table without a dent. In the link I sent I believe that there are a few recipes for dulling it down a bit.

The only other thing to keep in mind is that it takes FOREVER to dry and will hold fingerprints.

- R

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I've played with it a little, tried spritzing it on a figure for a finish. It's too glossy out of the bottle for my tastes, but I'll have to check out those dilution methods.

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Might be able to try the Krylon matte tomorrow and will report in. Problem is it gets cold outside and my test figure's paint on his hand cracked. Got to repair it and try some more.

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I've also seen it be damaged from laying on a paper towel. One of my first Transformers customs got some kind of weird etching effect on the roof, from laying on a paper towel for several days. This happened months after I'd painted the thing. The damage looked like it was inside the Future.

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I've had the same thing happen to figures while packing & moving from one house to another -- I had wrapped figures in paper towels for protection while moving. When I unwrapped some (not all) the finish had become tacky & in the worst cases, the papertowel stuck to the figures. There must be some type of 'off-gassing' that happens with paper towel that will mess with acrylic finishes.

Unsettling, yes?

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I use Future all the time. Its great on hard palstics. I don't customioze the newer figures, so I can't vouch for how it behaves on soft plastic.

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