jardann

Link to your auctions?

Glad to hear you could fix up those joints again. It looks great. You really improved that kit. Thanks for showing us your process with it.

Looking good. Great job on replacing the intake area. I would have thought that would be a lot of difficult work, but it looks like you didn't have any trouble! Can't wait to see it painted.

Looks good Kelsain! You've struck a nice balance between the straight anime look and the box artwork style. Good job outlining those squares on the sides of the "ear" parts. Were there some nice panel lines there for you to follow, or did you use some stencils? On my 1/72 after the original heavy paint job, my sanding and then the fresh coat of paint, some of those details were nearly obliterated! I ended up just shading around them when I did the oil wash and trying to very gently clean up the area to leave a little bit of the wash around the squares. I think they look better like yours with a bit more demarcation. It's really great the way you've managed to hide all of the aftermaket joints you integrated into the kit too.

Oh yeah! that little bit of streaking/dullness to the finish gives it some life! I just want to be clear that I certainly wasn't criticizing before, just making a friendly suggestion/sharing ideas. You've done a very nice job on that valk and however you like it is the way you should make it. Glad to see you're not too timid to experiment a bit though. That's how your skills will improve even more! Keep up the great work and keep having fun with it!

That turned out excellent! I really like the color scheme with the greay accented valk and the orange/yellow accented armor. They complement each other nicely You should be able to find some of the older 1/60s on sale from time to time for reasonable prices. I encourage you to do more. We deserve to see more of your great work!!!

Very nice custom. It's too clean though! A rough and ready marine 'mech should look like it's been out slogging through mud and kickin' a$$!

j/k Really is a cool scheme and I agree we need a better pic of the squadron artwork. What kind of paint did you use? Is it holding up well to transformation?

Kelsain, you make that bad boy look good! That's a really smooth build up. Your skills add quite a bit of quality to that kit. Great job!

Holy Cow!!! You get some radical poses with those improved joints! I'm glad my build up inspired you to get back to this! This baby looks fantastic. It is a huge improvement over the stock 1/100. I love that you can get it to sit in the "stowed" position! It makes me want to pick up another 1/72 and build in some of those joint pieces to really show off what a regult is supposed to be able to do. Your finish on all of the joint areas is really superb too. It's a testament to your modelling skill.

Keep up the great work!

Thanks guys! I'm glad you like it. I always enjoy seeing other people's WIPs and finished kits. It's nice to contribute some content back to the site.

Kelsain, I'd love to see some pics of your 1/100. They are nice, but yes, the detail and proportions are even better on the 1/72 regults. I highly suggest you pick up a repop! They are pretty reasonable now and the assembly is fairly simple. If I can rejuvenate this old one, it shouldn't take you too much effort to build one up straight from the sprues!

Grapetang, I first heard that motto over on the ScaleModelAddict website. A nice website for all around modeling with a lot of Sci-fi too. I think it rings true in almost all situations, but especially this hobby!

Those are some nice decals you have listed jefuemon, but I've already got two Minmei Guard valks waiting for bench time and I think I'd have to go a little different for a regult. It's a nice deal though, good luck and thanks for checking in!

So here are some pics of the final assembly!

I'll try and take some pics out in the daylight one day soon just to see if they will show the details a little better.

I'm quite pleased with the results, especially considering what the pile of parts looked like at the start! Seams really are the bane of my modelling existence, and there are still some that show in spots on this model, but they are pretty small and over all I like having this baby finished and on the shelf. Like I said, finished is better than perfect and this one is done.

Thanks for all of the comments and support guys! It really helped keep me going while I was trying to finish this thing under my percieved deadline. lol! Anyway, more comments are always welcome and hopefully everyone enjoyed watching the process of this build. Let me know what you think!

Here is a picture of the beginning of the weathering process for the legs. Mike Salzo had mentioned his process for weathering with acrylics on the acrylic base coat in his 1/48 pod thread. I tried his method, but I was either too impatient or too heavy handed and when I used the iso-alcohol it really tried to remove the base coat and I had to touch up a few spots on the head. So, I reverted back to oils and tried a ''filter" technique with various colors. You can see the dots of oil paint and the first streaking I did on the upper part of the leg. I think it worked well, but the red was too much. I ended up removing as much of the red as I could because it just overpowered the other colors and as it blended it just turned everything brown.

Unfortunately I didn't take a lot of pictures of the weathering process. Once I got started, I just went at it until i was finished.

Next up is the head. Here it is still masked up from the painting session. I had masked for the body color. Then I had to add some more to protect from overspray of the purple and gunmetal colors.

Various angles of the head with the masking removed and the weathering begun:

The green isn't a dramatic change from the anime blue color, but I think it maintains the military feel and besides, these pods are for the average Zentraedi grunt so they don't get as bright and complex paintjobs as the armored soldiers or the Meltrandi elite warriors. (that's my story and I'm sticking to it!)

I'm going to post the other pics I took now in the build order so you guys can see how the build progressed.

First are the legs after masking and painting. I have just started to remove some of the tape here:

A couple of pics of the legs with the fresh paint job:

It's pretty hard to make out with the poor lighting in these pics, but the dark areas are actually a very dark purple. I think it looks pretty good in person and I really liked the sheen that the paintjob had at this point, but I couldn't leave it like this. It was too clean for a Zentraedi mecha!

