MY PG Strike! ^_^

[Hikuro]

Yep, Finally after several months I was able to get the balls and got one at a lower price then that of some model stores. One booth at Sakuracon asked for 230 dollars, online shops asked for 160+, I paid at atleast 150.

The model honestly I thought was way out of my leaguge. It's a pretty difficult looking kit at first glance. But after cleaning, painting and solid detail working, I manage to complete a leg and a half.

I would honestly have had both legs done by tonight but for some stupid reason the lower half on the second leg isn't piecing together nicely...so I think something isn't fighting evenly into place and I can't understand what that may be...its sorta odd and I don't have enough light anymore to really figure this out...but I'm hoping I will at work or afterwards.

But here's what I finished tonight! Please honestly give me your opinions, its my first ever Perfect Grade and I'm really nervous since I did spend alot of money on this.

The Colors I'm using:

Brilliant Blue

Bright Red

Gray Violet

Silver

Aluminum

[Hikuro]

Bendage

[Guppy]

I'm finding the kit pretty easy to work on. Especially with the manual being easy to use. I think it is a great idea to have pics of which sprues you need so you don't have to look through them all to find the right part. I've done the whole skeleton and sprayed it with gunmetal gray, looks great!

Edited April 13, 2005 by Guppy

[Toonz]

nice!

and for all those whose PG Strike are completed, please post some pics

[zeo-mare]

i can get pics of mine but i do not want to derail this thread. by the way Hikuro it looks great so far, are you useing a airbrush? or straight out of the spraycan?

chris

Edited April 13, 2005 by zeo-mare

[peter]

I almost bought one of these last week when I was in Japan. This place called Plant 5 (just a giant box store like Costco or Walmart) selling them for 10,900 yen....maybe next time though.

[Black Valkyrie]

Nice, so this is how the inner-frame looks.

[Hikuro]

Going right off a can. I'm still stumped on what the problem is with that lower half of the other leg. If I can nail the problem why the two pieces to connect it as one are not going in properly then I can maybe fix it cause I hate it when there's a big section with a large gap...some pieces then wont fit into place too well or at all.

What I really like so far is the amount of time and detail I spent into the mechanical parts. Though some pieces are being layered over others, I still find it nice that I took the time to detail what I could. Though I did find some places where I went "Uh oh....I forgot this piece" but you wont notice it at all when the armor is placed over the frame.

Today at work I plan on atleast finishing the torso, starting out somewhere else. But I wanna spend just maybe 5-10 minutes figuring out that lower portion of the leg to see where I went wrong. Probably need to stick something in there, there might have been some water in one of the slots and I'll just have to dig it out with a pick since its more then likely hardened because of the paint.

If that doesn't work...then I'll just have to figure something out.

[F360°]

if you can take some pics of it perhaps we can help..

[Hikuro]

Sure, I don't have my camera with me here at work, but if things don't work out when I'm going to assemble it in the next hour or so, then when I get home I'll make sure to take some pictures and leave it alone till I get some opinions and just work on the other sections.

I also wanna say how I like in the instructions that they mention which trees you'll need to use when doing a specific part or parts. That's very helpful for someone like me.

[Hikuro]

I didn't work on the leg, I wanted to work on something else for the time being.

So for an hour I worked on Upper Torso and upper waste movement.

So far it looks fantastic. Joints are a bit stiff as expected on the shoulder area. But man my pilot figure looks great painted up and sitting in his lil cockpit.

Something I thought was sorta neat was when I pressed the upper canopy hatch down the screen frame would pull upward. Wish it went back down when your closing the canopy hatch that'd been really neat.

But the upper torso looks so cool with those hydrolic pistons working around and such I also put on a bit of the armor pieces just on the shoulder joints and the canopy hatch pieces. It should look pretty cool when everythings all done and over with.

I'll try to get some pictures right when I get home.

[Hikuro]

OKay showing off some pictures now!

[Hikuro]

Canopy Hatch!

[Hikuro]

Side shot

[Hikuro]

Piston working

[Hikuro]

Leg is completed

[Hikuro]

This shot you can see how well I was actually able to panel line with my new pen which I saved specifically for my first PG kit.

[Hikuro]

Lil bit of bending going on.

[Hikuro]

Angled shot. Honestly I think the design team for the PG Strike should have given their notes to the animators. The armor is just amazingly well thought out, I couldn't have thought of anything better. And the articulation is fantastic. I maybe talking out of terms since this is my first PG Kit. But comparing it to my 1/60 Real Details and my MG's, this is by far the best variation of Strike and I smack those who condem this variation.

