1/285 Tomahawk

[Justiciar]

Some of you guys may have seen:

in the fan art section. Well, now I have this to show:

Sorry about the photo quality. I hope to get some good ones (with it painted up nice) soon. It looks a heckuva lot better in person and it's not glossy/speckled in real life. There's quite a bit of detail (missiles, rivets, armor plating, etc.) that's not coming through in the photos, but is clearly visible on the mini itself. It's not perfect, but overall I'm pretty happy with it. At least, until the next rev. And every single joint is poseable, though you'd really want to pick one and glue it in place (unless you're using magnets). Hope you like it.

[big F]

Cool the posibility of my Macross chess set just got another step closer. I love those Ral Partha figures.

[HWR MKII]

I still say you should try scaling one up and seeing how it translates to 1/35 scale.

[Justiciar]

I don't know how else to say it other than please be patient. There's been little enough feedback that I'm just not sure it's worth the effort. I say effort, because while it looks nice on the outside, it needs to be completely re-built on the inside. That's a need, not a desire, because of the process of going from CAD to physical. And if only one person wants it, it's just not worth it (as in I would lose several thousand dollars to make one person happy). Sorry if that sounds gruff.

[HWR MKII]

Nah its understandable. I know how the process works. Just keeping the idea alive. Someone may want to tackle it at a later date.

[mojacko]

looking good....considering for a small scale.....yes think u should test to see if a lot would be interested to have a bigger scale....but d small scale is really nice at the moment....

[neptunesurvey]

Diffently more detailed then the 1/320 ones that I have and the 1/285th would go well with the GHQ stuff. Are you planning on selling any on the site?

Edited July 16, 2007 by neptunesurvey

[Justiciar]

Yes, I'm planning on having some available for sale, along with the rest of the Destroids. The kits are either going to be urethane, resin or plastic. Still working that bit out. Price will be comparable to metal miniatures of the same size/scale.

[promethuem5]

I would be extremely interested...

[Justiciar]

Final (hopefully) revision Tomahawk, Defender and Phalanx are going to the printers on Friday and should be ready within the next couple of weeks. The only differences are fixing the fits of some of the components and setting some minimum heights and depths on features to ensure they come out on the models.

Hope no one minds, but I'm tweaking the scale. Simply put, there are more people interested in these models for Battletech than there are for Macross, which means scaling them "properly" for Macross would jack them up to no end for CBT. End result is that some models will be in 6mm scale, some will be in 7mm scale.

Last chance to tell me how wrong I am. Speak now or forever hold your peace.

[MechTech]

Justiciar, I meant to post earlier on this but was having browser issues. That looks great! If you don't mind my asking, how much are they charging you to prototype the drawing? I've seriously considered doing this myself. Keep it up, looks great! - MT

[jardann]

Hey, it's your project, and it's turning out great. You can scale them however you want, but I would think no matter what general size you are going for, having them all be in the same scale would be best.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by 6mm or 7mm scale. Aren't they supposed to be different sizes in BT as well as Macross? I mean, if the Tomohawk is taller than the Phalanx, then it should always be taller when the two mechs are built in the same scale. Or, for BT are all of the pieces just made to be approximately the same size, no matter what they are supposed to be in "real life"?

[big F]

Hey, it's your project, and it's turning out great. You can scale them however you want, but I would think no matter what general size you are going for, having them all be in the same scale would be best.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by 6mm or 7mm scale. Aren't they supposed to be different sizes in BT as well as Macross? I mean, if the Tomohawk is taller than the Phalanx, then it should always be taller when the two mechs are built in the same scale. Or, for BT are all of the pieces just made to be approximately the same size, no matter what they are supposed to be in "real life"?

The scales in BT were originally all made up as they had bastardized virtually every mecha francise of the time, so when Ral Partha et all made the figures they had lineart to go on but had to botch up the scales to make em right for BT. The macross scale ones are mostly right except the Phoenix Hawk which is a FP Vf1s is tottally wrong compaired to the stinger and wasp which are just modded VF1`s the crusader is also out slightly as its a modded VF in GBP but looks ok apart from the mods to the head. The Glaug is a nice cast but I think its a bit small. All the LAM mechs are the same scales as the equivalent battroid inspired ones but are not to bad representations of the Gerwalk but could be modeed to to perfect.

