OK, so buried in between the two thigh pieces of any 25th figure, is a "friction pad."

What does it do? I'm not entirely sure.

Most of my figures haven't had slippery hip joints. But the few that do seem to resist any bungling on my part to tighten them up.

Case-in-point: Flint has slippery hips. I take his legs apart, reverse the friction pad, and... still the same.

So I'm thinking that that the concave portion of the pad creates the friction with the metal tri-bar in the pelvis.

So what if I swapped the friction pad in my loose Flint with the one in my tight Duke? Well, it works, sort-of.

Flint's legs are definitely the beneficiary of more friction, but they aren't exactly "tight." Duke had no ill-effects.

What gives? Any unifying theory on friction pads out there yet?

Has anyone managed to swap a friction pad from one type of figure leg to another (mold-to-mold)?

Let this man show you aaaaaaaaaall about 'friction pads' young padawan.

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I'm not sure how they work out either. I know the theory behind them. I swapped the legs from one Comic Cobra Air Trooper to a regular Cobra Trooper, and now the legs, mainly the left, are very loose at the hips. Everything went over, it has the same friction pad, the leg is just on a new figure, so I'm not sure why it's now loose. I'll learn to live with it, but it still annoys me.

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I tried the same thing with the same result. Its odd that 2 figures that share the same mold would have this issue. Upon closer inspection, it looks like the t-bar's ball is slightly larger on one figure that the other but I cannot be certain of that, or if it was just my eyes playing tricks.

It bugged me since I wanted to make some more 5-pack troopers out of combining the carded trooper with the Legion trooper. I will experiment further when I have time.

Wow,.. I thought this thread was about a new invention for fat people's thighs!

I found that with loose friction pads, a drop of supergle under tha pad helps a bit (and keeps the pad from falling out)

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I am just thankful for the quote

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I'm guessing it's all about that metal tri-bar. Since it's metal and not something that's (usually) exposed or intended to be seen and judged for its appearance; they have a lower QC standard for them, in terms of the end-balls being precisely so many microns across. Having some process that measures the exactitude of those end-balls would no doubt add costs to the manufacturing, and perhaps the friction pads are a cheaper alternative to precision-casting the tri-bars.

As a comparison, the RAH figs had the tension of the o-ring to keep the hip joints tight, from their being constantly pulled up tight into the sockets, while they swung freely on the actual endballs. But these 25A figs have nowhere else to maintain a hold.

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And I'm just thankful for the quote...

something weird, I've deconstructed several figures in the furtherance of customization and found, to my suprise, they have none of the friction pads. Well, usually one leg will and the other leg won't.

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Sounds like you're losing yours, CDR. Many times they're stuck in the socket of the inner thigh piece, not the outer. You may be taking the inner piece off the tri-bar without noticing the pad is stuck in the socket. Look on your floor, you'll prolly see about 30 of the li'l bastids.

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I've noticed some different thicknesses in the friction pad itself from one figure to another. Some appear to be thicker, sturdier pieces while others appear to have been smashed in the hip when assembled. And some have some excess flash around the edges making them look more cap-like than cylindrical.

And I too have noticed some figures don't come with the friction pad.

Sounds like a good question for the next Hasbro Q&A.

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