The repair kit has arrived!

included instructions for repair (in Japanese)


included instructions for painting (also in Japanese)


contents of the repair kit (dvd stack included for scale purposes)


It arrived on a Tuesday; was shipped the previous Thursday; ordered the Friday before that. So from order to arrival took 11 days. With the estimated time of shipping to Oz from Japan of 3-5 days being quite accurate.

Several days after getting the repair kit Felice has remained unhealed because of my concern that I would fuck up the job. Concerns that unfortunately were well founded.


I'd seen the images on the repair sheet before here:

http://fallenleaves19830916.spaces.live.com/

I just thought it was a devoted fan and not images properly associated with Arte Tokio.


The task of repairing cracks was actually more straight forward than I imagined. The silicone provided is sticky so the wound have a tendency of closing on their own; and upon scrutiny of the images and the products included in the package I deduced the logical means of what to do.



So from the images I figure what's supposed to happen is;


1) First you apply the 'primer' to the appropriate area with an ear bud (that's a cue tip, or cotton bud to some of you).


2) apply the silicone from the tube to a clean surface.


3) mix the silicone with a tiny bit of colour pigment. (I learned before that these pigments are very potent and that only a very small amount is needed.)


3) Apply that mixture to damaged area and close it.


4) Use a means to ensure that the effected damage area stays closed. (I omitted this part, trusting in the stickiness of material and force of joint to keep it closed)
(the images here were taken from http://fallenleaves19830916.spaces.live.com/)


Let's review the damage:

crack under right arm pit


crack on right wrist


dinged feet


& little cracks at the corner of the eyes

I began cautiously enough, beginning in the small obscure area that is the sole of the foot; in case I did mess it up. The tube silicone begins to cure quickly (minutes), so it's better if you don't dally once the silicone is out of the tube. Having decided that repair was easy and proceeded to finish up the repairs. And things would have been well if I had stopped there, as I had planned and intended.


Instead of following the care that I had at the beginning I got impatient and proceeded to painting. I also decided to ignore the instructions on the painting guide. I mixed the pigment and silicone together and tried using that as a paint. Unfortunately it doesn't go on so well as a paint, and in my effort to smooth it out, created a rather rough job.





It kinda looks okay from far away though...

When allowed to sit for several minutes the silicone is pretty robust. My hope is that it will eventually wear away so I can repaint it better, or figure out a way to repair it.


At the time this was written, Felice wounds were still in that 'leave for 30 hours' period.