HardlyNever

I've been eye-balling an HMR monster for a while, but in my experience with yahoo auctions (or any online auctions) is that price is going to shoot up a good 30-40% in the last few hours.

I agree this is good news for consumers, but we might be getting ahead of ourselves here. Like others, I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with Arcadia, in that I'm glad someone is still making 1/60 vf toys (that I didn't have the time/money to collect when yamato was around), but I'm a bit disappointed in the steep cost versus quality. For what I've paid (at or below MSRP) for my 3 Arcadia's, I think the quality of construction should be a bit higher and definitely more consistent. If a KO company can make a similar quality product for 1/3rd the cost, I think we definitely have grounds to be pissed at Arcadia (I understand they have a lot of other costs involved, and KOs will always be cheaper, but should it be 3x more expensive?). But I'm also skeptical of how good these KOs are really going to be. This is a design that has known durability issues, even when made by the official license holder, so there is definitely room for something to go wrong here, especially at almost 1/4th the cost. Looking at the advertisement again, the focker release seems to be missing a pilot and option parts (a minor oversight, but it makes me wonder what other parts of the mold they might be missing). Coupled with the limited run these guys seem to be doing, there isn't a whole lot of incentive for them to make a great product for repeat business. I'm really withholding judgement until some gets their hands on one and we get an idea of the quality. I don't think this spells the end for Arcadia if these things are going to break a month after getting them. But they could be great, we'll just have to see.

Are you saying Arcadia might be getting out of the sdf macross/dyrl? line? But don't they have the Yamato sdf-1 mold? Arcadia please...

At those prices, I don't see how the quality could match Arcadia, but I'd love to be wrong. I'd jump at an M&M pair for under $200. Hopefully someone will get the first releases and give us an idea of the quality.

It took me about 5 minutes on the Chinese Taobao to find products using the exact pictures that the Arcadia warning uses. I'm not going to link them here, as I don't know how that kind of thing is looked upon here. The prices are ridiculously low (Like sub $10 USD), so there is no way I'd ever buy them (as it seems WAY to good to be true), but they are out there. Maybe a braver soul would try it, just to see what they actually get. I'd be nervous about even giving out payment info/address, but that is me. Most are marked as KO's, so they aren't even pretending to be the real deal. Edit: Those prices might just be for pre-orders, I'm not sure. I don't read chinese, so I'm going off of a bad google translation, which is a mess.

Since the thread has taken a bit of a shelf detour, I've been wondering what people's experiences have been with weight issues. Ikea lists the Detolf shelf max load at about 8 pounds. Has anyone ever gone much beyond that, especially long term? I don't think I have 8 pounds on any of my shelves yet, but with display stands etc. and trying to push maximum shelf space, I could see how running up to that 8 pound limit could be an issue.

Anyone know what the deal with those figures is? I have no interest in the cockpit, but I'd be interested in those figures if you could get them separately for a non-insane price. Are they exclusive to the cockpit?

They also released these: http://arcadia.ac/products/detail.php?product_id=173 http://arcadia.ac/products/detail.php?product_id=229 http://arcadia.ac/products/detail.php?product_id=175 I don't know what you want to consider those. But I think they are also reissues.

About a year late on this one, still excited nonetheless. My first (and probably last) non-SDF Macross purchase (it kinda counts as sdf right ): Got the display stand as part of the purchase. It's a lot sturdier than I expected.

Really like this one. The monster is so huge! Tempted to get one...

My attempt at a "removable" gunpod strap for the 1/60:

Hey Noel. Yeah I looked for the noob/FAQ thread, but it seems to have disappeared. I fiddled with the gunpod in fighter mode some more and it is 95% straight now. I'm not sure how much the handle is really warped, might have just been lighting/frustration when I was trying to get it straight. I probably won't bother transforming it again until this weekend, so I won't have a pic until then. Even then, it would be really hard to see what I was talking about in a pic, as the bend seems very minor. I couldn't say with 100% certainty it wasn't like that when I got it, as I really haven't had it in fighter mode much. Either way thanks for the reply. I might update with a pic this weekend.

Not sure where else to post this question. Has anyone else had some weird warping of the gun pod grip when left in the gun-grip hand for extended periods of time? I've had the gun held in-hand in battroid and gerwalk for several weeks. When I went to put it in fighter mode, I keep having a crooked gunpod mounted below the arms. At first I thought it was the arms not lining up, but after several attempts, I realized it was the handle causing it to be crooked. I'm at work so I don't have a picture (could post one later, if necessary), but I don't know how much that would help (it is very hard to see). The grip is just slightly warped/crooked; it still fits in the arms in fighter mode and in the hands, but it just has a slight bend towards the middle of the grip. Is this a common thing? Is there any real way to prevent this when leaving the gunpod in hand for extended periods of time?

I actually disagree on this one, and that is part of the problem I have with the "premium" version in general. I actually prefer the UN Spacy kite on most of my FAST packs. Is it 100% anime accurate? No, but I prefer the way it looks like that, and I'm glad I have the option. I actually like some of the customization options I have with stickers, even if it isn't always 100% canon accurate. I guess I'm just saying I hope they don't remove the sticker option for future releases, as I actually prefer that to having everything tampoe'd, regardless of price increase (I don't like that part either, ofc ).

Yeah, I'm of similar thinking. Far be from me to tell people what they should buy, but as someone still interested in collecting some 1/60 valks, this might set an expensive precedent that I'd prefer is not repeated (or at least I hope we'll always get the option to get "non-premium" versions).

A little HMR action scene:

I'm still interested in arcadia valks (just got their GBP release yesterday, and love it), but I'm not going to get this one. My collecting space and interest is too limited to buy what is essentially a repaint of the Focker release. But if they made/rereleased either the VE-1 or VT-1, or even a VF-1D, I'd be interested. I might even jump on a VF-1A (especially if it was in Kakizaki colors). Outside of that, I'm not really interested in paying $200+ for a bunch of VF-1S or VF-1J repaints, though. I'm fine with just getting HMRs of those.

Went home for the holidays and dug this "classic" out of my parents' attic:

Does anyone know what this is? http://arcadia.ac/products/detail.php?product_id=173 I mean, it's obviously a DYRL sdf-1. It looks really small (105mm?). I didn't see any announcement about it, though. It says limited release, so I doubt you can get one easily, but I don't think this was posted on the arcadia website after the release date? I haven't seen it on any of the major import websites, either. This flew under the radar, at least for me. Maybe I missed the announcement somewhere else on here.

My first Macross Xmas since in almost 30 years:

Yup, I had the exact same break on the first day of getting it. After many super glue attempts (and re-breaks), I ended up sanding it down a little bit and using Loctite Gel Control super glue. It has been fine ever since. I'm not saying this is definitely the best approach, just what worked for me. It also seems like the peg on the flap that goes into the "hinge cap" was a tad too big, so sanding that down a little bit helped a lot (I think that is what caused the break in the first place). Your situation might be different, of course.

1/60 Virgin Road on auction, price is just a tad insane: http://page3.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/c556351342

Yeah, I've got one of those, but they are quite a bit more expensive... Can't have it all, I guess.

I've been impressed with the Glaug and the Hikaru VF-1J, so I decided to get max and the triple display stand. The quality on these is really high, I just wish they were a little bit bigger. Now if we could only get a Queadluun-Rau...

Bleh, I hesitated on the NY sale and it jumped up about 10k yen now. Any know the likelihood of it going back on sale anytime soon? It seems odd that they are basically doing a reverse black friday sale.