Chronocidal

Check back in my older thread, there are more details about what I did there, though it was simpler to do than I expected.. I was really planning on adding more tabs to hold the leg to the body, but just that one did the trick. Once the leg is held up to the wing section, the rest of the plane sticks together beautifully.

actually, I'm pretty sure that pink color is accurate to the anime. The VF-22 was always a much lighter shade than her VF-1J. There were a few screenshots from M7 a few pages back, and it looks close to me. Darn. There's another $400 yamato's gonna get from me. And the sale's over now? Double darn. I wanted to get a VT-1 in January.

Don't forget the nail clippers, I tend to use those just as often as sprue cutters for trimming things. Even better if the clippers have an attached file, so you can get rid of sprue bumps with a single tool. I keep finding new uses for nail clippers all the time. I remember finding a set in my backpack during a circuits lab, and finding out they're a great makeshift tool for stripping wire insulation.

There was another topic a while ago about the tabs I added to my VF-25G, they were a pain to make by hand (sanding tiny pieces to shape), but they've been very effective holding the legs up, and the wings down. Here's a picture showing the tab and slot, with the exact shape of the slot outlined since it's a bit hard to see (the rough cut I made needs some smoothing out).

Bumping because I just had a similar problem to the one above. I got a supposedly brand new YF-19 on Ebay (previous owner said he had only displayed in fighter and never transformed it), and the shoulders were a mess out of the box. I'm inclined to believe the seller about it never being played with, since he was more than willing to refund me, but he gave me a great deal, so I'd much rather fix it myself than look for a similar deal. My problem wasn't quite as external as the above pictures. I noticed that the shoulders would not lift at all, and noticed that the upper arm was very loosely held around the shoulder joint. On pulling up the shoulder covers and unscrewing the top joint, I realized that the shafts that the screws go into were both sheared off at the base. Once the screw was out, the arms just fell off, leaving the shaft still inside the hole in the shoulder. For now, I just superglued the screw shafts back where they belong, and reassembled the arms. I REALLY wish I could get the shoulder covers off, because they made this a pain. Btw, I did discover one thing.. the arms are MUCH easier to put together if you remove the lower arm. I just popped out the rotation pin for the sideways bicep joint, and everything went smoothly. The shoulder lifting motion is nice and tight on both arms now (the glue tightened the joints a little, on top of the screw being tight). Unfortunately, this thing has a host of other minor problems that I'm working on slowly (landing gear already fixed, working on the crooked gunpod). Two things I'm not quite sure about fixing.. well, three actually. First, the left upper thigh pivot (the "bendy" joint used in gerwalk) is extremely loose... It seems the ratchet tooth was molded too small, and it won't grip the joint. I've tried getting the area around the joint apart, but the area is really glued well. I might just add a thin layer of glue to the surface the tooth grabs onto, and see if it helps it grab better. Second, I can't for the life of me get the intake covers to stay in. It's like the pegs were molded too small, or the intakes are too big. I might need to beef up the pegs to get them to attach. Last, the upper shoulder rotation joint is just floppy. The arms will barely hold up their own weight, let alone the gunpod. I've been trying to get at the that joint to see if I can tighten it, but the amount of glue used on this thing is beyond frustrating. I might just see if Overdrive can ship me some spare parts at some point, and try replacing the arms and left leg, but that's a good chunk of the plane to replace.

It is looking darn good, and sooooo much better than the -25. One thing to be aware of with gerwalk mode though.. this one still doesn't appear to have any type of thigh swivel. So to get the pose shown, you have to drop the legs a bit, and swivel them out at the hips, same as the VF-25. You don't notice it as much, since the VF-27's intakes don't detach at the very front, but I don't think the leg posability has changed much, if at all. I'd love them to prove me wrong, and give this a thigh swivel, but something I realized a while back.. I don't think Bandai has ever made mecha with that type of joint. Gundams figures I've built have never had the sort of legs that would allow for that rotation, so the concept behind it just might not exist in Bandai's mind. On the other hand.. I'm not even entirely convinced that the VF-25 CAN swivel it's thighs. Sure, you see poses where it looks like it can, but I'm still not sure that the VF-25 has a spot on the leg where such a joint could even exist. I might need to just look harder. Based on the 1/72 kit, and the way the leg is assembled, the thigh pivot would probably have to be buried in the thigh extension hinge piece that you only see in gerwalk.

