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That is some very intricate and astounding fabrication methods with excellent results. One day, I’m going to grow up big and strong just like you. 😜

@Papa Rat That M.Lover looks GREAT! I love that Mr. Super Clear. It makes a lot of finishes just meld together. You're VF is coming along cool too! @nightmareB4macross Dude! Put your top back on, this is a family site!🤣 The Valk spread out reminds me of the old Imai cartoons where one of the girls has her Valks on display as insects with pins in them!😁 @Chas The paint looks SMOOTH on your SDF-1. The mods do too! ALRIGHT, so, my apologies for all the photos. I thought some of you might wonder how I did what I did and how it may help you (as I learn from you guys doing stuff too). Somebody I know wanted an F-35 for a temporary display. I mentioned I have an F-35B and they can borrow it after I build it. So I've been asked to build it, while forcing me to get it out of storage and building it. So, win-win! Back in 2018, I got the Hasegawa F-35B when it was new. Probably one of the best 1/72nd iterations of that airframe. Downsides, no ordnance and the decals are now outdated. The RAM tape that shows up as lighter colored lines all around the plane are now dated. It's all now the same color except for some hatches and stuff. The first thing people do when they look at an F-35B is look into the giant LiftFan behind the pilot. Hasegawa just has the top guard and a 1950's looking turbine blade under it, so I decided to make it more accurate. I think the F-35B is a cool plane design and I wanted to put the effort into it. The LiftFan has three sections you can see from the top. 1. The top guard with 11 spokes (and small sensor tubes all around). 2. Variable vanes that look similar to fan blades, but they're not. They're variable guides to adjust air flow. 3. The actual lift fan. In fact, there are two lift fans (counter-rotating) and other stators inside the fan housing, but you won't see them on the kit looking down, so I left them out here and on the model. First I tried making about seven turbine fans in styrene. All but one failed, and that one was shaped wrong, so I dropped that. This was about a week of wasted effort! So I'm showing you the bad with the good.😉 Next step was to build everything from soldered brass. That worked much better, but is A LOT more work. I used a pair of scissors and super-glued an angle piece onto it to act as a guide. - This is now how the "variable" vanes section went together: Then a depth gauge was used to keep the thicknesses the same when cutting all those tiny strips. Next, I needed a jig to hold the brass blades while soldering and doing other stuff, so I lathed and milled a block of bass wood. Next, all those little blades were sanded smooth to help with the finish and solder adhesion. Then the center piece was milled. This took a couple of tries. You can see there is hardly any material on the splines sticking up. This was the delicate part. They could easily break off - even in brass. The center piece and blades getting fit together. Then they were soldered. Note there is a slight angle to the left in the blades. - This is the top "Guard" piece. This is a similar piece, but it is for the guard that goes over the top. This is how I figured out how to shape it without busting up the delicate parts. The pieces stayed in the wood while I CAREFULLY sanded them to an angle. Soldered onto a piece of K&S metals tube. An iron was used because the mini-torch was too hot for this thin metal. And after A LOT of cleaning up, filing, and the center piece milled out... The top guard and vanes fit in place. The K&S tube was a God send, PERFECT fit after I cut out the center tub that came in the kit for the fan. The turbine center hub similar to above. This is also canted and tapered like the actual fan. The actual turbine was made similar to the vanes above. Just shorter, stockier blades. This is AFTER all the solder flux was cleaned off. I tried to think of how to put the twist in the blades. The answer was in front of me. I did opposite of the milling. I made a "reverse" screw driver blade with a taper. Then put it in the mill like I was going to make cuts. Instead, I manually twisted the bit just a little. Raised the bit, rotated the rotary table, lowered it onto another blade, and repeat - 24 times! I had to REALLY resist turning the motor on each time. This is similar to how I mill stuff in rotary increments. AND FINALLY, everything together. You can see Hasegawa's two pieces. Then (top right to lower left) came the LiftFan casing with the vanes in it, the top guard assembled, and the turbine - polished up and sized to fit inside the tube. The brass rod is the special tool used to twist the blades. It was fun, but A LOT of work to finally make a turbine. I'll have to remember this process for future models. Thanks for checking in! - MT

Yeah, I’ll have to dig through some old kit boxes and see if I have anything that fits.

Given the issues those had, that still feels overpriced. That really is a good deal for a Hayate with packs though. I want to say it's amazing that it's dropped that low, but I think this is what Bandai overestimating demand looks like. Unfortunately, it also probably means we're never going to see any of the other versions released.

