Welcome To My DiD Lift Dots Repair Page.

I have made up this page to try to demonstrate how I have had to do a repair, to the excellent DiD lift dots buckles on the recent US figure releases. This came about after I wanted, to have the Charles Winstone ammo belt on my Bayonet figure filled with rifle clips. And it was when I was doing the clips back up that the little pip broke off, so this is how I went about making a repair to them.

Note: Please read this page fully, before you attempt the repair, as I have placed some warning notes below.

This is the DiD Charles Winstone ammo belt that I intend to use on my figure, and in the picture below you can see the three lift dots that I have had to repair (first two left of centre and first on the right).

The picture above left shows the piece of stretched sprue, that used to make the rivet for the lift dot buckle in the above picture right. To explain how I made the thin strip of plastic above:

How to stretch sprue

Stretching Sprue

Get a piece of round sprue, these are the plastic frames that hold the parts for model construction kits. Get a source of heat, like a candle or a lighter, light it and hold the sprue about one and a half inches above flame in horizontal position. Hold the sprue above the flame about half way along, the trick is to not have it too close, or leave it in place for too long. After a few seconds the plastic will start to bend, remove from the heat source, and grip the sagging end and immediately start to pull it apart very slowly. Applying steady pressure until you have the plastic as thin as you want, if you pull too hard, it will break and curl up, which is not what we want.

What we need is a thin long strip of plastic as shown above, also as the sprue cools it will become more difficult to pull. Keep up the light pressure on the sprue, and I gently blow on it to speed this process up. Once I have the sprue at the right thickness that I wanted for the buckle, I then cut it to a length of about 3/4" long (20mm) which is slightly over length for what I want, I then apply a little bit of heat to one end of the piece of plastic. Just enough for it melt slightly, and while still warm I press the heated end down onto my workbench. This flattens out the end to make the head of the rivet.

The finished plastic rivet can be seen in the picture right, to give you an idea for the size of it. I then take out the broken white metal rivet from the inside of the ammo pouch, and push the new rivet through the hole in it's place.

Note: This where you have to be careful doing this, because to close the flap for the ammo pouch you have to put the 'spike' of the rivet through the other half of the lift dot connector. Because as I found the outer half can break off from the material, as it is not very well glued onto the fabric.

Note: So make sure when you put the 'spike' through the top half of the lift dot connector, it does not fall off. Once the 'spike' is through the eye of the top part, I then cut it down slightly as I intentionally made it too long, and then applied a gentle heat from my lighter flame to 'mushroom the 'spike' end to seal the ammo pouch closed. All that is left for me to do now, is just touch up the head of the 'spike' with some Gunmetal paint, and it should look just like the others.

Note: If you do use the heat method to seal the lift dot shut, make sure that the flame is not placed to near to the ammo pouch itself. You could also cut the 'spike' to length slightly over the top lift dot connector, and use a little dab of superglue to keep the connector closed.

Update on how I made the Lift Dot lock piece

In the picture right, it shows how I have had to make my own lift dot lock tabs. I had to make these because when I was adjusting some of the other equipment on this figure, I found that I had lost one of them. And as I only have enough CVI parts left for the other equipment, I had no alternative but to attempt this.

To make them, I used a spare DiD lift dot which I placed next to some thin plastic sheet, which I cut to the correct width and length as in the picture below left. I then held the piece in my tweezers, and shaped it with some sanding pad centre picture below.

With the flat lock part made, I then made a hole in the centre for the inner peg of the lift dot, and pressed it in place. I then cut the peg part to length, and used a flame from my lighter to make the end round off to lock the bag closed. I just have to paint them with some Gunmetal paint to finish them off.