Ok, so I finally got a 1/60 YF-19 after convincing myself the gullet wasn't so bad.. then realizing, yeah, it still kinda is. Note, this is my own personal nit-picky thing, I know a lot of you have accepted the gullet over time. I might too eventually, but I still like playing with what-ifs. So I started thinking what I could do to fix it, and how much work it might possibly be. Somewhere along the way, I realized.. even though the gullet might look oversized, that's not the main problem. Comparing line art, and the overall lines of the fighter... the nose is just sticking way up in the air. Just fyi, I'm not going to bring up the Hasegawa kit at all, since it really is far too thin to use as a reference. But the overall shape of the plane should have the tip of the nose roughly on the centerline of the design, which continues through the engine exhausts. The thicker legs on the 1/60 makes that difficult, but Yamato exaggerated the problem by nearly eliminating the fuselage curvature, and the nose centerline pops out way above the center of the feet. Now, the nose angle isn't nearly the only problem.. the 1/60 nose is just thick. The canopy is really high, and the whole nose is just too tall on the whole, but it needs that space for the mechanism inside, so there's not much you can do about that. It's just missing most of the curvature of the forward fuselage, which should be much more arched than it is. So, I started thinking of how you could change the level of the nose, while keeping as much of the original structure and mechanism intact as possible. Essentially, it boils down to modifying one piece (maybe two): the back half of the fuselage Z-fold area, which shortens to go into battroid. Now, there are a couple ways to go about this. The simplest way I could think of is shown above. Everything that needs to change is outlined in red. The top of the rear fuselage portion would need to angle down till it was nearly level, and the entire z-fold area would essentially rotate so that the forward nose section would drop. The good part is that the leg joints, main body joint, and nose underside flap joint can all remain essentially the same. You don't even need to modify the landing gear area at all. The underside nose flap would need to be slimmed down a bit to match the new shape, but that's one of the few places where there's room to spare. Now, the big question is how this would alter the transformation. I don't think the effects would be terrible. So many of the joints in the nose are double jointed, there's a lot of flexibility in the positioning of the parts in battroid. On the somewhat unfortunate side, this essentially means rebuilding the mechanism of the Z-fold. This could be good in the sense that it can be strengthened, but it might be complicated to make the new joint strong. Best case? this would just require remodeling the front edge, and a bit of the sides of the rear fuselage area to match the new nose angle. Worst case, you'd need to make a brand new part for that secion of the fuselage (which would be no small task, since this is also the hip-joint). The end result would put the nose tip much lower than before, and bring back a bit of the arched shape the lineart has for the forward fuselage. Now, I've never done anything like this, and I probably wouldn't do it unless I had a spare YF-19 to do it on. What I'd like to come up with is an add-on part that could replace just the front upper half of the Z-fold area. Ideally, it'd be some sort of kit where you just swap a couple pieces, and the nose sits lower. I'm going to attempt duplicating the YF-19 CAD model at some point in the future, and use that as a test bed for the idea, checking to see if it changes the transformation any. It might even be possible to use 3D printer of some sort to make a new fuselage section with these changes incorporated, but I don't know what type of materials would be needed for that. Anyone have any thoughts on this? Would it even be worth attempting, or is it more likely to completely screw up the plane? Edit: It may not look like much of a difference, but here's what the end result would be, without all the extra colors and lines.

