Like all of us here, I love to model, but I do struggle when I handle small pieces. I build mostly straight out of the box, and even when I use my sprue snippers, there is always a little something to clean-up/sand off on most parts.

When I'm trying to sand/clean-up really small parts, like hand grabs on armor vehicles its really difficult to get hold of them with my fingers (maybe I'm all thumbs!), and then sand off any imperfections.

Is there a trick to make this easier (i.e. cleaning up really small parts), or does it just come with the territory? I'd appreciate any tips. Thanks in advance.

I have a couple of things that work for me.

One is a pair of locking tweezers, but not the cross-action kind that open when you squeeze. I find the cross action kind do not hold strongly enough.
The kind I am thinking of came from Model Expo and have a barbell shaped rivet in a channel inside the top portion of the handle. When you squeeze the bottom, but top gets closer together as well and the barbell portion drops down 'locking' the tweezers shut until you push it back up.
You still have to beware of tweezer launch on closing, but not so much when you open them.

Also the flat jawed ( square sided) pliers from the jewlery section of the craft store (Michaels, hobby Lobby, Ben Franklin,whoever.. even Wal Marts sometimes have them) will also work, but you must apply constant pressure and might crush smaller parts.

I sometimes use a razor blade to trim the stub from the clippers, by holding the part against a flat surface with my thumbnail and carefully shaving the excess away.

That's nothing earth shattering I know, but so far it works for me.

HTH
Mike

I wrap a rubberband around my needlenose or the crooked version of them.... can vary the amount of pressure by wrapping more or less...

works well and is cheap

I use a pair of hemostats. I don't seem to have as much of a problem with tweezer launch when I use them. Try ebay and search for medical tools. You can find lots of useful items there. Everything from dental tools to hemostats. Sometimes the best modeling tools aren't modeling tools at all.

Patrick

The idea about the rubber band is great :-) I will have to try that one.

I have a variety of tools for holding small parts, depending on what I am doing to the part: small needle nose pliers, several hemostats (but I find that if not careful they can crush delicate parts), alligator clips, which can be mounted on a small dowel or piece of wire - especially good for painting small parts. Go to Radio Shack and get alligator clips with smooth surfaces, the ones with teeth can damage plastic - although the ones with teeth make great "heat sinks" for soldering. Finally, I received a packet of devices that come in a packet that looks like a paper match holder, and the sticks look like Q-tips, but with a sticky service instead of cotton They can be found at Modelexpo website or in their catalog. If the part has a hole in it, like a wheel, sometimes I can cram s tookpit in the hole to help hold it.

As stated above go to craft stores like Michael's or Hobby Lobby and even the hardware store for tools for modeling.

Happy modeling,

Jeff