LEGO Minifigures from LEGO keychains

If you go to a LEGO store or browse the LEGO website, you will find LEGO keychains featuring LEGO minifigures.

I was a LEGO store one day in 2015 (shortly after starting over with LEGO) and had an idea, so I purchased two of those LEGO minifigure keychains (Michelangelo and Leonardo from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise) with the intent of separating the minifigure from the keychain because I had 2 out of 4 minifigures already through purchasing LEGO sets and did not want to purchase two additional sets just to complete the collection of minifigures. I was also not familiar with Bricklink at the time (but shipping fees, minimum purchase fees, etc may have gotten in the way anyway).

As you can see in the pictures below, I simply cut off the keychain, and filed the part that was still attached to the figure. Not only this worked for me but I ended up purchasing several more keychains this way and gave the minifigures to my nephews as birthday presents and saved myself money in the process.

This is not new and other websites (just a Google search away) seem to cover this hack way better that I do. Makes me wish I looked that up prior to going through with the cutting part. You see, those websites offered better methods that would remove the metal pin completely from the minifigure. On more than one occasion (Chewbacca minifigure from Star Wars especially comes to mind), I would cut off the pin, and the head/torso would come off easily and expose an additional inch of jagged metal pin (poor Chewbacca looked like a mini concealed weapon when I put the head/torso assembly back... thoughts of miniature prison shiv/shank came to mind) that I would also need to cut and file.

The (better) methods outlined in those websites range from successfully pulling the entire pin by considerable force (I guess I was not trying hard enough back then), or use a soldering iron with a pointy tip to heat up the pin's ring just right to pull the ring and pin using the iron without melting the plastic. However, they do mention my method as well, but I was hoping to be able to remove the pin completely. Well now I know for next time I purchase those keychains again.

(Click on each picture for a full-size version):