marx

I was considering buying a 1J but I've heard unspecific negative things about the 1/48 1J line and now I have to ask before I buy. What is wrong with the 1J line versus the other 1/48 lines? I got my 1S Hikaru and to my supprise the air brake on top of the valk fell off and I never heard of anyone complain about the airbreak. Now I have concerns, even though the air break was quite a shocker. I still like the 1/48 line enough to buy another 1/48 though there is the looming possiblity of having a valk with a loose air brake. I would like to have some idea of what to expect if I buy 1J. So I don't post a thread complaining about some common issue with the 1J. Also, so I don't post another thread asking about the packs, any information I should know about fast pack kits for the 1/48 would be nice as well.

Thanks

I honestly didn't go for the 1/60 VT-1 or 1/60 VE-1 because of the design of the toy. I didn't like the way the tail fins were designed it looks cheap imo. The ostritch packs need to be larger and a little bit more bulbous imo. Those issues could be resolved on a 1/48 but yamato is moving on it seems. Terrible waste, considering they even bothered to make a 1/48 vf-1 in the first place.

I couldn't help but notice how the plastic canopy refracts the inside of the cockpit with a wavy pattern. Is it possible to make a clear plastic canopy that could eliminate this or is it better to use a glass canopy?

And finally a closer shot..

Glued it down with just tiny bit of elmers, worked good. Heres some pics even though just about everyone here knows what a vf-1s looks like. Courtesy of my crap cam... I mean quick cam...

cool. I guess I'll try elmers... a drop I guess..

I'm having some difficulty locking the arms into the legs.. any trick to this?

....Oh the pain...... I can't believe this...

It's a nice toy but the flap that is located directly behind the cockpit supposed to be loose? I turned it upside down in jet mode and it just dangled from the jet for a moment and then fell off.. My heart stopped for a moment.. Is it supposed to do that, is there something that I'm missing?

well, i'll stop ranting for now... i just wish that SOMEONE agreed with me.

I agree with you in just about all respects in your message. I think more highly of my VF-19A than I do of my 1/60 VF-1S. I have a Masterpiece Optimus (japanese) and when I took the massive toy out of the box and felt that cold hard weight in my hands, it brought a very odd warm feeling in my heart. There is something about die-cast that, I know when I'm holding these toys I don't have to worry about crushing them in my hand, the fact that I could drop it and it could put a dent in the floor and be undammaged seems very comforting. I have to agree with you that when companies put die-cast in a toy they are saying to me, we want this to last, we're serious about this product. I can take my jetfire out of the closet and see that it has turned completely yellow except for the die-cast parts. I like my bandai reissues, I like knowing that at times it could be a multipurpose object. I could be holding my chunky monkey when a burgler breaks into my house, all I have to do is throw my chunky monkey at him and I know he'll either be dead or unconcious. That aside, I can't explain why I like it, I just do. I have nothing against plastic toys, but I have a problem with things that feel extremely fragile and light.

The link seems to not work all the time. But this will give you a general idea.

Another Edit that is coming to the Star wars DVD. Friend linked me to this. It's basically the end scene from ROTJ, they replaced the older Anakin with Hayden. Supposely this is one of many edits and changes that will be made to the older trilogy.

http://owenward.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/ROTJ-...GHOSTCHANGE.mov

I can't buy toys that are going to yellow on me... Thats just gross.... Does this mean I can't buy a 1/48... Or that I shouldn't bother?!

A friend pointed this out to me. Shows that the old star wars is editted, or as they say in the clip, censored. Now some might argue that they editted this out cause you see the laser hitting him in the chest.

When I watched the clip, I couldn't help but notice how silly the so called classic edition looked. My theory is that these were editted not due to violence but due to the fact that the acting was bad. The guy gets shot in the chest and jumps to the side. Another guy gets shot in the chest and just stumbles around. I think these were editted just because those scenes were laughably bad.

http://dvdfile.com/software/cut_list/files/CensoredSW.mov

Somebody ought to start kicking Yamato for the Anti-oxidants in the plastics they use. Even el-cheapo outdoor furniture and household items maker use them. Heck at least Bandai and Hasegawa are already using them for their model kits. CHEAP MODEL KITS!!! Don't the pricy Macross toys merit a similar treatment if not better Yamato?

