Wire Hands or Magnet Hands?

I’ve never had a doll with magnets in the hands, but I have a little one with the S hooks and I find she poses well as long as I suede the wrist socket a little bit to give the ball joint a bit of “tooth” for lack of a better word....

I plan to get a FairyLand doll soon, and they have the magnets in their hands, my only concern would be the magnets somehow losing their magnetic properties somehow, though I’m not sure if that’s even possible with magnets.....

 

Magnet hands very often look like hands with S hooks, and pose exactly the same way, but have a divider just under the palm which attaches the hand to the S-hook part via a magnet.

So it's really more a question of:
1) Hands with s-hooks
2) Hands with magnets and s-hooks

Magnet Hands from random Google search

Spoiler: Magnet Hands (NOT MINE)

See how the hand is separated into two parts: 1) the hand and 2) a ball? The ball connects the magnet and the seam between the ball and the hand contains a magnet

The only reason they can sometimes have different posing (and I really wouldn't call it "posing," it's closer to "sturdiness" is because sometimes the magnet is not strong enough and separates from the rest of the hand when you don't want that to happen).

I find that substituting an N52 neodymium magnet (the slightly stronger grade) usually does the job to fix that problem.

The advantages of magnet hands, while they do not really affect posing (with the small exception of adding a rotation point at the wrist--but usually you can do that with the whole hand, s-hook and all) are twofold:

1. Makes changing hands easier

2. Makes dressing the doll (especially with knit sweaters) easier because you can remove the hand without the elastic and S-hook sliding up into the arm (the separate s-hook bit acts like a stopper)

As a result, I much prefer magnet hands.

 

My Fairyland doll (feeple60) is pretty sturdy. I admit that with the magnetic hands I often knock them off the wrist when posing. It is easy enough to put right back on unless you're trying to navigate really long sleeves. That being said, I take them off all the time to dress her so it is very beneficial to be able to take the hands off.

 

For pure posing, I prefer hands with S-hooks. I do not have a doll with magnetic hands per se, but I have a modded a pair of conventional hands to be used with magnets.

Apart from making the mistake of placing the S-hooks on top of the wrist parts, which makes posing them almost impossible, they have a tendency to fall off. Despite the use of strong magnets and inserting a little securing in form of a hook system, you really have to be careful to not hit them at the wrong ankle - they will fall off.

But they are sure nice for changing clothes. Though I feel that may some kind of threading system could maybe also work. I would love to have a system which does not require pulling an elastic in order to get the hand off for clothing.

 

For most of the dolls I have with magnets, I prefer them, because it's much easier to dress them when I can remove the hands first (and can be more reassuring to transport them if I can easily drop their hands in a separate place where they're less likely to be damaged).

Note that I said most, though. My WithDoll and my LittleFees all have locks on their hands in addition to the magnets, which make them hard to dislodge. My MNFs and Puki do not have locks, and while most of them do have reasonably strong magnets so I don't have to worry too much, the one I take out with me the most often also has weak magnets, and I've nearly lost his hands more than once. So my real preference is "magnets with locks" over magnets alone.

 

I have owned both magnetic and s-hooked, but my personal favorite is Volks One Touch system. They're s-hooked on, but there's a little slot in the wrist balls for the hook to sit on. It gives the hands the security of the s-hook, but ease of dressing of magnets.

Otherwise, I'd probably prefer magnetic, as long as the magnets are strong enough. It's such a huge pain to change clothes that don't fit over hands when the hooks keep slipping back into the arm.

 

I adore magnet hand systems. ADORE. It makes sewing clothes so much easier because you don't have to make sleeves extra-large for hands to fit or deal with taking the hands off just to put on a shirt. I have some dolls with S-hook hands too, but their clothing options are more limited since I generally won't remove their hands (I am lazy). It's also great with dolls like Fairyland Minifees because they have so many different hand options, and you can easily swap them out.

 

Megnet hands, all the way. I sew for dolls. I LOVE being able to dress them easily.

And guys did you know, you can re-"charge" a weak magnet by attaching a much stronger magnet to it for a couple of days? Realigns the polarity of the particles or something. I just did it to my pukipuki's magnets.

 

I had no idea, but I think I may have to head out to get some cattle magnets to see if they can "fix" Ed's hands.

 

I like the magnets waaaay better. Makes changing things easier

 

I can cope with hook hands, but magnetic ones are so convenient. It's never made a difference to me when buying.

 

I love the magnet hands. Makes changing outfits so much easier!

 

Magnet hands FTW. It's not just ease of changing clothes, but with my littlefee girls I can change their hands out altogether to make them have different gestures. I'm a sucker for option parts.

 

My chalco from soom is magnet hands, it's very easy to fall off! and ordinary wire hands like xaga is hard to wear bracelet. I like Volks wire hands best, they have a hold slot which make changing very easy.

 

@StellaMarigold I'm currently wondering whether to go with wired or magnetic hands for a Popovy doll, so it's very interesting to hear what people think about this.

I've read that Popovy wired hands can't be removed without restringing the doll, so I'm leaning towards magnetic hands for ease of dressing, even if it means I need to be careful not to knock them off. I plan on doing a fair amount of sewing with the doll and removable hands would make that so much easier.

 

I hate magnet hands. I have a few dolls with them and they're made of pure frustration for me. Khale's (Leeke muscle body) default hands, while beautifully blushed, are magnetic and have a lock mechanism. However, the lock thing has never worked as intended and if you breath on them wrong, they pop off.