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Healthcare for Figures!

*Pic sourced @Belela-San http://animestuff.wordpress.com, Sorry for the trouble!

Attack that Dust and Grime and Grease!

A week ago I covered heat as a long term threat to your collection, at the suggestion of a friend I’m now going to move on to a far more common subject.  Taking ‘regular’ care of your collection, because after all, if you’re like me you don’t have everything sealed up behind a glass case where dust can’t get to it, so time and time again you’ll find that there’s an additional level of unwanted detail added to your figs - mainly pollen, dust, and other such nonsense.  They can mar the beauty of your collection to say the least, and really just looks dirty overall.

There are both simple and complicated ways of keeping your figurines clean from a sort of ‘day to day’ method to even more intense washes.  Whatever the case may be, it’s important to always be gentle with the figurines, on not just a physical and chemical level, but also temperature wise.  Read on if you wish, fellow collectors, this post is for you!

First things first, you are always ultimately responsible for what you do to your figurines.  Always handle them with care, always be gentle, many have loosely held and even ‘out of the way’ bits that can easily break off if they slip out of your hands so whatever happens don’t blame me for whatever damage real or imagined that came as of following these instructions.  I use them on a regular basis and they’ve always worked fine without a flinch of trouble, and I’ve been collecting for about ten years!  ( ._.)

 

Important Points

• Never use strong chemical cleaners.

This should be logical, but unfortunately some people don’t think twice.  Things like thinners, turpentine, or industrial cleaners will end up fusing or even utterly destroying your figurines.  As an ex-garage kit painter, I’ve seen times where turpentine melts plastic resins, and I don’t think you want the cute face on your Haruhi or Tohsaka Rin figure getting all gooey and looking like the elephant man.   Elephant man IS NOT MOE.  Besides, you could end up having a chemical reaction to the paint and distending the colors or even causing runoff or tainting.  Bad.  Very Bad.

• Never use abraisive surfaces to clean, or abraisve cleaners themselves!

Again, a logical thing that most wouldn’t consider but even hard-bristle or ‘rugged’ sponges are bad.   These things can cause gouging, peeling, even scratch if given the chance.  Abraisve cleaners like powder mixes (like comet cleaner), end up having the same results as when you’d use an abraisve surface even if you were using a silk cloth.  Not good, especially if the cleaner has a bleaching agent in the mix. 

• Be careful with compressed air cans.

Compressed air cans can be quite useful when you’re doing spot cleaning or even detail cleaning after a soak wash (see later), but use sparingly.  Notice how some cans become REALLY REALLY cold as you use it?  That’s because there’s a compressed reaction with the spray that can cause it to suddenly drop temperature as it’s released, and doubly so if you tilt the can at weird angles.  When you feel the can getting chilly, or when you see that you’re spraying white mist, take a break and set it down.  If you spray it on a non-valuable surface, you’ll see it’ll leave frost that quickly evaporates, even if it goes away quickly, it can be cold enough to deliver frostbite to a human hand under the right conditions - and PVC reacts to temperatures, and can render it tempoarily brittle. 

• ALWAYS be gentle, no matter what you do.

There are plenty of ‘high detail’ bits on figurines, especially on figurines produced within the last two years.   Ahoge-hair, Alastor-chain on Shana, freelance bits of ribbon or dress, these sort of things are not meant to have force applied to them and are notoriously moody, and will break when you least expect it.   When you set your figures down for cleaning or soaking or brushing, do so on a soft towel with the least amount of tension-parts in the way.  For the most part that means usually the figurine will sit face down, but use your judgement.

• If you’re cleaning a self painted, modified pre-painted, or a garage kit…

Stop.  Right.  Now.  Clean painted models or even pre-painted models that you have done corrections or changes on are a completely different issue.  This guide is not meant for you and could result in undoing your work or even making it worse off.  This includes ‘joint’ fixes like putty softening, scratch painting, all the way up to full garage kit assembly.  The finishing on those are fundamentally different than pre painted PVCs and should be handled with care… then again if you do your own garage kits you already know more than most other collectors and should already know how to properly clean your kits, shouldn’t you?   (  n_n)>

 

Prevention

It’s the name of the game when you have figures.  If you really don’t like the idea of maintaining your collection like this, then there are other steps  you can take to get around the issue.  Like it or not, your figures will need to be cleaned one day or another even if you take some steps to make a sealed environment.  Unless you’re super rich, you won’t be able to build a clean-room after all.

