Lead Warning

For those of you who don't collect minis except these or only started in the last few years, these are old-school minis. Yep, 100% or close to 100% lead. If you have little kids, keep 'em away from your minis. And remember to wash your hands after handling 'em..

Cleaning

All the minis from these sets should be cleaned before painting.

Besides the mysterious blue-green crud found on some (not all) of the PC set minis, all of them have a fine metal dust on them left over from casting. I recommend using an old toothbrush, some Boraxo or Comet, and water - scrub em off, rinse with water, then dry em (I put em on a paper towel and then use a blow dryer to speed things up).

Happily, none of the SF minis I've seen had much in the way of flash - if yours do, remove it with an X-Acto knife.

You may also want to use a knife to sharpen some of the detail on your minis.

Related

Finally, here's some related minis that can be used with your SF minis without much trouble:

true 25mm scale:
Star Grunt (Geo-Hex): various military (incl. oriental, black, arabic and female minis, also Legionnaires with kepis), plus resin cast vehicles
Call of Cthulhu (RAFM): HP Lovecraft's horrors make good aliens, esp. the Great Race of Yith and Mi-Go
Reaction Marines (RAFM): good generic sci fi minis
Destructor Commandoes (RAFM): good generic sci fi minis
Space Mercs & Privateers (RAFM): good generic sci fi minis
Traveller: The New Era Figures (RAFM): good generic sci fi minis
Shadowrun (Ral Partha): good for corporates, paramilitaries, cops, etc.
Star Wars (West End Games): no need for descriptions; out of production I think but you still see numbers of 'em on store shelves

Oversized 25mm scale (28mm):
Kryomek (SimTac): armored military and Alien Menaces
Shock Force (Demonblade): good for ganger / pirate / rebel / rioter figures
Warhammer 40K (Citadel / Games Workshop): various military (heavy armor & BFG's), Eldar for Space Elf fans , genestealers which make good Alien Menaces
Warzone (Heartbreaker): similar to WH40K, lots of big guns, undead horrors etc.

Out of production lines but good if you can find 'em:
Alternative Armies (28mm)
Grenadier (25mm) - Traveller (1980's) and Future Wars (1990's)
Lance and Laser (25mm)
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