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Tips for balsa and foam poppers

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As most of you know, I am a huge fan of poppers, especially hand sanded and hand trimmed balsa poppers. Well, in my experience with the ole traditional patterns, I came across some info for making thier production a bit less troublesome. I'd like to share it with you here:

 

 

1. Whether you dip, airbrush, or handpaint your poppers ( foam or balsa), a great way to keep paint out of the eye is to dip the hook eye in paraffin or candle wax. The wax cools quickly and prevents paint from drying in the eye.

 

 

 

2. Inserting legs into a popper can be a real headache for the tier, especially when using pre-formed hard foam bodies. Try this: before painting the body, heat a needle for just a few seconds with a flame, and pre-set your holes. Once the paint is dry, you can easily run the legging material thru with the same needle.

 

 

3. Okay, say you have finished the popper's paint job and want to add an epoxy top coat, but you still want to add legs. Here's how you do it. After the epoxy has cured completely, heat a needle very quickly and slowly run it through. It will easily peirce the epoxy. If the body is balsa, the needle will slide thru easily. For hard, preformed bodies, I suggest presetting the hole first. The needle will still slide thru the epoxy with ease.

 

 

 

4. The heads of quilting pins make great buggy eyes for poppers. Simply snip the head off, leaving a little of the pin as a stem. Insert the stem in the popper where you want it and "Presto!!" Perfect eyes. The heads can be easily colored to make realistic pupils. Add a drop of CA adhesive to the stem and it holds long enough to coat with epoxy when you topcoat and seal the paint. This technique is perfect for a frog pattern!!

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