sqidd

Very cool!!!! I've been in the "hot rod" world (cars, motorcycles, etc) my entire life. What you're doing is classic hot rodding. I LOVE IT! There aren't enough "hot rodders" left in the world.

I want one of those helmets!

Awwww man, I want a Buck Rogers Starship!!!

Gonna have to up my steady hand game. Reminds me of this.

Are you laying that tape down and then trimming the edges with a exacto knife? Thanks!

Thanks!!! I'm a designer/development engineer focused mostly on motorsports so this is really far outside my wheelhouse. Not much I do has color. And if it does, it's anodizing. It's a challenge I like. I'm hoping to keep improving my skills. That was my first thought too. Previously I had done two sets of packs in different colors and didn't have any issues so I wasn't really convinced it was the process. The only difference with this set of packs was the color. Same brand paint, same prep process, etc. I rolled the dice and grabbed another set of arm armors and repeated the same process. No tab breakage. I think the set of SSP's I had were stored somewhere with a weird environment or something. Overall they were not as pliable as the other sets I had messed with. And someone at Bandai got real happy with the glue on this set too. They were much harder to dissemble. The set is pretty much junk at this point. I'm going to use them to practice panel lining and weathering. Once I have that dialed I'll paint another set with my hopefully newly developed skills. I've got some Tamayia masking tape in a few flavors. I was thinking that was going to be my best move. The trick is hitting the radius's correctly without cutting into the plastic. I'm going to have to get a good knife, maybe a magnifying glass arm mounted thing and hope my hands are steady enough. Since the set that is on the Fighter is pretty junky and has been promoted to test fodder I'll practice on those. Now to get some custom water slides. I messaged @Anasazi37 to see if he could hook me up with what I need. Fingers crossed. I don't know of any other sources. Thanks for the tips!

Now to get some water slides and practice weathering. The SSP's on the Fighter are all screwed up. They were really brittle and didn't work out so great. All of the arm armor tabs popped off and one of the boosters has a crack. I guess I'll practice weathering on this set and when I get it down paint an undamaged set. I need to figure out how to paint the four missile doors in the front of the FP black and make it look nice. That's a tricky one. Can't wait for the Camo Low Vis to show up!

I like it!

Yeah, those white gunpods are cool! I really like the Low Vis. It has some pretty "special" things about it. Soon we get to see how well I can match the weathering........

How many do you have now? That's a fun collection.

Enjoy what? I don't see pics.

I'm not a fan of the chicken hands. I haven't been able to find re-pop cartoon hands though.

Well, this one has been very frustrating. Bandai glued the strike cannon hinge together differently than the last two sets I modded. I ended up breaking the Strike cannon pulling it apart. I ended up being able to fix it but it's a couple steps behind the rest of the parts at this point. But worse of all, when I went to pop the arm armors on three of the four tabs (2 arms) broke right off. I hope that it's because they're old and were stored wrong and not that the paint process did something to the plastic. I just started to paint another set. If they pop on without breaking the tabs off I'm going with the original set was brittle. The grey I used with some flat clear coat hit really close to the Low Vis color. I don't think I'm getting closer than that. The difference looks way more dramatic in the pic. And I'm OK with them being a smidge darker. It's a military "aircraft" loaded up with mission specific parts that could have come out of inventory at a random point and been used a number of undetermined times. They probably wouldn't match perfectly in real life. I do need to do some of the sparse weathering that is on the Valk at some point. I have supplies inbound. I'm going to practice on my broken arm armors. I need to paint the small missile doors at the angry end of the boosters black. I'm not sure the best way to attack that. Tape them off? How would I get the radius's at the corners in there with tape? Cut very carefully with a utility knife as to get just the tape and not mat the finish??? I don't think I have a steady enough brush hand to go free hand. I'm going to need water slides. I'm thinking white skulls for the boosters with either a clear background or no background would be easiest. Matching the "blue/gray" from the Valks kite on the wing and tips of the tails would be cool and using that as a background for white skulls. I don't know where I would get those or match the blue/grey though. Any ideas? I need white UN Spacey water slides for the leg armors (like what I painted over). I can't imagine those are hard to get a hold of. If you guys have somewhere you could point me I really appreciate it. I'm learning things the hard way a bit over here. I think it looks pretty cool though!!

The wife is.............................................serviced correctly.

I'll certainly see pics if they're posted in here. I'm looking forward to it! I may pull the trigger on three.

Me, chill? Unfortunately and fortunately not in my programming. It makes it hard for me to be.......content may be the word. But, the glass half full of being like that is I get a lot of stuff done. It has to be managed though. I only sleep about 4hrs a night now. I need to get that back up to 5-6. I really don't know how I survive. I'm either working, in the gym crushing it or on the mountain bike trail.....you guessed it, crushing it. I'm always a bit tired, sore, beat up and I almost never fully recover. It's a blessing and a curse.

Those would be the three. I would like to have a TV VF-1S "Skull Leader" with Supers for my Hikaru shelf. I've got the DX-J, GBP and three DX-S's. I think I want to change that shelf up to be: -DX VF-1J in Fighter -DX VF-1J in Gerwalk -DX VF-1J in Battroid -DX DYRL VF-1S in either in Fighter or Battroid. Whatever works best for the shelf. -Yammie 1/48 TV VF-1S "Skull Leader" with Supers either in Fighter or Battroid. Whatever works best for the shelf. -GBP Getting two DX J's at current pricing isn't going to happen though. It's not THAT important to me. Maybe they will re-issue (unlikely I think). Or maybe in the future I can trade some of my DX S's for J's. I'm getting pretty bored of no DX Roy release. I may customize the three DX S's I have in boxes to be Roy's and not have to wait. I got those extra three just in case there was never a Roy release.........

TY That explains why I hadn't see sets....there aren't any. So it came with a VF-1J TV. If I remember correctly Hikaru never had Supers on the J did he? He only got them when he was in the S/Skull One? If that's the case it sure is hard to do a TV VF-1S with Supers.

Did Yamato ever do 1/48 TV armor?

Slacker!

VF-1S Focker Strike x 3 VF-1S Hikaru Strike x 1 VF-1A Hikaru Strike x 1 VF-1J Max Strike x 1 VF-1J Millia Strike x 1 VF-1J GBP x 1 VF-1J Hikaru x 1 VF-1A CF x 3 VT-1 x 1 VE-1 x 1 VF-1D x 1 VF-2SS SAP Gena x 1 VF-4 Lightning III x 1 Defender x 2 Spartan x 1 Monster x 1 Glaug x 1 Regult x 4 ------------------------------------------------------------------- I don't have the new VF-4 "Focker". It's not different from the original enough for me to care. Same for the second flavor VF-2SS I'm not getting more Destroids or enemy mecha because of room. I will make an exception for a Tomahawk or four though. I'd pick up a few more CF's at the right price.

Is this the new release?

I have this parked just to the left of my desk. Every time I turn that direction I think "Man, that is just a great design!" and "Why didn't I replace that sooner (I had one 10ish yrs ago)?" and "I think I may watch Aliens tonight!". What a great piece. If you don't have one, get one. If yours is in a box, get it out!

I wish I hadn't missed this. I would have bought 4-5 sets at that price.