Anasazi37

That's a nice addition. I'll try printing the new version today. The original one printed fine, but I think using the finer 0.2 nozzle reduced the amount of available friction when the adapter is attached to the valk, so it's not as secure as I'd like. I'm going to switch back to the 0.4 nozzle and see how that turns out.

I thought about it a bit more on my drive home from work and will try two arrangements. The one I mentioned this morning as well as another one where the adapter is basically upside down. You won't ever see the supported surfaces and it might look nicer in the end. Should be a fun test.

Nice! I'm definitely going to try this out. I have a P1S and plenty of clear PLA and PETG filament. I might play around with the orientation and slicer settings. Right now I have a 0.2 nozzle installed and generally print small adapters like this at 0.05mm layer height. Definitely takes a bit longer, but the results are good. Here's my first cut at how I might set it up: 180 degree rotation of the design around the Y axis with Normal Snug support surfaces that are manually defined. You can get away with Normal Snug in that orientation because all of the contact surfaces, except for the round peg, are horizontal. That is going to be challenging for any support structure. It also means the visible "front" of the adapter, once installed, has a clean finish. I'll let you know how it turns out.

For folks adventurous enough to try resin 3D printing (or willing to pay someone with a printer to do a run for them), there's a really good replica of the 1/55 gunpod available on CG Trader: https://www.cgtrader.com/free-3d-print-models/games-toys/toys/reproduction-gu-11 Created by a MW member many years ago. I heavily modified the design to make it easier to print and a bit more screen accurate:

Thank you! I hope the adapters are a helpful addition to your lineup. It was a fun side project to work on.

You and I had the same thought. I believe the reason the US shops distribute WWM items 2-3 months later is because those items come via a very inexpensive shipping method (boat). Assuming those items start at Japan MSRP, that maybe adds a few dollars if you distribute the cost of the shipping container space across all shipped items. So then what explains the significant difference in price between Japan MSRP and US shops? That's why I asked about Gundam items as a sanity check. Do we see the same pattern or are Macross items more costly to buy from US shops? Right now I think many of us have a gut feeling that the Macross prices are much higher than they should be, and it's a hard feeling to shake. For example, I just scrolled through the shops for Goodsmile in Japan and in the US, picked some items at random that show up in both locations, and the PO prices are almost identical (factoring in the fluctuating exchange rate), but the release dates are about 2-3 months apart. So, they are shipping to the US via boat like Bandai and somehow not marking up their items by 57%. And Goodsmile is significantly smaller than Bandai. The situation makes my head hurt. I almost missed out on the 0A because of business travel and was content knowing that, worst case, I could hand over more money to a US shop and get it 2-3 months later than the release date in Japan. It would be...fine, and we didn't use to have this option, so I'm glad that we do. Doesn't help for SDFM and DYRL POs, but no situation is perfect. There are several reasonably priced shipping options from Japan that can take anywhere from two weeks to two months, and as you say, shops like HLJ and AE have private warehouses where you can keep items for a bit and then consolidate shipping to save money.

This is why I haven't been able to bring myself to order WWM items from US shops. Retail price for the 0A in Japan is ¥16000 ($108 at current exchange rate). $170 is a 57% markup. Even Luna Park isn't that bad. I think we've established that a lot of the markup is Bandai's fault, or their US distributor's fault, since every US shop charges about the same price for WWM items and the shops are likely just passing the cost along to customers. Maybe it's how Bandai thinks they can justify the cost/risk of selling more "niche" Macross items overseas? Do Gundam items get the same treatment? I'm doubtful.

The Yamato 1/48 VF-1 adapters for Archi Stands are now on Cults3D. I'm selling them for $5 as a set of four (Fighter, Armored Fighter, Gerwalk, Battroid): https://cults3d.com/en/3d-model/art/yamato-1-48-vf-1-valkyrie-adapters-for-archi-display-stands Given the complexity of the designs, they may not be easy for beginners to print. You have to use supports in many places and there will be some post-print cleanup needed as a result. I pre-oriented the parts for printing to make them as strong as possible and to both limit the amount of cleanup needed and limit how visible the supported sections are.

Yeah, for WWM items, it's now largely by choice that I put myself through this. Purchasing from a US seller means a significant markup (courtesy of our friends at Bandai) and waiting at least two more months for delivery, but at some point I'm going to tell myself that I'm getting too old for PO Madness. There is a bit of a triumph/disappointment nostalgia feeling, plus it keeps my skills sharp for purchasing non-WWM items!

I got back super-late from a business trip last night and managed to snag one from HLJ, which I didn't think would happen. Landed at the airport, dashed through the terminal, took the shuttle to where my car was parked, and got to it a few minutes before PO Madness started. Refreshed the HLJ site a few times on my phone, the 0A showed up, got cart jacked three times (HLJ tradition), but still somehow managed to get a PO. Thank goodness for 5G service. Would have stayed in the terminal to do it, but the cell and wifi reception there is terrible. This was too important to leave to chance.

Wish I could say that I did something special to keep him that white. I've had him sitting on an open shelf for years, but I live in a really dry place at high elevation and keep the display room fairly dark. Some or all of that environmental stuff probably helped. I did have a wing on another 1/48 start to go yellow on me, but I think that happened a long time ago when I was living somewhere far more humid.

