BAN005 torx convex head Ducati 1,0mm

A full millimeter is the limit of manageability

A millimeter head is the first step that can be worked almost like real fasteners. It will take being gripped with tweezers without the risk of bending, it will take a tip being put to it, and while seating it can still be turned so that the star points the same way everywhere. That small thing sets a carefully built model apart from a quick one: heads turned at random look restless, heads aligned on one axis give the surface order.

Where a size like that fits

In 1:12 scale a full millimeter works out to a real head of around twelve millimeters. That matches the joints which on a machine carry a load: frame plates, the covers of the swingarm pivot, the mounting of footpegs or the holders of a brake caliper. In 1:6 scale the same element drops to ordinary body fasteners and can be scattered over the whole model.

A procedure that has proved itself

The hole is drilled with 0.9 mm, which is at the same time the neighboring step of the same line – anyone who buys both sizes thus has the smaller of them as a gauge for drilling. The element is set in dry, the orientation is checked and only then is a drop of thin glue brought in from the side, which draws itself under the foot.

This head is offered two steps higher still. Above 1.2 mm the brand lists the sizes in a separate number series intended rather for machinery than for motorcycles.

Anyone building for the first time does well to try this size first. A mistake on it can still be put right by prising it out and setting it in again, whereas with the finest steps it usually ends with the element snapped off in the hole.