Chronocidal

As much as I want Bandai to actually release something I want to buy, my wallet is appreciating the long breather. I wouldn't be surprised to see another new VF-1 release announced around Christmas though, or at least some new DX of some kind.

The head really doesn't bug me. What I find funny is that it actually does a better job of streamlining fighter mode than either Yamato or Banadai, since it's big enough to pretty much cover the shoulders from the front. Just funny to me, since fighter is probably this one's "worst" mode. Not that it's even particularly bad, it's just that the innovations ThreeZero made all benefit the other modes more, and the arms are just too big for a streamlined fighter. It's definitely in its own category compared with the other options, and feels much less like a toy, and more like a display piece, mostly due to the overall paint, rather than the bare plastic both Bandai and Yamato/Arcadia use. It's interesting to transform and pose, but all of that paint is definitely telling me to pose it, and leave it alone.

I'm kind of getting the impression that whoever posed the toy for the promos didn't actually know how to transform it properly? The legs look.. I mean, frankly, they look like they're kitbashed from another toy entirely, and it just doesn't look like they're collapsed properly? The thighs look like they're made from panels that can shift and move independently of each other.. or maybe that's just sloppy assembly? My brain is frying itself trying to understand the legs, because it looks like they tried to give the thing quadruple-jointed knees. It looks like each one has at least two ratchets, a twist, and slide, plus whatever that weird pinned joint on the back of the knee does... but in all of that mechanical shenanigans, it looks like they don't actually slide to collapse the knee at all? It looks like the knee is entirely exposed when "collapsed," and then pulls out even further from that point. And I still have no idea what that funky mid-intake joint is supposed to do. On the plus side, it does look like they actually painted the landing gear white.

Definitely needs a reissue, but I don't think the Kairos' canopy was ever frosted in the first place. It's the only VF-31 I have where I can actually see into the cockpit.

I'm happy for the folks who want this kind of thing, but I'm satisfied to sit back and watch... whatever this is. Like.. what the actual flying mc-frak is happening with the legs? Edit: Side note because I just noticed, but I wonder how far off those pics are from the "final" version, since I'm curious what they expect you to do with all those missiles if there aren't any hardpoints for them... and really just weird that they just decided to provide a full set of TV missiles.. then mismatched pairs of the DYRL boxes and reaction missiles.

Yeah, all quibbles about the actual media presentation aside, I'm loving the book itself. I'll definitely put the discs in my older Japanese release box, but the book is probably going to occupy my coffee table for years to come. I admit, I didn't read the description in detail, and wasn't actually prepared for how big the book is, since I was expecting something like an awkwardly sized squared-off standard disc case. I'd never bought any of the previous books of this sort, so I'm happy to have a nice big archive of the art. I will say I was slightly disappointed by the artwork choices for the prints though. As long as they were including the Hasegawa YF-19 box art, I would have preferred a matching copy of the YF-21's box, rather than a reprint of the prior release's box. But eh, it probably wouldn't be that hard to get a frameable copy of that art as well. Otherwise, the selection there has a couple of my favorite production images, so I'm going to be happy to get frames to hang them up.

I love how clean those displays look, will be amazing seeing your layout once it's all done. Hopefully still room for Kairos in there somewhere as well.. though I feel like that one doesn't deserve the bottom shelf treatment. Quick question about the stands though, is it a trick of the light, or are the feet turning bright yellow?

Interesting.. it does look funny without any of the red striping or other markings worn away, but judging by how mine arrived, it might not be hard to damage them yourself if you really want. On that note though, ThreeZero came through on my scratched up wing. Replacement came in a bubble-wrapped ziplock baggie in a cardboard envelope, and in perfect shape. Might be a while before I install it though, I've got the figure in a nice pose, and don't feel like taking it apart to swap it out at the moment.

Just noticed the payment went through yesterday from my bank, so I'm just waiting for them to ship at this point.

