MacrossJunkie

The seller directed me to the Bandai returns and replacements web form. https://www.bandai.com/returns-replacements Since the box has the Bandai Namco sticker, I'm hoping they can help.

Argh... this thing is a total QC piece of crap. I went to put in Guld and found that the part of the canopy that attaches to the hinge is half disintegrated. There wasn't even enough plastic inside the cockpit or anywhere else in the box to make up what should have been there so this too must have happened at the factory. FML, I got a real winner here. Contacted the seller to see if replacement parts can be obtained from Bandai. Or if not, then if a return and exchange would be possible.

I found my heat gun and straightened it out. Just toasted it for around 15-20 seconds on both sides over the heat gun and it got really soft. Straightened it out and there's no stress mark at all any more. The top did curve bit. I'll see if I want to bother fixing that later or not. Just out of curiosity, I tried which paints I had matched the color of the head laser the best. It looks like the "Flash Gitz Yellow" Citadel paint was the closest. I used the paint straight out of the pot and painted the whole ring in the pic above. It's close, but just a tad brighter. It only needs a very slight tinge of gray to match if anyone without a heatgun wants to touch up the stress mark with paint. .

I got mine and it's just as bad. After examining the packaging for myself. I have to conclude that the untrained bonobos they used to package these in the factory damaged the head laser at some point before even putting the plastic cover over the tray. There are no signs of denting, stress, or abrasions to the tray covver, aside from some rubbing on the outside of the tray with the box. You can't get this degree of bend without any stress marks to the tray cover from putting the cover on or any jostling or crushing during shipping. It's simply impossible. Frustratingly, I can't find my heat gun anywhere and my hairdryer doesn't get it hot enough to get the plastic soft. I won't be able to fix this unless I can find my heat gun.

That's what it's looking like to me. I was unable to imagine how a bend that severe could possibly occur in shipping unless the box itself sustained nothing less than puncture damage right above where the head laser is.

Man, yours is almost identically bent like kajnrig's. A slight bend - I can understand how that happens, but I can't imagine how they're getting bent to this degree though. Is there any sign of indentation on the middle of the box?

Yikes, that is one of the more extreme ones I've seen. It looks half broken off...

I haven't gotten mine yet. Tracking says ETA Aug 4th. I'm hoping for the best, but preparing for the worst. If mine does arrive bent, I have a heat gun I can use which should work better than a hair dryer. I've used it to bend acrylic and fix weirdly bent pvc parts before. The key is to dunk it in cold water afterwards while it's still being held in the right position. Worst case scenario where there's a visible stress mark, I may try matching the color and painting the piece.

I wonder if painting the piece to hide the stress mark would be an option, either just on the stress mark or the whole thing (and just paint around the red label as close as possible). Just based on the photo and not having it in hand yet, the color looks close in color to either "Tau light ochre" or "Averland Sunset" Citadel paints.

Got notice of shipping from Kappa Hobby. This is going to be a stressful wait to see what I'll get with Schrödinger's head leaser.

Alternatively, I would have used the heat gun (or a hair dryer if no heat gun is available) first on the bent part of the plastic to soften it up some, then applied the clamp to keep it straight and submerged in icy cold water for like a minute. From past experience, I find that is usually enough to straighten out plastic. Less items needed and a much shorter time. I'll probably be doing that if mine comes with a bent laser.

Sounds plausible to me. In reality, it could be that and other reasons, none of which are exclusive. Whether it's getting bumped around, shipped upside down, box getting squished, etc, it still comes down to the poor packaging design that leaves the head laser susceptible to damage. and compounded by Bandai not owning up to their screw up and calling it a "quality variance".

They can't be serious! This isn't just some quality variation where tampo is misprinted or joints are loose. This is damage due to poor packaging design on a $300+ product. So basically Bandai is saying "Meh, it's fine. Deal with it" So HLJ can't/won't help? I'm seriously considering cancelling my order now since if I get one with a damaged head laser, it sounds like I might not have any recourse for a fix from the manufacturer.

Painted up the nids I got recently to be more like Leviathan colors. Also took some inspiration from the SM2 teaser.

Some weathering, inking and highlights added to Abaddon and a couple Justaerin terminators

I have mine through Kappa Hobby so I won't be getting mine until August either, but I doubt we'd see any fixes if they were even inclined to make any. I believe that time gap is mostly shipping by cargo ships across the ocean as it's far cheaper than by air. So unfortunately, what we'll be getting will likely be the batches already made and to be distributed throughout NA.

At the very least, the way they connected wouldn't have been so janky.

Battroid mode definitely needs the FP attached to the belly plates to make them look right. They're so short that even the gunpods are sticking out past them when attached... That said, I have to wait until August to get mine. I couldn't get any from overseas vendors. Dreading whether I'll find a broken head laser or not. I really hope Mr. K's desire to have another go at the YF-21 at Arcadia actually comes to fruition. It feels like Bandai didn't even put in half the effort they expended on the YF-19. They even went so far as to integrate the neck cover for fighter mode right into the shield so you wouldn't have extra parts laying around and making it actual perfect transformation and not having large divots in the back of the thighs that require extra parts to cover up. Then here with the 21, we have "auxiliary parts" unnecessarily and a number of questionable design and packaging choices.

By itself, the DX doesn't look too bad, but when placed next to the old Yamato, the Yamato's proportions in fighter mode still blows the DX away.

Wow, that's crazy they packaged it like that. A thin rigid plastic piece at the highest point in the package, protected by a flexible plastic bubble. Gee, who could have predicted that this could happen if anything should get placed on top of the box? Should have just kept the head laser detachable and separate in the package. Also, I still think those arms are too small and scrawny. While the Yamato version needed Omega Pants, Bandai's needs Omega... sleeves?

Got the last of my 10th Edition terminators today, the chaplain. They all look really good, especially with a bit of extra work done to them. Now I just need the apothecary and a bunch of 'nids.

Yeah, seriously. I hope they can rotate outwards.

Wait... so that clip is not something that is flip out and is actually a separate piece? wtf... I hope it's not actually necessary. As far as the YF-30 goes, that brace at least seemed to be optional. I never needed it for my YF-30.

Joytoy TMNT figures are up for pre-orders now on the JoyToy site but apparently they're only available exclusively for mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau. So I guess if you want one, you'll need to get them off of 3rd party sellers.

I really wish they would fix the custodes figures. Both the regular ones and the allarus terminators. The regular ones look more like they are squats in proportions and the allarus also have legs that are far too short compared to the upper body. Until then, I'm not getting any more custodes. Also, it's annoying how they designed the apothecary. The canister is permanently attached to the figure via the cable, unless you cut it off or manage to break the glue. Glad that it seems to be as big as the primaris captain in gravis armor though. Not Voltian, but the newer one. Seems to me to be about the right height of what a primaris should be. The 3.0 primaris marines like the sternguard and recent rereleases like Lt Agaranthe, Castor, and Wolf pack are still barely over 7 feet tall if you multiply the height of the figures by 18. That's like the low end of firstborns and not what you'd expect of primaris.