Modification Thinning the Neck/Boy Bits - Sandpaper or Dremel

I would go for sandpaper for the neck! Even if you’re very careful the dremel takes off a lot! Better to be safe and slow, as it’s a lot easier to take more off than to add if you make a mistake!

Best of luck

 

Depends on how much you're looking to take off, I would say. I usually start with 240 grit and work my way up, usually to 1000 to get a smooth finish! If you can I would recommend buying a pack with different grits and experiment to find what'll work best for you and your project!

 

Sand paper will need more time and elbow work, but will be more controlled. With a Dremel it will go faster, but you have higher risk of taking off more then you want, and will still need to do hand sanding with sand paper for final smoothness.

That said be sure you have the right safety gear, mask, goggles and gloves. Mask needs to be rated for particles there is a pinned thread here somewhere in the custom and mods part of the forum on what kind of masks to use. Resin dust is toxic, so sand outside or in a well vented space away from people and pets. One that you can easy clean any mess, and there will be mess. Even wet sanding will leave you in resin dust. Whenever I sand I do it outside and wear a plastic rain poncho to try and keep it out of my clothing, and I shake off and/or vacuum off myself before going back inside to change.

And thus closes the safety first message of the day, I hope your project goes well.

 

Looks great!!!

 

There's also an item found in beauty supply stores that is a helpful adjunct to sandpaper - in the nail supplies section, they sell rectangular sponge bricks with abrasive surface particles. Used for sanding/smoothing acrylic nails. The white ones are a more coarse abrasive, good for taking off rounded or curved surfaces, while the yellow ones are a finer grade. I've used them for years for sanding necks or altering chins, cheek hollows, etc. The sponge interiors let you conform your sanding to the curved surface without leaving any edge marks like from a stiff paper sandpaper. The bricks come in several grades (all color-coded), including much coarser), but I've found the white and yellow to be the most useful.

 

I've had really good luck with the micro-mesh type sanding pads for modding BJDs. You can bend them around curves for pretty good control of the final shape while still keeping the final surface pretty even. They're good wet or dry and for me have been really durable. They go from fairly coarse (but maybe not enough for the first stage of a major mod) to very fine. Here's the ones I bought but I'm sure there are countless equivalents. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000H6EC4C

And for final polishing wet/dry polishing paper is great. The finest stuff doesn't even feel abrasive. You can get down to a highly reflective lacquer furniture type finish if you step down in alternating directions. Amazon.com It's also very durable.