It needs some work to not be ugly depending on the angle, probably with some tweaks to the shapes, but I think it has potential, especially if the upper half could be a sleeve that covers the lower when collapsed. But yeah, the thing that gave me the idea was just the original art. Look at the angle of the tip of the tail compared with the root. The tails just look like they're swept back. Folding in the tails the way I showed would actually be more accurate to the art, since it would be angling the tips the same way. The shapes of the tails just wouldn't be the same, and the panel lines wouldn't line up properly, since it's clear that the art just has them morphing like the YF-21's wings.

So I had a thought the other night, and decided to try a quick and dirty concept model. It would take some very high-precision molding or printing to make the proper parts.. but maybe with the right tail design, we can have our cake and eat it too. The folded tail is not going to look very nice.. but when you fold it up, it's covered by the booster. Keep the overlap on the inner side of the tail and it might not look bad. If you had the molding capability, you might be able to get really fancy, and have the lower half slide inside the upper, but that would be much harder to pull off, while keeping the tail looking good when extended.

Will look forward to seeing your review/comparison when you get to it! It's an interesting mix of features to process.

Not going to lie, the E-Wing would be pretty tempting, if it were anything approaching a reasonable price. Even if they did shamelessly gank it from the EU, and smash it face-first into a bunker until the nose collapsed. Seriously, why do they keep doing that with ships? Stop ramming them into solid objects! Though.. it actually might not be hard to get a printed nosecone to slap over the the stub. I had no idea Dora the Explorer got isekai'd into Star Wars though.

That was my thought as well. It's not going to be a small amount of masking, but it's definitely doable, if you only want to reduce the shine on certain parts.

Same thought I had. Store the better content in the superior package. Same thing I did with my de-specialized Star Wars DVDs when I got the bluray box.

Updating this with a few more detailed options, specifically for the SendCutSend site. I didn't really break down the options for what materials are available, or what settings are needed, so here are the options I think would give the best results. First off, the parts should always be measured in millimeters, and loading the drawings should give you the following overall dimensions: The thickness of the parts should be as close to 2 mm as possible, without going any thicker. The original parts from Sculpteo were cut from 2 mm stock, but depending on the material options from SendCutSend, you might not get that exact number. After looking through the options, there are really only three with thicknesses close enough that I'm going to call them viable: 1. Stainless Steel (304 Series) This one is probably the first to try. A little less thickness might not hurt, and the material will be the most sturdy. 2. Aluminum (5052 H32) 3. Aluminum (6061 T6) I do not have the material knowledge to really know what the differences between these two aluminum options are, or whether either would be different enough from the stainless steel to make them more or less suitable. The prices are all close enough to really be negligible in the long run. In fact, the most effective option? Since the site has a minimum order of about $40 USD, you may as well just order as many variants as you might want to try. I was able to order over 30 individual parts before I went above the minimum price. I would expect all parts to need some application of a metal file to smooth out rough edges. In that sense, aluminum might be easier to work with. You will also want to clean out the insides of the loops to make sure they do not rough-up the plastic parts when inserted, especially the pivot point for the wing. You want it to rotate smoothly so it doesn't grind up the plastic shaft. Once I actually place an order, I'll probably do another replacement from scratch on one of my stock YF-19s, and document the process carefully. If anyone does order these, please post your experience here for reference, since I might not have time to actually get a test set ordered for a while.

Honestly, the solution to the tails for me is just to only display it with the boosters, or in gerwalk. I still am interested in kitbashing a different backpack together for one though, just to see how it would change.

I wasn't planning on repainting anything if I can avoid it, just taking some of what Bandai put there off of the spine, since it's such a huge patch. The wings would definitely need repainting though, and I've just never gotten around to it.

Huh.. not something I'd probably pick up, but I will absolutely give them credit for probably the most creative use of effect parts I've seen so far for a transformer.. or really, any figure. Snapping them all together to make a display stand is a great way to keep track of them.

