Can warped resin pieces be readily straightened?

I purchased Legend's XM-134 Minigun kit, which has the makings for two guns, and both barrel sets are warped. I'm wondering if I can heat them up slightly and let them straighten out or if I'm out of luck.

Thanks in advance, -zon

I am pretty sure hot water will work. I haven't had to do it but many say that it works. I am sure someone will chime in here soon with more info.

Anyways HTH
Herky

Any chance of scratch building the barrels? If the hot water doesn't do it, scratching may be the way.
My fear is that the water and heat may affect more than just the barrels. Be careful around the details and any pressure you apply to straighten them.

The choices are
1. Hot water
2. Heat gun -probably to much heat everywhere and you won't be able to control it.
3. scratch building barrels, cut out warped section and fill in with styrene rods or wire segments,

Thanks Herky and Scott,

I do have some brass rod that is about the right size, I'm just not sure my skill level is up to scratch building, but I might try anyway.

I will also try some hot water on one of the barrel sets. I've got a piece of angle that I was hoping to set it in once it is heated, so that gravity would naturally straighten it out, rather than me trying to bend it and mucking it up worse!

Again, thanks for your comments and advice!
-zon

make the water really hot. I work a lot with resin and I heat a cup of water till boiling. As long as you can submerge the part, you can straighten anything. Barrels are still tricky though. When you get rid of one curve, you make another one yourself.

I tried rolling a resin barrel once fresh outta the hot water on the countertop and it worked{I may have gotten lucky though}....try it

I just thought of this (so I don't know if it would work), but you might want to hang the barrel from the end to let gravity pull it straight.
You could prep one or both ends of the barrel to hang it with cord (i.e.; drill a hole through the base plug for a thread to pass through, or drill a hole and glue/thread a rod into it that you hang it by). One end would be for hanging the barrel vertically and the other end would be to possibly add a weight to help pull the soft barrel straight. This also might work better for the heat gun method.

What’cha think? Does the above make any sense?

I've had better luck with a hairdryer on high versus hot water.

Paul

Aloha all,

The hot water worked fairly well, but still left one little bend at the end. I then tried my wife's hair dryer on low heat and that worked really well and only took a few seconds of heat. I straightened it out with my fingers, then set it in a piece of brass angle and rolled it a bit.

Thanks for all the great replies and assistance.

Make jig of two straight edges that are high enough to be able to push against the part. Secure one to the table, heat the resin with either very hot water or a hairdryer and use the second straightedge to sandwich it between it and the secured piece.