Official WarSeer Finecast Poll.

[Zinge]

I would like to see good stuff get through now and again

[Hendarion]

No, we don't want to see this sort of rubbish in our shiny toy boxes, but I understand how poor stuff gets through now and again.

I understand that workers are humans. But if you have a production method that produces such outcomes, you have to make sure you advance the process itself and not only let poor fellows do manual quality checks. So no, I don't understand how such outputs still can get through. Either they manage to make Finecast what it is supposed to be or they acknowledge it was a bad idea and return to what they have been really good at.

[Angelwing]

I understand that workers are humans. But if you have a production method that produces such outcomes, you have to make sure you advance the process itself and not only let poor fellows do manual quality checks. So no, I don't understand how such outputs still can get through. Either they manage to make Finecast what it is supposed to be or they acknowledge it was a bad idea and return to what they have been really good at.

Well we have seen they are trying to advance the process, with the sprues coming out with a difference in vent position / more vents. If we had enthusiastic hobby guys manning the qa conveyors without time constraints we would see a big leap in quality. I suspect though that it's Everyday Joe with targets to meet on the line.
I used to work in a salad factory. We once had a large live and hopping frog make it through from farm, transport, refrigeration, washers, cutters, washing with chemicals, drying, refrigeration, conveyors, several levels of weighing machine with snapping jaws, the packing machine with snapping jaws and the weigh check / metal detection system all the way until the final packing, with qa inspection all the way including an infra red scanner at one point. Quite frankly it beat the odds by some margin. So I understand how such astoundingly bad products slip through the net.
On your last point though I totally agree. The amount of finecast products with small, but model ruining faults is not acceptable and GW do indeed need to up their game. My personal opinion is that I wouldn't buy it 'blind'. I would have to inspect it in store. Pity really as I'd happily buy metal and plastic blind with faith in the product.

[Daniel36]

We once had a large live and hopping frog make it through...

Must've been a Slann Mage then, no?

I've bought one Cockatrice, which is the only Finecast model I currently own. Loved the model, had maybe one slight mishap, but it wasn't unfixxable. In terms of annoyances, it wasn't more annoying than your average mold line. Basecoat took to it without having to wash it, the model was a joy to paint. I had it on sale though, which made it all the nicer.

[Hendarion]

So I understand how such astoundingly bad products slip through the net.

Well, thing isn't that sometimes small mistakes get through a very fine net, but more like elephants running regularly right through rarely span filaments.

[Coasty]

I got a KFF Big Mek last week. It's a model I would never have bought if it had stayed in metal. I was very happy with it.

[Antigonos]

After receiving the 3rd replacement for my 25th 40k Anniversary Miniature, I can say that Finecast sucks! A lot! I had the same experience with Astorath from the Blood Angels range. In general, after all these I will buy a model in Finecast only if it is ABSOLUTELY necessary for my list (and not collection).

EDIT: I have to say though that GW Customers Support is great. I just wish their Quality Control was half as good.

[75hastings69]

I'd like to see liquid greenstuff fix this... Though this is beating a dead horse, it isn't the worst I've seen. Between all the players at the indy store here, I feel confident in saying there have been several hundred dollars in refunds by GW for their finecast and even their plastic kits in the last year. We even had several bad batches of plastic thunderwolves with air bubbles. As my friend said from this last experience, "This my friends, is top of the line in the miniature world."

Attachment 136249

Oh so crisp!!! LOL!!!

This is exactly what my Lelith Hesperax model was like only this rending happened further down the body and left her with no lower legs or feet. Way to go non existent QA guys!

[shelfunit.]

It would make a great torture room bit of scenery for a DE diorama piece/scenery if you get to keep the current "model" though...

[Cthell]

This sort of thing occasionally happens because the employee on the conveyor belt for 8 hours gets bored / sleepy, or its nearly home time or they just don't care for whatever reason. I can't comment on the GW factory, but I've been in other factories and seen people on the line with glazed eyes. If the belt is made of links you can get almost hypnotised by the moving pattern after a while. I've done plenty of this sort of thing and it's a thankless task.
No, we don't want to see this sort of rubbish in our shiny toy boxes, but I understand how poor stuff gets through now and again.