Darn, you beat me to it. Although, I'm sure there are plenty of boobs on HLJ too, depending where you look. They're all fake, and likely plastic, but sometimes you take what you can get. On the other hand, he should add a link to that pic in his sig. They most definitely fall under the category of fun things to look at when you're bored. Back to the VF-22 though, that looks awesome. It's a much brighter shade of red than the VF-1J (which really looks way too dark to me), and should look great next to Max's. I just need to hold off a few months for these, since I just got the YF-21 on sale instead. You know, I think I actually like the Yammie YF-21/VF-22 BETTER than the Hasegawa version... they're both sleek, but I like the Yamato style nose better (the Hase has a kind of lip on the nose edge, while the yamato nose is blended more smoothly).

I just remembered where those Sara and Mao pics came from... topic from way back in 2003, and it did have one big Nora pic to boot. I believe all those pics were drawn by Joseph, though he hasn't posted since April. Here's the original topic, as well as a couple of the pics from there. Macross Zero Fan Works I seriously thought some of those pics were official images at the time, but then he put up the in-progress shots of some things.

I just finished watching the THORA rip set on my 47" tv (HDMI out from a laptop) and I have to agree, the quality of the video was rather astounding. In fact, the CGI was actually a bit unsettling at times, it just looked too real. I watched the whole thing on media player classic, and had no trouble with it. My one gripe is that while the subs are fine, the karaoke subs seemed horribly mangled to me. Granted, I don't speak Japanese, but what I saw looked like a nasty case of reverse engrish. I've read the romanized lyrics for many of the songs in Frontier, and the lyric subs on the THORA set don't match up. It's like they shifted word breaks and syllables around, resulting in something like... well, imagine taking the lyrics for "Jingle Bells," and coming up with, "Jin gulbels, jin gulbels, jin gulal the way." It's definitely what the song sounds like, but they aren't real words. Again, I don't know Japanese.. but their lyrics don't match the lyrics I've read anywhere else.

My HLJ sale items just shipped in the past hour or so.. but I'm leaving for Christmas saturday. Unless they use some kind of portal system, I won't get to open my VF-1D, VF-11, or YF-21 till after new years. Oh well, something to look forward to in the new year.

Lots of fun ideas here, even if some are impractical. Things I'd be seriously interested in buying: 1. Part upgrade kits (new shoulders, updated style nose hatch.. this might get tricky since the replacement parts wouldn't be universal, and would need to be color coded for specific planes) 2. Spare heads of all types (unpainted, maybe unassembled) 3. Spare pilots or other figures (please make a female mold ) 4. Extra weapons packs (doesn't necessarily have to be present day weapons, but maybe modifications of existing ones). Note, these would probably be universal, since as far as I can tell all weapon mounts since the 1/48 are compatible (dunno about the VF-0, but I'd assume they would be similar). Things that would be fun/amusing, and I might pick up for the right price: 1. Side covers (I know this is a main want for many, but I can live without them) 2. Popped out seats for battroid mode 3. Lots of ground crew/equipment, especially boarding ladders, maybe some weapons carts Things that would be awesome for the new VF-1 kit version 1. Photoetched detail set for the cockpit (instrument panel, controls, seat, etc) 2. Scaled up versions of the decal sheets from some of the Hasegawa custom variants (VERY preferably water slide, but I'd take stickers over nothing at all) 3. Spare heads (needs to be mentioned here too, releasing the kit with just one head type is lame)

Oy.. well my VF-11, YF-21, and VF-1D are on the way, but I won't get them till january (need to have the post office hold my mail for the next couple weeks). Gotta say it's a bit satisfying to finish my Mac+ trio and get all my major VF-1 wants out of the way so quickly... but 11 valks in 3 months?... oy. Oh well, I guess it averages to one per month for the year, which was what I've been aiming for. I just need to space them out better in 2010, instead of ordering them in groups of 3. I do hope the sale extends till after Christmas though.. I might get a VT-1 for January. Time to wait a while before anything big and/or new though... I've got my YF-21 on the way, so I don't feel so bad waiting for the M&M VF-22s. I don't mind paying full price for a few valks if it means I get them before they go out of production, but I love getting stuff marked down if I can.

