Ratcheting Miniature Holder — Painting Handle

A ratcheting painting handle for tabletop miniatures. A trigger-controlled jaw grips the base securely — no hardware, no glue, no elastics. A sturdier alternative to the Citadel painting handle, with four rack sizes to fit different base sizes.

4 Different designs for hand-holding preferences.

It's so solid, clicky and springy it makes a great fidget toy as well!

The design holds your minis SECURELY. No hardware, no gluing. Once tight, the jaws will not let go until you press the button. 

USAGE:

1. Hold down the trigger button and move the jaws out. 
2. Place your mini base between the jaws.
3. With your other hand, rotate the base knob until the mini is secure. Two or three clicks after the jaws touch the base is enough. Be careful not to over-torque or you may damage the shaft (though you really need to crank it to hurt it).
4. The mini is now secure.
5. To release, hold the mini while pushing the trigger button to keep the mini from falling when the jaws loosen.

I recommend the spring and shaft to be printed in PETG. The shaft acts as a spring, so a lot of torque is applied to it. PLA works as well, but will eventually wear down. Everything else works great in PLA.

Assembly is simple, the trigger is inserted from the bottom and clicked into place, as shown below.

Then the spring is inserted against the trigger into the two holes:

The print profile adds a heavy base. If you do not care for it, or don't want to use that much filament, remove the adjustment cube on the print profile.

There are also 4 different rack sizes. The parameters are rack height (a higher rack height for thicker model bases) and rack length (longer rack for wide bases). I've had no problems gripping standard bases. If there are use cases that I've missed, I'm open to taking requests.