That's why I'm surprised GW haven't invested in a basic computer vision system to weed out the really big howlers like the example. Just looking at silhouettes should be able to pick that one up, and such a system would reduce the workload on the human QA checkers.

[Spiney Norman]

Well we have seen they are trying to advance the process, with the sprues coming out with a difference in vent position / more vents. If we had enthusiastic hobby guys manning the qa conveyors without time constraints we would see a big leap in quality. I suspect though that it's Everyday Joe with targets to meet on the line.
I used to work in a salad factory. We once had a large live and hopping frog make it through from farm, transport, refrigeration, washers, cutters, washing with chemicals, drying, refrigeration, conveyors, several levels of weighing machine with snapping jaws, the packing machine with snapping jaws and the weigh check / metal detection system all the way until the final packing, with qa inspection all the way including an infra red scanner at one point. Quite frankly it beat the odds by some margin. So I understand how such astoundingly bad products slip through the net.
On your last point though I totally agree. The amount of finecast products with small, but model ruining faults is not acceptable and GW do indeed need to up their game. My personal opinion is that I wouldn't buy it 'blind'. I would have to inspect it in store. Pity really as I'd happily buy metal and plastic blind with faith in the product.

That's not really a fair example, if you were to equate your one instance of a live frog making it down the production line to the finecast situation you'd have 1 in 10 salad bags leaving the factory with a live frog in them. The fact that people have complained to GW about a badly deformed mini only to have one in the same condition or worse sent to them (this happened to me 5 times with the TK liche priest) so frequently is totally astounding. I really can't believe that the sheer quantity of badly miscast FC minis making it the shelves is the result of QC missing things unless they have employed blind people to do the job, the only way the finecast situation make sense is if the QC team have actually been instructed to let miscast models through in the hopes the some people will not return the and ask for a well cast model.

The other possibility of course is just that no-one is doing any QC at the finecast factory, which wouldn't surprise me all that much.

[iamfanboy]

Here's my take on it:

If the minis making it through QA are this bad, how bad are the ones they stop?

Think about it for a moment. The bit about QA guys being human is very true - but the thing is, the human brain adapts and adjusts to a certain level. If these are the things they consider 'good', what are the things they consider 'bad' like?

Though admittedly with resin you can't just toss a mistake into a pot, melt it down, and use it for tomorrow's batch; it's trash if it's not passed through QA.That could lead to a culture of acceptance where stuff that WE think of as bad becomes 'borderline' simply to raise their production numbers, because they'll probably get fired if they don't produce a certain amount of minis every shift.

In other words, on all levels Finecast is a failure: as a sculpting medium, as a production material, and as a gaming piece.

[f2k]

Here's my take on it:

If the minis making it through QA are this bad, how bad are the ones they stop?

Think about it for a moment. The bit about QA guys being human is very true - but the thing is, the human brain adapts and adjusts to a certain level. If these are the things they consider 'good', what are the things they consider 'bad' like?

Though admittedly with resin you can't just toss a mistake into a pot, melt it down, and use it for tomorrow's batch; it's trash if it's not passed through QA.That could lead to a culture of acceptance where stuff that WE think of as bad becomes 'borderline' simply to raise their production numbers, because they'll probably get fired if they don't produce a certain amount of minis every shift.

In other words, on all levels Finecast is a failure: as a sculpting medium, as a production material, and as a gaming piece.

I think you hit it on the nail with this one.

I quite simply refuse to believe that Games Workshop’s QA guys are this bad – particularly when “handpicking” replacement models. Instead, these models are wilfully let out of the factory, rather than being discarded as they should have been.

In fact, I have no doubt that, had these models been metal, they would have been tossed right back into the melting pot without a moment’s hesitation.

The only other option, in my mind, is that the QA guys are not bad, but missing entirely...

[spaint2k]

It's been said before multiple times but there's a difference between QA and QC. QC should be catching the miscasts while QA is supposed to create a process that doesn't generate miscasts in the first place. I don't believe this is the fault of QC; as I've already said I believe the problem to be the process itself, which seems to be incapable of producing castings to the same quality as metal casting.

