Lily’s knee surgery (4Woods)

[Nescio50]

Thank you for all kind replies!
It’s about two and a half day after surgery and all seems OK. Lily is doing well and inspects her leg


Some of you said “I wouldn’t dare”. Me too didn’t dare. But also, I didn’t want Lily to have a broken knee. So, after a few weeks and after reading most of the threads on TDF on doll surgery, I did dare. To me, it simply was a necessity. And I’m very happy it went well

As it was mentioned, there’s not much on 4Woods repair on TDF. This is one of the reasons I decided to document this surgery. I hope no 4Woods owner has to do surgery, but if necessary maybe this report is of any help.

[mission]

This looks like it is a lock nut. If it is it should never unscrew by itself in the normal course of events. You should point this out to 4woods.

[Nescio50]

This looks like it is a lock nut. If it is it should never unscrew by itself in the normal course of events. You should point this out to 4woods.

Earlier this evening I've sent an email to Doll Story, the doll's vendor and 4Woods partner in Europe.

[1jayjay]

Thank you for all kind replies!
It’s about two and a half day after surgery and all seems OK. Lily is doing well and inspects her leg


Some of you said “I wouldn’t dare”. Me too didn’t dare. But also, I didn’t want Lily to have a broken knee. So, after a few weeks and after reading most of the threads on TDF on doll surgery, I did dare. To me, it simply was a necessity. And I’m very happy it went well

As it was mentioned, there’s not much on 4Woods repair on TDF. This is one of the reasons I decided to document this surgery. I hope no 4Woods owner has to do surgery, but if necessary maybe this report is of any help.

As I said that was a very good and informative pictorial. But even better is I'm so pleased to see it went so well Nescio. Lily's looking so good after the sugery, you did a fantastic job.

[Longshot]

Nescio50, the surgery looks really profession. Considering that you were figuring it out while preforming for the first time it’s amazingly well done. I agree that you couldn’t have left Lily with a broken leg and were forced into action whether you wanted to or not.

With the pictorial documentation that you have compiled it surely seems to be a manufacturing quality control error. Especially with the type of rotation that particular joint provided that nut should never have come loose. At the very least 4Woods should give you a gift certificate as compensation.

[Mechwizard]

This looks like it is a lock nut. If it is it should never unscrew by itself in the normal course of events. You should point this out to 4woods.

I'd say it was never done up properly in the first place, probably just spun on by hand and then forgotten.

Good job Nescio

[Nescio50]

Earlier this evening I've sent an email to Doll Story, the doll's vendor and 4Woods partner in Europe.

The representative of Doll Story has replied. She was in Japan and discussed some photographs I sent with 4Woods staff.

I made skeleton assembly when I was in Japan, and I can assure you that every nut is completely screwed.
This piece has certainly been unscrewed gradually, by moving the leg of the doll form right to left and vice versa.

Doll Story offered me a repair kit for free:

For repairing the scar [...], I send you :
- a silicone glue
- a sample of skin color
- a bottle of primer
- a bottle of hexane
- a box of special powder

Repair of the knee scar :
1) Apply some primer with a cotton tissue on the scar, to prepair the silicone and help the adherence of the glue.
2) Mix a very (VERY) small quantity of silicone color (the size of a needle head) with some glue, on a piece of cardboard, with a spatula. The mixture must have the same color than your doll. If you put too much color, please repeat the mixture.
3) when the mixture has the right color, add some hexane (about 10 %, but more or less is OK, that will just soften the mixture), and continue mixing.
4) apply the mixture on the scar.
IMPORTANT :
Please make the repair as invisible as possible immediately, by wiping off the excess with a cotton cloth soaked in hexane.
5) leave to dry for 24h.
[...]
The repair kit will be sent to you for free.

Last week I received the repair kit. The silicone glue is a tube of Shin-Etsu Silicone 1 component RTV (KE-42-T). Yesterday I used it to fix the irregularities of the scar. This silicone glue is quite easy to use. Although the scar isn't fully invisible, I'm quite happy with it.

And about the cause I replied that a gradually unscrewed nut might not happen. But I don't want to discuss it. I'm just happy it's all fixed and my doll is still so pretty!

[Lonestar_46]

I just had the same problem. I have chance the to live in France so I brought back my Lily to Doll Story. They'll fix the knee for free. I'll just pay her journey.

[rubherkitty]

Great job on the repair.

If this is a ongoing problem, perhaps the end of the threaded studs need to be penned over once the nylock nuts are torqued. They would never back off then.

[Wim]

This topic almost deserves a sticky. It's great information for future causalities.

[Nescio50]

This topic almost deserves a sticky. It's great information for future causalities.

This was almost 2 years ago, and it still is easy to find in the 4Woods Repairs forum

[lvveedub]

@ nescio50

thanks for the picts! used your wrap n tape bandage on my rd2's knee surgery this morning!

[Nescio50]

Hi lvveedub, I hope your surgery has been successful. I had the idea of the wrap and tape from other threads at TDF. To me, this seemed better than using staples.

[siliconefun]

Happy new year and all the best to our dolls!!!!

Dear Nescio50, happy to see Lilicia smiling again.
This bad thing arrived to Mia on her new A.I.NEOim-body who I received September 2013 (ex A.I.Evolution-body, returned to Doll Story). Painfully just at the day my Christmas holidays started I noticed her left knee was loosen due to the strange leg position. Before this happened I must say that bending her knees where not an easy task compared to the A.I.Evolution-body. The joints from her knees where tighten too fast and I really scared to move them. Another important thing I located before this happened was an unusual clacking when moving the knees.
When you determine this on your 4Woods Doll, take aware!
My research ended on your tutorial and after the left knee was repaired successfully I noticed that the same mistake on the right knee who the 8mm lock nut was only a few turns on the screw.
When this locknuts are correctly installed they can't move again. The worst on this surgery is the small amount of space inside the knee. After everything was on place I readjusted the joint screws with lesser friction so I can better move them. By far this skeleton joints are very strong and good machined parts and its rather possible to kill the plastic tubes!

Mia is well in good condition a happy to take new photoshootings.
The silicone repair doesn't look so professional as Doll Story Staff did finish but for my opportunity I'm glad to say: It's well done!

My conclusion: The staff who's assembled the skeleton have forgotten to tighten the U-joints assy.

Nescio50, great thanks again for your advises. I would like to post some pictures to show this extensive repair for other users.
Tomorrow I contact doll Story concerning this serious problem.

[Nescio50]

Mia is well in good condition a happy to take new photoshootings.

That's most important


I didn't have a problem with knee joints being too tight. But it seems there's sometimes a problem with 4Woods dolls that moving the under-leg left/right causes a nut to loosen and get disconnected. They should use a kind of thread-lock to prevent this.

Well, Mia is happy again!

To anyone having this problem, best is to contact 4Woods or Doll Story and I'm sure they will help.