I'm actually kind of hoping KC will keep up with their figure-capable releases, and maybe give us an actual Gnerl for the first time in.. ever. It wouldn't be complex or particularly feature-rich, but if they give it articulated fins and nozzles, some retracting landing skids, and a cockpit on par with the Battlepod, I would actually pony up and preorder a couple.

Interesting idea, but including random pictures of sprues from unrelated kits is.. confusing? None of those are even parts from the completed kit they show.

I've been tempted to do the same thing at times, but mine don't tend to fall off quite that easily, and I have a hard time justifying another one. I still might if I see a good discount on Amazon. I think if I could just swap the feet from the Advance, I'd be happy. One thing I've been contemplating since release is actually stripping away a chunk of the black patch behind the cockpit on each side, raising the lower border until it's level with the canards all the way back. Unfortunately that also leaves the black hinges on the canards, because of course they drop below that line, and it's probably why the line is so low in the first place.

Yeah, I'm being at least partly sarcastic about it, but in my personal experience with every request I made for a replacement of anything broken or missing from any of the DX releases I've ordered going back to the VF-25, every single request was either outright denied, or I was told to send the entire item back at my own expense. My VF-25G Michael came missing his crotch plate, and I was basically turned down flat for any help. Bandai was just completely unwilling (or unable) to send me that missing part, and the best I've ever gotten until now was the vendor telling me to send them back the whole item for a replacement. Given how insane the demand has been for pretty much every DX release, I never saw that as a viable option, because I was not going to bet on there ever being any stock available to even exchange it for. That VF-25 purchase was the point where I started ordering two of everything, just to ensure better odds of getting at least one whole item. Even in the case of something like the VF-171s, that gave me pretty good odds of at least being able to combine two broken ones into one whole one.