I'm calling my Yamato 1/48 VF-1 adapters for Archi Stands complete. Tinkered with them a bunch over the long weekend, after not working on them for a few months. They can be printed in something more durable like PETG, but PLA does just fine with the way that I designed the structural reinforcements. There are four available: Battroid, Gerwalk, Fighter, and Armored Fighter. There are two Fighter versions because of how low the legs, arms, and gunpod sit with the armor attached. Plus the Armored Fighter is a lot heavier. They attach to the Archi Arcadia-A adapter. There's a tab that sits inside the Arcadia-A and a sleeve that goes around the outside for added stability. Even under extreme banking scenario tests they've held up just fine. They are cradles, in other words they do not clip onto the valk. They leverage gravity and valk weight distribution in each mode, which eliminates worries about paint scraping (helpful for customs). I would not recommend tilting the valk 90 degrees or holding it upside down with the adapter attached. Not sure why you'd want to do that, but I'm putting the disclaimer out there anyway. I'll be putting them up on Cults3D or another site soon. Will likely sell them as a set for a small amount, mainly to recover the cost of all the material I went through while designing them.

I think there might be an "intentional scarcity" aspect to this as well, where limited releases are exactly the point: they're here for a moment, then they're gone. I've seen a few articles on the topic over the past few years, which seem to focus on the idea of valuable things being ephemeral and hard to obtain on purpose, so they will be cherished over time. It's an interesting idea, that scarcity is accepted and perhaps expected in this context. There's also the cold, hard financial side of it, where limited supply boosts overall demand and profits while minimizing risk, which you highlighted so nicely. A quick search turned up this article: https://www.statista.com/topics/8446/toy-market-in-japan/#topicOverview

Both options definitely get the point across.

I'm starting to refer to this version as the "Null Set" instead of the "Full Set" since it comes with no accessories except for those egg-beater pinpoint barrier punch attachments.

Same with me: that (so far) was the only time I've had an issue with DHL. Sounds like our DHL customer service experiences were almost identical (they don't want to work with the recipient, just the shipper), but your experience with AE seems better. I will say that they were consistently polite and apologetic, but they kept pushing me to file a claim with DHL. Maybe they've learned that it doesn't work so they just file the claim themselves. I'm betting that they'll at least refund the shipping cost.

That's horrible! If you got them from AE, you should at least be able to get your shipping cost refunded. My VF-25F Alto Super came like that. AE said talk to DHL since they damaged the package, DHL said talk to AE since they owned the shipment and get them to sign a waiver so DHL could work directly with me. I sent the waiver form to AE but they apparently didn't want to reveal any information about themselves or sign a document, so they finally just offered to refund my shipping cost after they spoke with DHL on their end (not sure if that actually happened). Took about two months of hounding them for the refund, but it finally showed up. FedEx and UPS seem happy to work directly with the person receiving a damaged package. DHL, apparently not so much.

We might have to do some coordination within this community. For folks that have the YF-19 Full Set, all we'd need is the fold attachment for the YF-21. I'd be open to selling the rest of the add-on to someone who has the "null set" YF-19 reissue but doesn't want the YF-21. Maybe that's a small group of people. If Bandai really wants to stick it to us, the YF-21 fold attachment will be sold on its own...and for the same price as the add-on set for the YF-19 that has a lot more pieces (including the same fold attachment).

Usually between four and six months

Nice! I have a large backlog of 1/55 customs that I need to work on and designing/printing some of these parts was on my to-do list. Especially the part that slides inside the forearm and has the fist attached.

My proxy just received the Max and now both are ready to ship. Looking forward to having the whole squadron!

After the really big showing at last year's event because of 40th anniversary of Macross, where more than 30 new items were previewed, this year was disappointing. Just a small handful of items, some of which were already previewed last year or have been teased for several years. Apart from the Super Ostrich prototype, which was a genuine surprise, it seems like they phoned it in this time. I'd like to think that Bandai's designers and engineers are hard at work on toys like the 1/2000 SDF-1 and the remaining HM-R Destroids, so they couldn't put much time or energy into the event, but we're talking about Bandai. They're focused on other, more lucrative properties. At this point I'm just hoping that most of what they showed last year gets released...eventually.

Saving my money for the DX Super Ostrich...and I had to prepay for my PO of the RIOBOT Voltron Legendary Defender. It set me back ¥92120. That hurt. A lot. But it's the first decent version anyone's made. The Playmates version sucked.

If you are willing to send me files to work with (STL is fine), I'll see what I can do. Not difficult to convert the can mesh back to a set of parametric objects so I can do more with them.

I might be able to help with decals for it, too, if you weren't already thinking about making them yourself. The yellow and white banner wouldn't take too long to design, and based on how you made the top piece, all you really need is the white text since the rest can be painted yellow. The red and blue artwork with the black lines on it, that spans the six cans, would be a little more challenging due to the curved surfaces and how everything has to line up, but is feasible. I'd need the print files for the machine to do everything correctly. You could include the decal artwork file with your print files. I wouldn't want any compensation, just offering to help another fan. I could probably print a few decal sets for folks who are interested.