i love to see the process of basicly anything being made. this was deifnitly super cool! and like said before its funny to see these factorys so small!!! did anyone catch the molding process? i couldnt really gather what they were trying to explain. they pour and swirl in that mold? but if thats true how do they get the guy out?

Yeah, I really wanted to see that as well. I think the actual production of the figures goes on at a "real" plastics factory. If I understood him correctly, there's an autoclave-like machine that spins the mold with the liquid vinyl in it to get it hollow. I always wondered about the demolding process myself, especially since the molds are clearly one-piece affairs and there aren't mold lines on vinyls. I've heard that since the vinyl is still soft they just pop it out, but I have yet to see proof!

a big hairdryer

They just grab the extra vinyl and yank with big tongs.

Thanks for posting this video. M1 has made some great figures and they are what I primarily collect... so this video was a real treat.

thanks again!

Amazing. Thanks for posting

Great video! Baikin, you're a lucky mofo!

Thanks for sharing!

Roto-casting might be what Yuji is explaining. The plastic is heated then poured into the mold and then it gets spun around til it cools down a bit. Once it is hardened up a bit, the grab the flash (excess plastic that is sometimes cut off...like the Skkullbees that were sold in a box and you had to cut off the excess plastic to put it together) which in most cases is the neck or where the shoulder meets the body. Before it is put together, they dunk it in water (usually cold) to force the plastic to stiffen up and keep it's shape. The tricky part is the pull from the mold. Too much twisting to get the piece out can deform it. Dunking the piece in water quickens the curing time for the vinyl. As we all know, you can heat up vinyl with a hairdryer. If you heat a piece up enough and then force it to a different shape but, vinyl has some memory properties which is why it will go back to the shape it was...but that can be altered with a good amount of heat and some cold water. I could be wrong since it's been years since I sat in a Materials and Manufacturing class.

Amazing videos to kick off a sunny saturday. I'd be interested to hear more stories concerning the vinyl being poured into the mold.

Gatchabert pretty much explained it. The manufacturing of M1GO's figures doesn't take place there, I'm not sure where the factory is but it's the same one that makes Marmit's stuff.

I have a TV show on DVD (it's on the way, Hillsy) that shows the vinyl factory Marusan uses. I'll see if I can get permission to post it online.

Dennis is a rock star!

that'd be cool if you could post it.I would love to see it!

rad...rad...and rad.

Interesting Roger, because I've always found M1 vinyl to be superior in feel to Marmit's - it's always felt like a higher quality vinyl to me in terms of heft and finish. i've always assumed it's because M1 uses a different manufacturing plant or process (or different formula for vinyl) than Marmit. That doesn't mean Marmit and M1 can't come from the same factory - but maybe they each have their own vinyl formulas or tweak the manufacturing process in their own way to account for the differences.

In fact, I'd always assumed that Marmits were made in China because they have a noticeably "cheaper" feeling to me. Especially the old VP series.

The switch to Marmit's factory only took place a couple of years ago, after M1GO's original supplier, Mommy Doll, shut down. Incidentally, Mommy Doll was the original spin-off company that Marusan established in the 60s to make vinyl stuff.

I don't know if Marmit was always using this factory, either, but there's a noticeable difference in quality between something like the present-day Hukkokudo reissues (Marmit's stuff) and the crap Marmit was making ten years ago.

The roto-casting process is interesting and all (the dvd is awesome) but what I really want to know is how they make the molds.

I'm acquainted with a few methods of metal casting and find the process on these one piece molds intriguing. What do they use for investment?

thanks for the explanations guys, i had thought maybe thats how it was done but i thought it might have been a little crazy. guess it is : ) it does make sense considering how soft you can get the vinyl when you heat it up. i would also love to see more on this, if that dvd could be posted that would be so cool!! thanks again for the post definitely very cool! and like winu i was watching the whole time thinking this lucky guy, this lucky guy!

ooo, ooo, i know, i know!! we all hafto e mail the history channel and get them to do a "how its made" on Japanese Vinyl!!!!

So was that like a colour key sheet on the door that he held it up to?
I assume after about 25 of the same colourway, you know what it's meant to look like, but initially they must get a map of sorts, right?

that's so rad to see how a pro does it

If I remember correctly the rest of the DVD is fashion and music, no more toy stuff.

here's another question for anyone in the know - I've always assumed that B-Club and M1 used the old Bullmark and Marusan molds for reissues (like the smog monster, Godzilla, etc.) but I've also noticed that people sometimes comment that the M1 smoggy or some of the other "reissues" are sometimes slightly larger or smaller than the originals. Is M1, B-Club and the others using the actual vintage molds or are all of those old molds so shot, lost or whatever that they've made nearly identical recasts of the molds themselves?

Sometimes they use the vintage Marusan/Bullmark molds, but occasionally they will have access to the "master mold," the one that the other molds were based off of. These master mold toys are slightly larger, and it's hardly noticeable.

When those older molds are used they sometimes have to use older machinery that can't produce toys with the usual thick vinyl. If anyone has any of M1GO's original Marusan Godzilla resissues, they'll notice that the vinyl is much thinner than their normal stuff.

My guess is they sculpt it with a kind of clay or even wax. Wax might be the best bet since it is a single mold. What they might do is make the sculpt, make a 2 part mold and cast it using wax, clean up the parting lines, and use the wax figure for the one piece mold. You can guess what they do with the wax figure inside the one piece mold
Now this is just my guess as to how they do it. They might be using a different method all together.

When I was talking with Marmit about the Sky Deviler figure I went to one of the factories located in Saitama (They have 5 factories if I remember correctly) They make stuff for Amapro, Sunguts, Gigabrain, Empiya among others. The process of making them is as follows.

1. Clay sculpt

2. Wax transfer
The clay is cut up into parts, arms, legs, etc. and joint connectors are added. An intermediate mold is then made. The parts are cast in Wax and given some finishing touches/clean up.

3. The mould
The wax parts are put into an electroplating tank for two weeks. (The waiting is the hardest part)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electroplating
They can explain it better than me but I can tell you its very toxic.

4. The casting
Japanese Vinyl is not Rotomolded as many believe it is slush cast. The vinyl comes in a liquid form called Plastisol, the same stuff most T-shirts are printed with here in the U.S. (I was a screenprint major, minored in sculpture) The mold is filled up with the liquid vinyl and put into a ceterfuge. This is what was being referred to in the video. It is spun for 30 to 45 seconds. This step removes all the air pockets. I hear some places use a vacuum chamber. Next the mold is suspended into a vat of water that is heated up to 300 degrees. Wait, what's this, the water isn't boiling over? They put a white powder into the water that prevents it from boiling. I don't know the chemical name for this as they only knew the japanese word for it. So the mold sits in the bath and cooks the vinyl. The longer its in the thicker the vinyl gets. After a minute or three they take it out and drain the excess back into the vinyl storage tank and put it back into the tub for another minute of two. Finally its taken out and put into a rig to hold it as someone yanks it out with a pair or pliers. The parts are thrown into a box to be sent to the trimer.

5. The trim
The trimmer cuts off the flash with an exacto blade and drills out the holes and its sent off to the painter.

6. The Paint
The painter lives 10 minutes down the road. He sits on the floor of his porch/workshop. He paints them in parts. In the hour I was there He painted 200+ legs with silver spray. No respirator just a big hood sucking all the fumes and cig smoke.

7. Assembly

Seven steps to satisfaction

This is an awesome post!




I do believe it is sodium.