Next is a pic of the "ears" and the gun barrels. I was really pleased with the way these turned out. I used Tamiya gunmetal and then added some black and airbrushed in the shaded areas. The original two smaller guns on the chin area were broken, so I found some inexpensive paint brushes and I'm using the ferrules to replace the broken gun barrels.

I actually painted the rear hatch black and had just used a brush. I really wasn't happy with that though. So, I sanded the black down lightly, exposing some of the plastic again and then I gave it a light coat of the dark purple color. You can just make out some of the color variations that produced and I decided to go with it.

Hah! Great idea Benson, but it's definitely too late for that now. A Minmay guard theme of her red Chinese dress would be hilarious!

Thanks for the tip MechTech, but I wasn't too worried about some uneven paint as I wanted the kit to look a bit old and used/reused by the Zents. We know they arean't supposed to really repair anything or do much maintenance on these and I wanted the finish to look a little rough or uneven, just not slathered on and drippy. I haven't used pine-sol, but for removing paint I have had good luck with a product called Greased-Lightning. It is a degreaser and is biodegradeable and pretty easy on the plastic too.

Well, I actually finished this baby last week. I spent a couple of very late nights finishing up and then when I checked back on the club website I realized that the "Anything Asian" theme night isn't until September!!! My own darn fault, but at least I finished a kit!! Now that I realize I have more time, I may add a touch more weathering and a nice flat coat, but it is done for all intents and purposes. Sorry I didn't post more in-progress pics as I went, but I thought I was under a severe time crunch!

Lookin good benson! That wash makes a huge difference because of the nearly all white scheme. Breaks up the flat areas nicely and pops the details. You are really showing a good process to your builds and it looks like you are learning a lot as you go. Keep up the good work! I'll be interested to see your next project.

Sounds cool I might give it a try. Thanks for the tips!

Wow, I never really thought a technique like that would work with Tamiya or other acrylics. I'm guessing the base color coats weren't acrylics? Or did you use an enamel or laquer clearcoat before the weathering? I thought the iso would eat through the acrylic base coat. Thanks for the description!

Green is the first color that comes to mind, but that's not a big variation from the blue. Purple could be an option, just like the male power armor. Or it could be orange for a trainer like the VF-1D! Limitless possibilities!!

Last night I got the head part all taped up ready for painting so I've got to decide. I really want to get some paint on it tonight if possible.

Does anyone know how long Tamiya fine primer needs to cure before spraying a color coat over it? It sure does leave a nice durable surface.

Thanks for the interest guys! Gabe, the repops are pretty reasonably priced, and to be honest, the "bones" of this kit aren't bad. The joint system is pretty ingenious and they seemed to work pretty well although they coudl be fragile and loosen up over time. That's why I have to go with a fixed pose for this refurb. It is kind of freeing to work on these old kits because there's nothing to lose and I can experiment as much as I want.

jipe, It's funny that you mention that because I was just contemplating some changes to the scheme as I worked on the kit last night. The decals had to be sanded off and I don't have exact replacements. I do have some other Zent style decals but they are a bit different. I just might follow your suggestion and mark this pod up as if it was from a different platoon or something.

Keep watching guys.

Hopefully I can get this done by next week.

Hey yeti, can I still get in to purchase one of these?

The kit looks great. It's a great finish to all of the planning and talent you put into this project.

Very sweet work on those kits! The VF-11 is my favorite mecha from Macross Plus. Yours has the cleanest, most crystal clear canopy I've ever seen on a model! Is that just from a nice dip in future or do you have a special technique?

Bumping this thread because it is pure awesome!

Mike, that is the way a Regult should look! I love the Imai box art too. I'm currently redoing a 1/72 Imai kit and my goal is to get the finish to look like the box art (or yours). Did you use oil paints for the streaking and weathering, or pastels? I think I am going to try some "filters" with artists oil paints to get that old painted metallic look.

Has anyone else started building one of these behemoths? Show some pictures! I need more Regult!!!!!!!!!

Mike, did you get this to Wonderfest? I hope it was a successful show for you!

I was able to spend some time on the kit yesterday and so there was much sanding, and sanding, and sanding, and.....you get the idea.

After I had the seams taken care of (relatively), I decided to add some detail at the joints that were really moved out of place due to the pose. I cut some concentric ring shims to fill in the spaces at the joints. Hopefully they provide a little bit of detail in those areas.

Tonight I was able to get a layer of primer on the head and ears. The primer does reveal some flaws, but I think I'll be able to live with them. I want to dirty this Regult up a bit and make it look kind of worn and used up. Hopefully the flaws will blend in a bit as I add the weathering.

My goal is to get this finished by next Tuesday so that I can take it to the local IPMS meeting. The theme for this month is "anything Japanese" so I think the Regult will fit in nicely!

Thanks for looking in on the thread, and please feel free to share any thoughts and ideas. I'll post some more as I make progress.

OK, so I tried to sand all of the rough paint off of the parts. The head and the one ear were the worst. I hit the legs too.

At this point I wanted to get an idea of how the model would be posed. This needed to be put into a fixed pose because most of the joints were loose and wobbly, or just falling apart. This is the pose I decided to go with:

I think it has at least a little bit of life to it.

I secured the pose by cementing all of the joints into position using Tamiya Extra Thin cement. It works quickly and flows easily into the seams in those tight spots. After that, I turned my attention to the legs. I added shims to the seams with wide gaps and also wedged plastic into the spaces left at the joints in order to secure them a bit more.

Then I puttied all of the seams and left the parts to cure for a couple of days.