Shinki Maintenance: loose chest joint (specific case)

[kintaro]

First off, this is not a universal approach. It will only work when there was a specific joint assembly mistake and it is not clear how common that mistake is.

Case: Patient (Arnval Mk.2) presented with near absence of friction in the upper part of her chest joint.

Initial suspicion: defective joint or missing parts.

Maintenance procedure:

Chest "vest" removed:



Upper body disassembled and joint exposed:



Clear insert is what provides the friction. It is not glued to the joint and slides out easily:


I believe that in cases of wear and tear (or manufacturing defects) replacing this insert with a part made of similar material (silicon, vinyl, rubber?) would restore the joint's function with fewer side effects as compared to applying chemical products (glues. polishes etc) to the whole joint.

In this particular case however the insert is completely normal. The problem is with the way the joint is assembled.

This is how it was assembled:



This is how it should have been assembled:


A simple 90 degree turn corrects the issue and restores the joint's function completely. There is no need to disassemble the lower part of the body, the screws just need to be loosened enough to perform the turn.

[bang04]

For loose joint I use Latex. It is trick that I found in Japan web, many of them use latex to fixed action figure joint.

https://www.facebook.com/sakarin.bang/m ... 700&type=3

[Zenislez]

According to my experience you can use either clear nail polisher or just cover the torso joint with glue to fix that.

It is not permanent solution though and will require regular maintenance and reapplied glue (depending on how often you pose/play with her. Erica, My Altlene, need monthly maintenance but that is because I play with her everyday).

It should be good enough for a while and much cheaper alternative.

EDIT:
What I meant about using glue, is rather than stick the joint to the body, but more the glue will act as a layer to make more friction.

Another EDIT:
Oh, you don't want chemical solution. Well, it's true that the nail polisher can be hazardeous to the paint color, but for glue, I think not all glue will have strong reactions.

The glue I was using is just a normal paper glue, hence not very strong and constant maintenance. So people adviced using super glue or even hot glue, but I don't want any permanent damage incase any screw up happen.

[Klinkin]

On the topic of loose joint fixes, I hear that floor polish works well. It's durable but won't brick your figure if you screw up; you can literally just paint/pour it into the joint, let it dry, and you're good.

[Lock Cade]

Hey,

So I had roughly the same problem with my Arnval Tempesta and I just followed your instructions to the letter. As it would turn out, the joint for the chest was assembled correctly, but apparently the factory failed to tighten the top-most screw in the back of the torso because the chest joint was pretty loose inside the torso (hence why she kept flopping over and couldn't stand up straight, especially when I have her put in her long hair piece). So I just tightened up that screw, assemble the chest piece back on and what do you know... that did the trick. So now my Arnval Tempesta's no longer floppy and she can now wear her long hair without falling over when she stands up!

So thanks for posting your loose chest joint maintenance on here! It really helped me out!