Resurrecting this thread for the purposes of updating the status of those replacement wing brackets, and their availability from different laser cutting services. The original vendor I used for my metal brackets was Sculpteo.com. As I'm finding out apparently they've shut down their marketplace service as well? So I'm not sure you can even get the POM brackets I made there anymore. They had discontinued their metal cutting service long ago, and you can apparently still order the POM version, but now the shop is showing me a minimum order price of $50, at which point those just are not worth it. So, I'm not sure what the best option is. I've seen a few places recommending two sites for ordering custom laser-cut orders: SendCutSend (https://app.sendcutsend.com/) OshCut (https://app.oshcut.com/) These two seem to have slightly different approaches, but both seem to have solid reviews on quality. SendCutSend seems to be the preferred choice for very small one-off orders of unique parts, and while they have a minimum order price, it's not terrible (or no worse than Sculpteo was, anyhow). For a quick rundown, I uploaded the drawings and setup orders for a set of two brackets from both sites. SendCutSend has a very low per-part price ($2.13 for a single copy, and it decreases from there the more you order), but they bump up the order to an oddly specific minimum of $37.21. They do offer free standard shipping, and add normal sales tax, so for California, this came out to a total of $40.65, for up to 34 individual parts. That's how many I was able to add to the order before the minimum price was overcome. If you have a bunch of YF-19s to fix, this is absolutely the best way to go, provided the quality is good. OshCut's process is fairly similar, with a higher base part price ($6.20 for one, $4.41 for a pair, and decreasing from that point), a flat $15 setup fee, no minimum order, but also no free shipping. You would think that would give you a better price overall, but the cheapest shipping they offer is USPS Priority for $15.71, which feels completely ridiculous for literally a few of ounces of metal you could mail in an envelope with stamps. After tax, this one actually comes out about a dollar more, at $41.61. In the end, it's kind of a wash between the two. You may get better prices from shipping or tax options in other areas, but at the end of the day, a single pair is going to cost about $20 per piece. Considering how many I can get from SendCutSend for $40, it might make sense to just place a bulk order there to test the quality, and then offer to send them to anyone who wants some at the cost to ship, which should be pretty miniscule. I'm going to be paying the $40 to get a sample either way, so might as well get my money's worth out of the first order, and pass that on to anyone else who wants these. The other thing I will do is link the design files for the two sizes of brackets I made. That'll provide the maximum flexibility for anyone who might have another favorite service closer to them, or if you happen to have access to the machinery to cut these yourself. Hopefully the links will work correctly, and not trigger any weird filename warnings. The format is a very ancient standard of AutoCad file for vector drawings, and has been accepted by all of the assorted cutting service sites I tried. ============================================================================================================== Here is the file for the version that leaves wiggle room for the wing to better align the pylons directly forward: YF-19 Bracket Loose.dxf Note, the wiggle room shouldn't be sloppy, it just depends on the wing hinge being tightened, and the part tolerances fitting the pivot shaft in the wing. Here is the version that was shifted slightly to snug the wings up against the legs, giving the weapons a permanent very slight outward angle. YF-19 Bracket Tight.dxf I tested this copy again today, and could barely see any angle, but I'd rather keep both options available. ============================================================================================================== Please note, both of these files are designed to exact size, with no margin for material loss during cutting, so they're intended to use with metal. They may not work with other materials. When I had my POM copies cut, I had to add a margin for how much plastic would be burned away. Also, because I forgot to mention it earlier: these need to be cut from material 2 mm thick, or as close as possible. If anyone has any other recommendations for services, I'm happy to hear more suggestions. The two I listed here were just the main pair I saw called out in hobbyist forums over the course of searching this evening. Edit: As an addendum... I re-mounted a pair of the "Tight" brackets to test.. and I seriously can't see any outward angle anymore. Maybe my original impression was an optical illusion? The legs being angled towards the back does make them seem angled outward to the front in comparison. I'm thinking maybe the reason I kept the looser ones mounted was that having the wings held so tightly in place tended to pop open the leading edge of the wing gloves. Doing this mod requires popping any glue there (it wasn't very much), so while they stay together well enough without, pressure from the wing being pushed into them can cause them to leave a gap. Obviously you can re-glue them if you like, but I've left mine open and haven't replaced the screw covers so I have a copy to experiment on. It's starting to show too, because there are a couple places on the wing gloves and legs where the black striping is fading from how much I've handled the parts. There's a reason I call this one my "beater copy."

I've looked through the site, and they just completely stopped offering metals with their laser cutting/engraving service. I didn't notice specifically when it happened, so I may have missed the explanation, but now the only materials offered are MDF, plywood, acrylic sheet, and POM. I would think laser cutting services are much more common than 3D printing ones though, since cutting and engraving metal have a lot more everyday applications. I just haven't done a lot of research to find another service that would make the parts in metal, and not require bulk orders to make the production costs make sense. I did find one with a quick search that will cut them out of stainless steel (xometry.com), but to bring the price down to what I think feels reasonable (my prototype order from years back was about $10 per part), I'd have to order upwards of ten at a time. The unit cost for each part starts at $110 if you only order a single one, and doesn't drop below $10 until you order fifteen or more. I can't say the single unit cost is unreasonable considering the effort, but it's just not practical for anyone to order a set or two for their own use. It would have to go the way of a bulk order that I mailed out to anyone interested. I'm not really opposed to going that route if enough people need them, but I haven't seen that many people wanting to do the replacement. Edit: Browsed a little more, and it looks like OSH Cut (https://app.oshcut.com/) can fill smaller orders for a more reasonable price, about $24 for a pair in stainless steel, but you still run into the problem that these places are geared towards rapid bulk orders, which means the cheapest shipping option for something you could slip in an envelope with a stamp is over $15, meaning you're paying over $40 for one pair. I'll keep looking at options, but maybe the easiest thing to do is just to paste the cutting pattern, and let everyone browse for the best option they can find. I'll do that in the main YF-19 thread though, we've probably derailed this one enough.