Hi there.
Long time lurker here, but ever since seeing Macross Zero the SV-51 has become one of my favorite variable designs out there, and the prospect of a Yamato figure for it has prompted me to post. Looks awesome, but like many others I'm already bracing myself for the inevitable fragility of some of those joints.
One thing I noticed on that large scan is that if you look closely, you can see the "giraffe neck" bar behind the head, so it looks like that feature's probably going in.
And not to go off on too much of a tangent here, but one thing that's always bugged me just a bit about the Sv-51's design is the incredibly long nose. Does anyone else thing it would much nicer if it had a stubbier, VF-0 like nose? It would eliminate that extra joint in transformation, as well as take care of the great Mystery of the Missing Front Landing Gear. Using pics from this thread, I've whipped up what it might look like. Forgive the quality, but I only spent like 30 seconds on these.
Hmm, I wonder how difficult it would end up being to chop off, sand down, and glue a shorter nose on this thing...