Movement bases for 1/76th WW2 figures - Introduction

I started my 1/76th (20mm) WW2 Eastern Front collection in 2001.  This was when you still sent off for a printed catalogue /black and white list from the manufacturer if you wanted to see what they did.  Internet shopping for niche hobbies was in its infancy. There was no Flames of War or Bolt Action.  WW2 was mostly gamed in 6mm or 20mm.  You had to read books to research your forces blah, blah, blah  Anyway enough of my old man's ramblings and let's get to the point. 

My SHQ WW2 collection

This was also before pre-cut MDF bases were available.  I based all my figures on 17mm washers which I felt worked well with the slim, well proportioned and cleanly sculpted SHQ figures.  I based them singly apart from lmg teams which are on 2ps and a few 3 man teams on bigger washers.  Singly based figures are fiddly to game with though.

To solve this I looked at various products.  The problem was that no-one makes any movement trays to fit the 17mm washers.  There's plenty for pennies or 15mm bases but I really didn't want to rebase them and pay out for all those movement  trays as I have around 150 figures.

I'd seen some movement trays for one of the Games Workshop games on a site which I can't recall now. They were more like platforms to attach your figures to and that gave me the idea to look for circular bases to stick mine to.  The available MDF bases are all thicker than I'd like and it'd be a fair few quid buying that many.  And then I hit upon the solution.  I've got hundreds of 2ps courtesy of my dear old Dad.  These were the perfect size but how to make this work?  And the solution of course is magnets.  

I'm aware that these have been used for some while by hobbyists and I'm behind the times here.  I did some online research to find out what size was needed and ordered a small batch of ten 3mm x 1mm to see if the idea worked.  They came within a couple of days.  I got some figures out to try and the magnet snapped to the metal washer rather than the base of the figure.  First thing to sort out.  The next thing was they didn't magnetise to the 2ps I was using for the test.  I gave up at this point as we were having some major work done in the house and I didn't have access to my painting table for the best part of the week.

It wasn't until the weekend that I took another look at this.  I tried the magnets on some other 2ps and they worked.  I then realised that the 2ps I had originally tried were just too grimy.  I then spent a good bit of time checking every 2p with a magnet and then bagging them up.  The grimy pile (on the right in the photo) will be used as figure bases. It's all rock'n'roll with me of a weekend. 

 
Tuppence anyone?

And that is where I'll leave it until we get into the full process.  I don't want to excite you all too much do I? 

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