Dust travels on air but gets anchored by gravity, so the simpest and most effective way to keep them from getting dirty so fast is to buy a glass-enclosed shelf and put your figurines within.  This can be cheap to expensive depending where you buy, and places like Ikea can provide a sensibly priced solution for that, such as the Klingsbo Shelf located here.  Barring that, there are places you can buy clear plastic box enclosures for figurines, though most of the ones I’ve seen are meant for Gashapon or really small scale items like 1/11 or so.  I’m certain there are larger boxes but I couldn’t find any for this reference.   They use them in convention displays so I am certain they exist.

The final option is simply to leave your figurines boxed.  Now, I don’t like this option, it prevents people from getting a good look at them and overall you don’t get the same amount of light on them and those boxes take up a LOT of space.  I know some people do it but I just don’t see why, figures are meant to be displayed, they wouldn’t be so pretty, cute and sexy if not!

 

Day to Day Cleaning

Danny Choo of www.dannychoo.com and Mirai Inc describes ‘basic’ figure cleaning as a theraputic thing.  I agree, as I find it a nice change of pace and relaxation in a day if I need to get my mind off of things.  Using the term ‘day to day’ loosely, I tend to set time aside to just do basic sweep of the figs about once a week.  I just call it ‘Day to Day’ for convenience. 

Day to Day cleaning should be a dry-run thing.   Most people use a cloth to clean light dust away from figures and I do the same at times, however I am not sure the kind of effect that twice-threetimes a week rubbing with a cloth could have on a fig, so I offer the following as an alternative.   Find a non-coarse, medium bristle brush from a paint shop, art shop or even a dollar store.  I use that for dusting, and the one I have has 2.5 inch bristles, which allows it to get into the odd nooks and crannies that oft appear in dynamic fig poses, and it’s even useful for figure-pansu cleaning!  Yay!

Compressed air can come into play here as well, in little controlled bursts.  If there’s visible grime buildup in ‘nip’ points or crannies like hairlines or whatnot, giving it a close range, short burst of compressed air sometimes does the trick.  I usually find that I prepare a bath for them instead when it gets to this, but it’s worked for my friends in the past!

 

‘Wet’ Cleaning your Figurines

I have a large plastic ‘bin’ I use for this purpose, it’s about a foot deep and a foot wide with two feet long or so.  It holds a few liters of water, but you may not need something that big.   Whatever the case, if you want to wet-clean a figure it takes a bit of preparation in advance.   Keeping in mind what I mentioned in my previous figure-care post, we don’t want too much heat so I usually pour the water into the bin a few hours or even the day before (since I usually end up forgetting as I wait, haha) I want to clean.   This is done to leave the water gain room temp, so that it matches your figurines as close as possible.   Also, do the same with a picher of water, you’ll need it to rinse the figures off later if you use soap.

Water alone usually does the trick, but I sometimes mix the water with a bit of extra gentle hand soap(* See a bit further below) and use the same kind of brush I mentioned in dry brushing above to whisk the water around to get it a little sudsy.  This can help for some really greasy or stuck-up dirt deposits.    Strip the figurine of all its accessories first, if it’s a break-down or cast off, split it apart first, and then let the pieces soak in the water for around ten minutes.   If I’m not in the process of doing anything else, I sometimes create a small current by using the brush to make a circular pattern.  

When soak step is done, take a piece of your choice from the mix, use the tip of the brush and dab it over the surface, making slow circular motions.  Always keep an eye on the figurine as you do this, if you see discoloration, stop immediately.  It’s rare, but if you have a ‘fake’ import figurine (like a chinese knock off), paint can strip from it really easy, but not so much at brand name figs.    When satisfied with brushing, rinse the figurines with the pitcher of water or swish them within or whatnot - just get all the soap off so you don’t get icky soapscum left when it dries.  I usually set the pieces of the figurine on a fluffy towel folded in on itself and set a normal housefan pointed to it to get the water to dry off faster.   It’s not a long nor short process after all but it does get your figs really spic n span.

*a bit more on the soap:  I use a really gentle, non abrasive gel soap to mix into the water.  Generally if you want to use ‘bathroom’ soaps, which I recommend since it’s gentle, avoid those that use the term ‘exfoliant’, and ‘hydrating’.   Exfoliants will have abrasives, hydrating uses greases.  Just use your head when judging what to use as a cleaning solution, and if you don’t trust what you’re putting in, then just go with water.  You can’t go wrong with just water.

 

If you’re feeling adventurous, try combining the soap-brushing with a bit of compressed air for those extra hard to reach places!   Then your figurines will be ready for a photoshoot!

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I hope these steps provide some insight for you if you find yourself wondering how to keep figurines clean.   I always welcome comments and feedback, so please feel free to leave a word if you visit or even contact me via the contact and suggestion forms up at the top of the page!  My AIM, YIM and Gmail addies are available there as well!Until next time!

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