[Hikuro]

Okya now that other damn leg. Now if you've built the strike you should sorta get what I'm saying.

The problem lies with the lower portion of the leg where it would connect with the bottom end of the upper portion. For some reason the two halves will connect fine at first then when your snapping the top end of the part it just stays like it is, it wont snap into place.

[Hikuro]

Right around the top area of these pieces is where the problem exists in my opinion.

[Hikuro]

Here's how it looks after placing the two pieces together.

[Hikuro]

Here's a top view.

Also note the rear leg verniers wont go into place correctly cause of this gap. It's gotta be happening to that left side.

Edited April 14, 2005 by Hikuro

[Hikuro]

Another shot.

Big update there, but any theories or ideas what could be wrong and how to correct this?

Edited April 14, 2005 by Hikuro

[Guppy]

I can have a look at my leg when I get home.. I didn't have any problems with assembly, IIRC that part had about 3 or 4 little PC bits and stuff that fit inside before you snap the 2 leg parts together. so my vague guess would be you have one of the parts inside flipped the wrong way around or isn't sitting straight in its sockets.

[port]

Hikuro, Go back an look at direction again. Look real close. You may have two of the same parts, maybe. I know when stuff like that happens to me thats usually the case. But it looks great. Keep em comin.

[Shmitty]

Yeah, I'm looking at my PG strike instructions right now, and you have that polycap in the wrong way. There are slats on the sides of the leg where it fits in, that you have to put those little tabs on the sides of the polycap into. In other words, you got it sideways.

[Hikuro]

I took a look and I just moved ONE piece by flipping it over and WHAM! It fit into place.

That bottom "cube" as I call it was backwards...man I couldn't have noticed that either hadn't I listened a bit here.

Everything looks fine now, I'm gonna try to complete the leg tonight and maybe even get the waist built up. But thanks guys problem is solved!

[Hikuro]

Here this was the one, which I think was mentioned as being wrong.

[port]

Cool. Glad you got it.

[F360°]

glad you got it to work and is now back on track,,

[Shmitty]

Actually, this was the part I was talking about, up around where it wasn't fitting together very well. The red part is the little tab, and the blue part is the slit where it's supposed to fit it. The polycap needs to be rotated 90 degrees.

[Hikuro]

Yeah I fixed that too...I took those pictures right when I pulled it apart going "Oops!" after the pictures...

But yeah even after my correction after my post I realized I still had something slightly wrong and fixed it yet again from scratch, now its fine.

I basically tonight finished both legs and waist and torso without armor. However everything else has its armor plating now. Panel lining is fantastic, some of my best yet since I'm sorta being "selective"

Note on this picture, I took the 1/60 Sword Strike and my PG Strike and stood them toe to toe. The PG Strike I believe will be maybe 1 inch or lil more in height compared to Bandai's 1/60 RD Strike.

If I'm lucky I'll complete an Arm at work, gotta remember to bring the hands with me, this is the third night I forgot them in the gradge. And when I get home maybe complete the whole body.

The Shield, Armor Schnieders, and Beam rifle can wait.

Also I'm tring to look for that blasted CR1220 battery for the LED....I looked in Walmart and Fredmyers and haven't turned out anything close.

You'd think because your spending so much money on these PG Kits Bandai wouldn't be stingy and just give us one lil battery.

[RainBot]

All Radio Shack stores or watch retailers will sell you the battery.

The Perfect Grade Strike is an exercise in Zen wisdom. If something doesn't work, you haven't done something correctly. Bandai went out of their way on this kit to make sure that instruction following folk could not make a mistake unless they ignored or mistinterpreted a step in the process.

I found it quite a meditative process, much like raking trails in a sand garden. I had moments like yours above, and with concentration, mixed with a sip or two of Jasmine tea, things came together.

I have fears though, that the process will not be the same with the PG Char's Zaku and the PG Zeta I picked up.

And for those in Toronto, swing on down to Anime Extreme and pick up the PG Strike for only 160 smackers. I thought I was smart getting mine from Hong Kong for 109 US plus shipping. D'Oh!

[Hikuro]

*looks at his empty bottle of beer* ......this wasn't the problem I swear it!!!

Today at work I plan on completing 1 arm and the torso plating. With any luck I'll accomplish this task leaving only the 2nd arm and the head unit and the body will be complete.