[Hendarion]

It's been said before multiple times but there's a difference between QA and QC. QC should be catching the miscasts while QA is supposed to create a process that doesn't generate miscasts in the first place. I don't believe this is the fault of QC; as I've already said I believe the problem to be the process itself, which seems to be incapable of producing castings to the same quality as metal casting.

^ This. No matter how good QC is, QA needs to be right too and it obviously isn't. (neither is QC, but well, QA is always more important for profit margins)

[TomG]

I think, that GW only presented how they care about customers. I think FW had prepared us for FC a bit. I had expected something like FW casts, but it was far worse. More bubbles and misscast and it looks like zero QC. And when you want replacement, you should be lucky to get real replacement not worse one. Wait a minute. What?
From this email seen few pages back from guy in FW. It looks that GW probably use centrifuga for FC. It was good for metal, but for resin it is bad as said Mr. Brown.
I´m not sure, what they are trying to achieve with that, piss more customers?

[iamfanboy]

It's been said before multiple times but there's a difference between QA and QC. QC should be catching the miscasts while QA is supposed to create a process that doesn't generate miscasts in the first place. I don't believe this is the fault of QC; as I've already said I believe the problem to be the process itself, which seems to be incapable of producing castings to the same quality as metal casting.

My old Navy bases used the exact opposite of how you use it (QA checks finished products, QC makes sure that the process isn't at fault for defective product and correcting said process), so...

Neither of us is wrong. No need to get a tad huffy just because someone uses them differently than you.

Besides, BOTH sides are at fault. The people checking the process should be hearing NOTHING but the loud screams of those who have to check the finished products. Maybe the flaws are being let through as a rebellion of sorts; "If they won't listen to US when we say the process is bad, maybe they'll listen to the customers."

.....Which means they don't know GW very well, do they? *points to signature*

[spaint2k]

My old Navy bases used the exact opposite of how you use it (QA checks finished products, QC makes sure that the process isn't at fault for defective product and correcting said process), so...

Neither of us is wrong. No need to get a tad huffy just because someone uses them differently than you.

I'm not getting huffy because someone's using them differently to me - I'm getting huffy because people are using them differently to me and everyone else. People shouldn't conflate the two. A very quick Google search for Quality Assurance will throw up the following link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quality_assurance

The first couple of paragraphs are so good that they deserve to be reproduced here in their entirety:

Quality assurance (QA) refers to the planned and systematic activities implemented in a quality system so that quality requirements for a product or service will be fulfilled. It is the systematic measurement, comparison with a standard, monitoring of processes and an associated feedback loop that confers error prevention. This can be contrasted with Quality "Control". which is focused on process outputs.

Two principles included in QA are: "Fit for purpose", the product should be suitable for the intended purpose; and "Right first time", mistakes should be eliminated. QA includes management of the quality of raw materials, assemblies, products and components, services related to production, and management, production and inspection processes.

Suitable Quality is determined by product users, clients or customers, not by society in general. It is not related to cost and adjectives or descriptors such "High" and "Poor" are not applicable. For example, a low priced product may be viewed as having high quality because it is disposable where another may be viewed as having poor quality because it is disposable.

EDIT: Having said all that, Wikipedia's entry for Quality Control sounds like it can be broad enough to include Quality Assurance, in addition what I've already called Quality Control (inspection of output). I give up!

[loveless]

So, two weeks since I last called in for a replacement and was told (essentially) that there were no good casts of Arjac Rockfist in the US warehouse/distribution center, but they'd let me know when they got some in.

They've had my money long enough and I've had useless chunks of resin long enough. Any excitement I had for the model is dead, so I'll be trying to get my money back today. I certainly didn't get anything out of it but headaches.

So, that brings the Finecast score to 3 passable, 2 fails, and 1 epic fail for me.
Meanwhile, the stack of metal GW and PP models I picked up recently were all flawless...and cheaper than Finecast. Go figure.

[Crazy Harborc]

loveless

If you used a credit card to pay, I suggest you contact the credit card company. Especially if you are "IN" the USA. I've been there and had to do that.