I wouldn't say the SV-51 grew on me so much as I saw it and went, "holy crap... WANT!" It's just so unique as a valk design.. maybe it's just too unique? The thing just pulls elements from so many badass real life aircraft, I can't help but love the design.

Sheesh, good thing I already got one, or I'd be adding another valk to my order But still.. is the SV-51 THAT unpopular?? I can't believe they keep dropping the price on that one, and don't even touch the VF-0.

What the... lol.. well, so much for that idea. I was counting on the restock to happen later, so I'd get charged for my YF-21, VF-11B, and VF-1D in January... but you just HAD to get your restock today, and charge my paypal account this morning, didn't you?? Curse you again HLJ! This makes December my personal highest number of valks ordered in one month, and one heck of an expensive Macross month... and it means I really shouldn't order any more for a long while. Another bad part about that is that I won't be around when it gets delivered (unless it arrives by friday, which isn't likely) since I'll be leaving to visit my family this weekend. So, unless HLJ pulls a warp speed shipping job on this, I won't get it till next year anyway.

I could be obnoxious, and say that if you have to look for a good deal, you're not a true Macross collector... but I love discounts. Considering before this september the only valk I had was a 1/48 Hikaru 1J from ebay, I didn't really have a collection until recently. In the past months though, I've mainly stuck with HLJ and Overdrive, picking up on sales when I could. I think the only valks I paid full price for were my 1/60 v.2 M&Ms. The rest have been free shipping deals or discounts. You just have to keep an eye out, and hope you catch deals on things you want. Best deal by far is the YF-19 I am getting though (supposedly later today), and that came from Ebay. While it is possible to get burned if you aren't careful, it can be a good idea to keep an eye out there for good bargains. My 1/48 came from there too, and even if I may have overpaid a little at the time, I don't regret having a set of 1/48 TV fast packs.

As of tonight? In the past year... Macross 11 assorted Valks 1 model ~$1600 (oh boy do I wish I hadn't bothered to add that up ) and that's in the past 4 months alone.... That's leaving out about $600 worth of Legos (yay for the giant Millenium Falcon), $150 worth of model kits... And considering how I use my laptop, yeah, that qualifies as a toy I think... And the 47" tv... and the 360... Yes, this has been an expensive year. Screw the economy, I'm having fun dang it!

I think combining items helps cut down on shipping a little, though I have no idea how much exactly... and I can't speak for SAL, since I don't trust shipping with no tracking number... plus, it gives me an excuse to check my email for shipping updates constantly. On the downside, I ruin more F5 keys that way. GAH.. aaannnnd.... I added another valk to the order. Funny, this all started when I wanted to buy JUST an orange VF-1D this month, everyone was out of stock, and I found that YF-19 on ebay... it was a chain reaction. This is the perfect time to get one though.. so my order just hit over $400 with shipping. Oy. At least now, I think I can call my little VF-1 collection relatively finished. Not nearly what many would call complete, but I've got the main characters, and major iconic VF-1 variants all covered within 6 valks (orange -1D, red white and blue -1J trio, and DYRL Focker and Hikaru -1A). If I get anymore VF-1s, they'll probably be the kit versions, since I love tinkering (that, and I want some VF-1s in F-14 markings). ...And maybe a VT-1 eventually, because it's so unique. Maybe. Next year. So I basically completed my SDFM and Mac+ collections in one fell swoop. Bring on the M7 stuff! (just not too fast, my wallet needs time to recover )