You mean to say that Yamato's can turn yellow? Whatabout the bandai Reissues, those turn yellow also? I looked at my 1/60 VF-1S that I've had since they were released and it has not turned yellow and it has been out of the box ever since I got it. Same thing for my VF-19A which I've had even longer, and I don't store my toys in the boxes usually.. Cept for a few..

I watched dyrl for the first time last week. I noticed that the Ostrich got a lot of onscreen time in the movie and that the main character Hikaru is out joy riding with Minmei. Yet we don't have a 1/48 version of this valk. I could understand why we wouldn't have a 1/48 if it was shown onscreen for 3 seconds and really didn't have much to do in the movie. Maybe the resaon why they don't make the Ostrich into 1/48 is because it would require them to resculpt the wings and new jet packs and redesign the way the packs hook up to the fighter, and also a new head and different color.. Whereas they could continue making valks that only require a diferent colored stripe on the chest and a different head. Does this have something to do with the popularity of a valk or a combination of the two?

Edit: I forgot they would also have to change the cockpit into a two seater.

I got my Masterpiece Prime today (japanese version). I opend the box and slid him out, I became a little impatient undoing the twisty ties he had all over. But just seeing him out of the box was enough to make think, "should I bother getting the original Prime?" Then I transformed him, and my mind was made up. I'm not getting the old prime for sure now. This is the best Prime that has been ever made. Now all it needs is a trailer. The cardboard piece of junk doesn't do it justice, it needs a real trailer for sure.

I guess part of my problem is when I think of modern warfare, I'm not sure how valks would be used. It seems a lot of war today is fought by shooting long range weapons. Sure there is a ground war but a ground war seems to be apart of political implications. In a futuristic war, we're fighting aliens, would we bother fighting a ground war when we could simply shoot large destructive weapons. I think I'm looking to far into again.

In the Macross universe, battling fleets do shoot each other at long range with large destructive weapons, but they also use mecha to attack critical points on enemy ships, such as external weaponry and command centers (in DYRL, a single powersuit almost toasts the entire SDF-1 bridge crew during the first battle) and/or infiltrate enemy ships to destroy them from the inside-out (Hikaru's flight at the end of DYRL). Mecha also provide a solid defensive shield to protect against these types of tactics.

The SDF-1 Macross relied heavily on these tactics due to their shortage of ships and heavy weaponry.

I do like the idea that the mecha could walk on the surface of the spaceships vs having a bunch of turrets on the surface, just cause the mecha would be mobile and be able to dodge incoming attacks. Whereas turrets could be targeted and destroyed a little easier, rendering a ship completely defenseles. But having defenses based on mecha, 50% of ship could be destroyed yet the ship could still be fully armed and able to continue fighting to the bitter end and possibly beyond. Another advantage would be the possibilty of mecha jumping from ship to ship, like for instance a ship could be on the verge of destruction, a friendly ship could swing by and pick up the mecha defenses, the loss of the ship in a fleet wouldn't be so catastrophic if you could still retain the same amount of firepower. Downside would probably be reloading weapons, and the possibility of just getting knocked off the surface of the ship and floating off into space.

Cdr Fokker

Guns for arms greatly reduces the versatility of the Valkyrie. With arms and hands, it may perform utility work as well as combat, and for combat, it could utilize multiple types of gunpods without physically changing any "modules" (well, if more than one type of gunpod was standard, that is)

That seems like a pretty good explanation for hands. You're in the heat of battle, your weapon gets dammaged. You just pick up your fallen buddy's weapon and continue fighting or if the enemy is also employing similar design with the use of hands, you could pick up enemy weapons. You could use various objects in your suroundings, throwing boulders and cars, etc.

Graham

One presumes that the Valk and Destroid pilots were also briefed to some extent on the possible threat they could one day have to face. In the TV series, Focker certainly seems to have been already aware about the potential alien threat.

This also seems like a logical explanation, that doesn't require a leap of faith. Surelly scientists could uncover something on who built the SDF, somone had to have built it. Preparation to fight these aliens would probably occur, cause we would fear that these aliens might be hostile. Works for me

Graham

As for the reason for having a head, it is cetainly a convienient and practical location for a sensor cluster (TV, IR, Thermal, Radar(?) Cyclops(?)) to be used in battroid mode. In a fighting machine, you usually want your sensors high up to let you peek over walls, buildings trees etc, without exposing the rest of your fighting machine. A good real world example is the mast-mounted radar on the Longbow Apache.