Those Zeon hands are a major improvement. You could probably use some spare poly caps and some epoxy putty to hold them in

Yeah, it’s simple, but great. Plamax does some great battroid kits

https://cosmicbook.news/henry-cavill-voltron-amazon-streaming Well, I don't know how much this site is usually verified, but I think that's true. After all, if it is true, Aazon would be trying to cut taxes with this, especially after the new tax on productions in the US

To Badly Go Where No Hairstyle Has Gone Before...

When I read that, I couldn't get this clip out of my head:

That would rock!!

This is the cheapest I've seen it. https://www.amazon.com/Tamashii-Nations-SuperSiegfried-Immelmann-Chogokin/dp/B0D2K888LM?ref_=ast_sto_dp EDIT: The VF-31AX Kairos is also on sale for $175. Amazon.com: Tamashii Nations Tamashi Nations - Macross Movie: Absolute Live!!!!!! - Bandai Spirits DX CHOGOKIN - VF-31AX KAIROS-Plus (Hayate IMMELMANN USE) : Toys & Games

Well, Shoji Kawamori is listed as one of the designers of the original G1 Convoy/ Optimus Prime 1984 toy.

Yeah, @Papa Rat those look much better!

I'm always up for more space Winnebagos.

Love this rendition of the Battroid! https://x.com/feggxplus/status/1923304373481808124?s=46&t=NgApUr0JxJVmdHJ5mss_Sw

Picked up some Gunpla round option hands and it’s going to make a big difference. Now to get a ball socket in there. I also need to make some tiny verniers from some of the runners since they are absent

Currently playing Chaos Galaxy II that just came out for the Switch. It's an old school turn based 4X space conquest game with grid based fleet battles. I got the first one for like four bucks on a whim and was shocked at how good it was and how in depth the tactics were, and this one is no different. The aesthetics of the factions are pretty hilarious to me. It's like the devs threw a history book and 80s pop culture in a blender together. We got factions that look right at home in Romance of the Three Kingdoms with the ships and mecha to match, a faction that is basically skynet, a faction that is the East India Company, Fremen from Dune that control space worms, Japanese Samurai pirates seeking to rebuild after their home planet got nuked, space ancient Rome, space ancient Greece complete with mythical heroes like Heracles, and finally space America with generals based on the likes Amelia Earhart(who pilots a custom starfighter), and Teddy Roosevelt.😆 Did I mention the Space Dragons? A faction that are basically the Tyranids that pop up from outside the galaxy and consume all the biomass of a planet rendering it uninhabitable and the more planets they consume the more generals and fleets they get and the harder they become to stop? The political aspect is pretty fun as well, as this is one of the few 4X games that lets you continue to play if you become a vassal to a larger power and can even regain independence if you want.

Genesis does! Sixteen-bit tactical espionage action. Can't do this on Nintendo! "Ummm, actually, that's an 8-bit game. Like, I'm pretty sure you're running modified MSX code on the Genesis Z80. And we did do this on Nintendo literally decades ago." Genesis does! What Nintendon't.

The bottom is going to be Optimus' blocky chest with a couple intakes on the shoulders a la the Seekers. From what I can see of the fighter mode, it appears the shoulders are visible, as usual, along the sides of the jet, and I suspect the forearms will somehow, perhaps via a series of joints, fold in between the legs like most valks. The shield is attached to something, and I assume it's likely the forearms. Then again, the outer legs look squared off, so chances are far, far greater that Takara did their usual lazy approach and the forearms will simply tab into the outer legs and somewhat supply the curvy shape of the VF-19's legs/aft fuselage. They generally can't be bothered with finding better ways to engineer their jetformers, so why start now? The more they reveal of this thing, the more ass-tastic it looks to me. I much prefer my actual Macross toys to this. Too, I'm not a big fan of Basara anyway, so no real loss in passing.

I'm pretty sure everything's an Optimus Prime because they sell more that way. There's people who have Optimus-only collections, and will buy any random thing that says Optimus Prime on the box but nothing else. I still think Basara should cross up with Armada Starscream, who is already 3/4s of a Fire Valkyrie. He even has a reasonable approximation of a sound booster pack as a character-specific gimmick! Failing that, Nekkimus Prime should be Rodimus-based, not Optimus-based. Especially if he's getting a Space Winnebago trailer.

Oh, ok, I was wondering what was going on here. Thanks for the info

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Pretty sure he's the kind of Star Wars fan that actually likes anything associated with Star Wars.....

Yeah, the Delta version has a catgirl pilot.

Wow. This is a complete wtf mash up.. but why do i really want one..?!