Assembly Notebook - Yuri the Axe

Yuri the Axe is the uber-Manhunter, as well as a field commander. I really must commend PIP for its newest sculpts, i.e. the stuff from Legends. Yuri looks fairly straightforward until you uncover the nuts and bolts. This is not a mini for the casual gamer, it takes a bit of skill to get all the pieces in place. No that's not bragging on me, I can't even get Vlad's cape to stay on, and he came out week one!

Yuri is one of the few new models with a beefy tab to fit in the slot! Compare that with the dinky mini-tabs on the Koldun Lord or even the Manhunter variant pose and you will see what I mean. (Do I dare voice the conspiracy of PIP to sell more 2-part putty to fill in for the mini-tabs? Oops!)
Anyway, I always bend up the full size tabs to help fill the slot, in some sort of s-pattern using needle nosed pliers. This is a trick I learned after my first unit of all metal Space Marines had a distinct tilt, because the tabs weren't wide enough to fill the slotta base.

Luckily the sculptor made the cape thick enough on the socket end to take a drill and pin. My tweak is the same as mentioned on the Core Techniques Vol. 1 video from PIP. Yes, I do recommend getting it. Drill out the cape, then place a flattened roll of blu-tack in the socket. Be sure to wet the end you want to come away clean. Press into the socket where you want the cape placed, and gently remove. There should be an obvious finger of blu-tack indicating where the drill hole lines up. My pinning is much improved since I learned this from the video.

After setting your pin, I recommend missing up some putty and gap out the hole. The cape socket is way wider than the cape, so putty placed at the time of gluing will help fill the gap. I do it wet, not trusting myself to let it dry fully and still retain the proper placement. WARNING: CA superglue supercharges the curing time on the putty. It will harden in an eyeblink, so work quickly. Glue and place it, and after the glue grabs ahold, take an old file or sculpting tool and clear away the blops of putty waste. Since the cape is fur, scratch some rough lines into the putty-filled seam. You can clean them up once the putty hardens a bit more.

I would normally recommend fitting and drilling out the arm before placing the cape, but since the cape can take and extreme angle, I would wait until after. Once the putty and glue fully dry, (like maybe overnight) see where you want the axe to place. I drilled and pinned the left arm with a short pin, and let the other arm socket in with putty and glue.