stimtoybox: DIY Silicone Sealant Spiky Tangle I’ve spent the last three weeks working on my ow
stimtoybox: DIY Silicone Sealant Spiky Tangle I’ve spent the last three weeks working on my own version of @gothtistic-stims‘s Spiky Tangle, using a cheap eBay Tangle Jr as a base. This version uses something more readily available to me in Australia: dollar shop silicone sealant, the kind used to patch window seals and the edging around sinks/baths/showers. I used the 50 gram Duramax tube shown above the Tangle, and it didn’t quite finish the whole Tangle–there’s quite a few gaps. However, I had to wipe away part of the Tangle in the process, so if you don’t make mistakes, I’d say that a 50 gram tube is enough to finish a Tangle Jr. I found the Duramax silicone for $3 AUD, while the 30 gram tube shown below is available between $1.20-$2 AUD, depending on store. This cheap silicone sealant isn’t durable enough to make fine spikes: they just break and scrape right off under handling, even when fully cured. I scraped the Tangle clean and tried larger, chunkier spikes like those above–so it’s more knobbly than a Tangle Hairy–and this version lasts under normal handling. I can break off a piece if I deliberately scrape at it, but not under normal use. I do like how the chunkier spikes feel so very different from a Tangle Hairy, so I think this is an interesting possible variation on the Spiky Tangle. It will not hold up if you want to pull at or pluck off the silicone bits. If you mean to do this and replace the silicone every so often, I suppose it has utility as a picking/plucking/pulling stim, but the effort of modifying the Tangle, to me, means that I can’t recommend it for this purpose. In theory, this is a simple DIY: press the silicone out of the tube until it forms a thick blob, pull the nozzle away, start another blob, repeat. Wait until the silicone dries (it cures fully in twenty-four hours, but I found that it needed four to five hours to set enough for gentle handling), turn the Tangle over and repeat. Easy, right? Words can’t express how difficult this mod was for me–pressing even larger, well-spaced-out spikes of silicone means pressing hard on a metal tube to control the silicone, and I can only manage a few rows (maybe one row over five pieces) at a time, once a day–for three weeks. I do not recommend this for stimmers with chronic hand pain or any disability that impacts strength or movement, and if you’re like me and do it anyway, please expect this mod to be a week or three in the making. This hurt my hands. This hurt my hands a lot. I don’t recommend that even the most physically-abled of stimmers do this all at once. Please, take very frequent breaks and space this out over a few days at least. It’s one of the most physically-demanding DIYs I’ve ever done, and I’m genuinely concerned that doing this without appropriate rest breaks and spacing will cause RSI-type injuries. This said, if you’ve been wanting a cheap DIY Spiky Tangle, I think there’s some potential in silicone sealant, and it has the advantage of being a readily available product in most dollar shops. Image description under read more cut: Keep reading -- source link