Given that the VF head is capable of quite a wide range of movemen (it rotates side to side and up and down), the head is a convenient location for the anti-missile lasers in battroid mode. Also, in fighter mode the heads are mostly recessed into the plane (much more than on the toys), so wont create much drag.

Having sensors up as high as possible definatelly works, I've heard of radar towers, and being able to overlook the battlefield has been common since at least the 1800's when hot air balloons were used for reconnaissance in war and now we have the more modern spy satellite.

I guess part of my problem is when I think of modern warfare, I'm not sure how valks would be used. It seems a lot of war today is fought by shooting long range weapons. Sure there is a ground war but a ground war seems to be apart of political implications. In a futuristic war, we're fighting aliens, would we bother fighting a ground war when we could simply shoot large destructive weapons. I think I'm looking to far into again.

Anyways, I still like the mecha designs and I would still like the designs even if I had gotten bad answers to my questions. But the answers were good and I like the fact that the design makes sense.

Okay, I saw dyrl. I've also seen 1,2 and 4 (woops skipped 3) episodes of Macross zero. Now I got more questions. My questions really pertain to the Mecha designs in Macross.

From a technical standpoint when in war, I think people would generally agree that it would be better to have guns for arms instead of hands. But I was told that the reason why the Valks have hands is so they can take on the giant Zentradi in hand to hand combat. (that sounded reasonable) Yet in the movie they don't seem to know anything about Zentradi, and they still have valks with hands. In Macross Zero I haven't seen any zentradi yet but valks with arms and fingers are still there. I was told the purpose of a valks head was so that the Zentradi would aim for the head instead of the chest. But from a technical standpoint I think it would cause problems with wind resistance in fighter mode.

So my question Boils down to what is the purpose of having a robot with a head and hands?

Maybe I'm looking to far into it.

I've spent a few hours now looking and found at the low price of... $95... I'm gonna give up on this search and go for a Max Q-rau instead. Thanks anyways.

When they say it is going to be live action, to me that says Humans are going to take a front seat in the story and all the robots are going to be side characters. Honestly a Live action transformers movie sounds fine to me just as long as humans don't have a huge role in the movie, or if possible, no part at all. They could do something like they did with Disney's Dinosaur and just drop Robots into the scene. But in the end, I think human interaction is pretty much set in stone, how else do they become robots that transform into jets and cars..

Well it sounds like I want the Takara reissue #0. I see it in a bunch of different places on the net for $75 to $80 and they all say sold out.

I was looking at a bunch of G1 Optimus Prime japanese (actually convoy) reissues and was wondering how many versions of the G1 Optimus Prime have been released? What are the differences between the various versions, any QC issues?I've seen like 3 now I believe. I'm not interested in the US versions since they've destroyed the smoke stacks, would anyone know where I can get a good deal on one? Cheapest I've seen is $130 US and for that much I might as well buy a 1/48 VF-1.

Okay, then that brings up another newb question. See, I don't understand the relationship between the dyrl and the tv series. Are they both a retelling of the same story? Or is there progression made from one to the other. Dyrl came after the TV series right? Cause Dyrl came in 1984 and TV series 1982 if I'm not mistaken.

Along time ago I think I watched two episodes of macross expecting transforming robots, but those two episodes I watched didn't have hardly any action at all. Is the tv series slow, getting to the cream filling? (robot battles) I bought the dyrl dvd from a friend I should get it in a few days. Maybe that'll fill in most of my other newbish questions.

I got a newb questions. (slightly toy related but I still figured it belonged here, my apologies mods if I made you angry)

I noticed the 1/60 scale of the yamato q-rau and the 1/60 scale of the vf-1... The pilots are much bigger in the Q-rau than the vf-1. Are the pilots in the Q-rau giants? I've read the pilots for the Q-rau are ladies, then is there a male variant of the Q-Rau, (if you could link me to a pic of the male variant I would like to see that robot)

What is the difference between Miria Millia and Minimay?

Is Max a guy? If so why is he piloting a Q-rau (yamato blue Q-rau), I thought Q-Rau's were only for the ladies.

Last question, (sorry mods but I thought it'd be rude to start another thread in toys section just for this question) When is the Yamato Blue Q-Rau coming out? I read in July but if I'm not mistaken, it is July and no Q-Rau.

Sorry for my horrible newb questions but I don't get macross or robotech where I am. I've only been able to get toys. (I love robots, especially when they transform, and unique designs like Q-Rau with the curves and no hard edges)

My appologies again if my questions were too newbish