working with photoetched material

My absolute favorite tool for dealing with the PE monster is Xuron's shears, no. 440 - you get a nice, square cut, and with a little practice you can get rid of the "nubs" on all but the most delicate PE. They're also great for small diameter brass rod, to get an absolutely square end as opposed to a pointed one.

To get rid of the nubs after removing a piece of PE, I invested in a diamond needle file from Tamiya - it's small enough to fit almost anywhere, and usually only a few strokes are needed to get rid of the nub. Which is wayyyyyyy better than my old way of trying to trim it down with a razor blade!

I built my own "bending" tool from a piece of aluminum plate plus a couple of K&S stainless steel strips. I use it only on large assemblies, however.  For small pieces that need bending I just use X-acto knives, one with the chisel blade. I also use X-acto knives (#11 blade) for cutting the pieces from the fret.

I use thinned white glue for gluing PE to the model.

Hey,PLASTICJUNKIE! I am glad you wrote this.This goes to show that you don,t really need a whole plethora of super tools.Just a good lot of common sense helps more than anything else.TANKERBUILDER

My PE tools are very simple. I place the PE on an old 4"X4" ceramic tile used as a cutting surface and a round exacto blade to cut the pieces from the fret. I use my old flat jeweler's file to remove any burrs. For bending I use two single sided razor blades (one to hold the part and the other to scoop and bend it) and tweezers. With these limited tools I worked on an extensive Griffon detail set in 1/144 scale for a Type VII/C Revell U Boat that won 1st place in the IPMS Region 12 Convention.