Curse you HLJ, I'm almost considering giving up on the M&M VF-22s and VF-11C for now, and getting the YF-21 and VF-11B. I wish I could count on sales like this later... I already spent this month's toy allowance on a cheap YF-19 on ebay, and 2 Fine Molds 1/48 X-Wings, all of which I should be getting in the next few days. I blame the YF-19... as much as I want to hold out for the 22s... Ahhh, screw it. I just got paid, and these might not ship till after Christmas anyway due to the restock.. I'll just call this my monthly valk purchase for January. I waited 3 years to get a YF-19, I can wait a while to get the 22s too. Maybe by then, they'll get this kind of sale too. What I want to know is why the frack they aren't discounting their VF-0s yet?? The SV-51s were frankly superior in every way to the VF-0 releases, and those things are going for almost half off. If they would mark those down, I might actually consider buying one, problem shoulders and all.

Sheesh.. here I am trying to convince myself to sit down and watch MF again on bluray, and you have me wanting to watch 7 again I might have to catch up and join in at some point.. been a while since I've seen M7, and forgotten most of it by now.

Actually, with what I know now, I'd like to redo that tab system better. It's a good secure attachment point, but I did a half-assed job of cutting the holes, and should have measured to make the tabs/slots more precise. And I'm sure with enough tweaking, there'd be a way to push those legs higher... or maybe the solution would be to just extend the backplate a bit so it matches up with the legs. If I could find a good sale, I'd probably buy at least 3 more of these, probably 2 alto and 1 ozma (RVF never did it for me really). I would buy them now, but I've bought 8 Yammies in the past 3 months (), and I need to stop for a while to recover (and build up anticipation for the M&M VF-22s ) The shipping from HLJ just kills me.. I wish I'd gotten more than one kit in that HLJ VF-25G sale, because when everything got screwed up from stock problems, they shipped the dumb thing alone, and I wound up paying more for shipping than the kit cost me. I do plan on painting mine eventually (possibly by hand, I've done it before) though I probably won't do a canon Michael scheme.. I might tweak it a little into a 2059 Max version. Shoot, if Chuck Yeager can keep flying 50 years after he started, I'm sure Max can. A VF-1J variation scheme would be a lot easier to mask and spray too, so I could do all the main markings with paint, and use spare Hasegawa decals for the kite logos (screw continuity ). I don't mind leaving one version half-assed as long as I have a spare or two to really finish nicely. My first one was kind of an experiment that I wasn't worried about screwing up.. now that I know what I'm doing, I'd love to do more.

So I was browsing my old posts a while back looking for something, and came across this picture from 2004 (forget what I posted it in originally, but the topic is long gone). Anyway, I'd love to get a closeup of the buno on that plane, and see if it's meant to be the same one... This one looks very close to the JSI. I'd need to find my original Flying Fighter poster to check, but the only differences I see off hand are the gun vents... doesn't mean there aren't other differences. I imagine the front gear doors are still wrong, unless that sensor bump on the door came along with the others under the wing glove. There's also no way to tell which chin sensor is on this plane either, but I think the single TCS chin pod was in use by this time.

I kinda wondered if you might've glued it. Looks really good that way. I think the shading hides the gap ahead of the legs, I can't get rid of that on mine either. It's much better than default with the new tabs, but I'd like to make another someday, and see how far I can really get the legs to mesh with the backplate. For now, mine's just in "just out of the box" mode, no painting or gluing anything. In the end, I might skip the decals altogether (except for logos and such) and try to handpaint the stripes and such. I'm worried what effect the overall paint will have on the fit though.. right now, the fit of everything is nearly perfect, it just takes a good squeeze around the hip gun area, and everything fits beautifully. I just wish Bandai had put a bit of thought into the colors of some pieces.. the big blue hinges in the white underside look stupid.

Looks really good to me. What'd you do to get the legs to stay up that high? The legs on my VF-25G stay up solidly thanks to the tabs I added (funnily enough in roughly the same place Bandai added tabs to the VF-27 ), but the little vents on the back of the thighs don't pop up quite that high, and there's a noticeable gap ahead of them. Did you file down the pieces to allow the legs to move higher?