eugimon

ouch, sucks that it broke, those little non movable fins are pretty out of the way though, I've never even thought about being careful about it but I wouldn't worry about them if anyone is concerned about them being too fragile.

I heard that they also did the maintenance on oceanic flight 815

yup, goes right through with just fingertip resistance. The scalloping acts like a serrated edge and just goes right through the soft plastic used in that joint.

yes, please do make an FF 13 thread. just so this thread doesn't get fouled with it's stale blandness.

you would think that, but not really, the pin's knurling isn't barbed or hatched, it's just scalloped, it will go in knurled side first pretty easily. Besides, the plastic is way soft. I speak from experience when I was fiddling around with mine after it broke. I don't think there's any reliable way to tell. The length of the hinge pin is pretty spot on so I don't think you can make any sort of guesses. Honestly, if you're worried, go order the spare hinges from Graham in that other thread. But I have played with mine and despite people telling me that they'll explode and cause global warming, they have yet to do so.

I honestly have the opposite reaction. worrying about the paint, fishing around for swappable hands, having to to do things like swing the entire leg +waist assembly out of the way to get to the arms, having to pull the arms out just to get to the gun latch, that stuff all feels like "model" to me where the transformation was an afterthought or add on. I still think it's miles above the vf-25 but I still think they have a long way to go to reach parity with yamato

wait...we *are* talking about yamato here, right?

I think when you have some person making pennies an hour, making these things as fast as humanly possible in assembly lines, they don't give a flying crap what end of the tiny 1/2" pin goes in first.

right... don't forget they also cause cancerous autism and if you feed them after midnight become zombies and eat you.

I think it all depends on which direction the pin went in in the first place. If it went in knurled end first, pushing it out with stress the plastic because chances are you're not going to follow the grooves it cut going in and the burrs with stretch everything out or the burrs will just stress the other end out whilst being pushed out. If it the knurling went in last, you'll just push them out the same grooves they cut going in and then you won't stress it. my personal theory is that the workers were putting the pins in knurled end first and by the time the pin reached the other side it had so much plastic debris wrapped around it that it stresses or cracks the hinge.

The 1j with the GBP set is definitely old stock, graham confirmed this with yamato. But until Graham had the sad misfortune of his breaking, no one knew because no one else here had reported a breakage. I'm not saying it's not going to break, or that it will, I'm just saying I own a dozen of these things with more than a few on the "bad shoulders list" and the only one I have had problems with is 1 shoulder on the vf-1s strike focker. if it cracks, some people have had luck with superglue or epoxy, I didn't. I ended up making a little metal insert and attaching it to the hinge.

That's what I thought as I was putting them up.

That's very true, and if you look carefully you can make out "yamato" on the side of Oceana flight 815 as well.

or if just had a double hinge so it could fold back. Not that it really matters, the hips hit the swing bars anyways, there's not much movement there.

yes, and I've had my hikaru 1j for months now as well. I have no doubt that the 1s fokker will explode, but I will say the other arm is doing fine on mine. And pushing out the pin WILL stress it. And yes, if it's already cracked, fix it, I'm just saying if you have a later release and it hasn't exploded or tried to eat your brain you might want to consider leaving it alone.

or, if there is no crack, you can just leave it alone. I have the standalone 1j hikaru and the GBP set, neither have cracks or explosions, caused cancer or autism despite numerous transformations and frequent posing.

well, it has a thigh swivel. but yeah, less posability around the hips, the swing bars and the especially the canards get in the way. oh, and the back plate actually sits flush against the back instead of being propped up by the the canopy.

shoulders lock in place it has an actual gerwalk mode where the vf-25 had a legs dangling under the plane mode collapsible shield actual pilot figures (such as they are) versus unpainted blob in chair longer, sculpted landing gear crotch lock seems better no giant gaps around head and fuselage in fighter mode better arm posability (the shoulders actual work) better leg posability built in gun holder for fighter and gerwalk mode jewel inserts for sensors instead of being painted on.

nope, there's an actual film on the plastic. I can actually see it, it's streaky and looks like grease on plastic and if I buff it out with tissue it comes off and the plastic feels noticeably cleaner, "squeaky" instead of greasy. If it's mold release, I'm not surprised the paint comes off like it does, the thing is coated in it, nearly every surface has it.

the little hubble dongle is awesome, don't hate.

well, the other paint flubs are really small. On the other hand, there's lots of paint on paint places or where painted parts can rub together. So if the paint does flake off easily, there's plenty of opportunities for it to happen. On the other hand, stuff clicks together much nicer than on the vf-25. The wing root locks on the legs for instance, snap in and out cleanly and there's little holds on the metal shoulder assembly to help keep everything in place.

sorry, the poster tray is in the 2nd box that holds the vf-27 box. got confused there. and an example of bandai's paint quality... right out of the box.

the package was HUGE in comparison to the size of the actual vf-27 box. there's a separate tray for the poster which comes rolled up secured by uhm, plastic cling wrap. Then the vast majority of the ginormous box is filled with foam chips, roughly the size of potato chips but thicker. Then there's another brown box which holds the actual toy.

I wonder, since this thing feels like someone ate a bag of french fries and then wiped the grease off on it before packaging it... how well are they cleaning it before it get's painted/stamped? We're all agreed it's just the mold release but if they're not wiping it down well enough between mold and paint then there's the culprit.