For my Macross chess set idea they`d all work except the Phoenix hawk where I`d just use a normal stinger with mods to it to give it FP`s

Edited August 21, 2007 by big F

[Justiciar]

I'll try not to make this too confusing.

6mm is 1/285 - 1/300 scale (depends which side of the Atlantic you're on) and is very common for micro-armor (WW2 tanks). It's also the "official" scale for CBT. 7mm is 1/240 and is really not a scale "officially" used. The problem is that over the last several years, many manufacturers have been cheating upwards on scale, meaning they'll label something as 25mm, but it's really 28mm or even 30mm (Games Workshop is notorious for this). Iron Wind Metals, the company that makes all the miniatures for Classic Battletech, started doing this as well a couple years back. All the new models are larger than their originals. On the one hand it's nice because you can put in extra detail. OTOH it totally torques the scale. Believe me, that 1mm in scale difference, when talking about things like giant robots, makes a huge difference.

What really causes it to be an issue here is that the sizes of mecha in Macross do not necessarily translate the same into CBT. Formatting is a pita, so please bear with me. We'll compare Macross to CBT using some commonly seen designs. Note that the problem is even worse when jumping to 7mm, which would be necessary to keep the models "in the same scale" as the Iron Wind stuff. And since that is where the majority of interest for these kits comes from...

Macross name ...... 6mm model height ...... 7mm model height

1. VF-1 ...................... 45mm ......................... 53mm

2. VF-1 w/ FAST ......... 45mm ......................... 53mm

3. VF-1 w/ GBP .......... 45mm ......................... 53mm (50mm and 59mm to top of booster)

4. Tomahawk ............. 40mm ......................... 47mm (45mm and 53mm to top of 6-pack)

5. Defender................ 38mm ......................... 45mm

6. Phalanx.................. 40mm ......................... 47mm

7. Spartan.................. 40mm ......................... 47mm

8. Glaug .................... 51mm ......................... 62mm (59mm and 70mm to top of gun)

All heights are to top of head.

Now the same mechs, in the same order, but with their CBT names (also to top of head):

CBT name ............ 6mm model height ..... 7mm model height

1. Wasp....................... 30mm ......................... 35mm

2. Phoenix Hawk .......... 35mm ......................... 41mm

3. Crusader ................. 40mm ......................... 47mm

4. Warhammer ............. 45mm ......................... 53mm

5. Rifleman .................. 39mm ......................... 45mm

6. Longbow .................. 48mm ......................... 56mm

7. Archer ..................... 45mm ......................... 53mm

8. Marauder ................. 45mm ......................... 53mm

Here's relative to each other in both 6mm and 7mm in true/Macross-scale:

Here's how they look relative to each other in CBT-scale:

It's a bit crude, but hopefully these pics help a bit. Download them and pull out your trusty metric ruler and re-size them on your screen and you'll get a good idea of how big these models would be in real life in both 6mm and 7mm scale. The Tomahawk looks great in 7mm (holding prototype in hand), but the Valkyrie and Glaug are just too big.

Basically, the Valkyrie and Glaug cause the biggest problems, though the Phalanx and Defender do as well. It's all because in Macross these guys are basically the same size (except for the Glaug), but in CBT they're all over the map. It's worse when you throw in the Monster, which should be 79mm in 6mm scale. It jumps up to 94mm in 7mm. By comparison, the tallest 'Mech in CBT is 56mm and is supposed to be substantially larger than the Glaug.

At the moment, what I'm planning is Tomahawk (and the other non-Monster Destroids) in 7mm. That'll give them some bulk on the table-top and look nice. The Valkyrie and Glaug (and by extension, Regults) I'll do in 6mm. They'll still be large enough to have nice detail, but will be more-or-less usable for both CBT and Macross (not that I know of any Macross wargames... other than Palladium's Robotech and the new fan version of Macross Mekton <sorry, forgot author's name>). Call this the Hasbro-scale, where the goal is to have all the toys more-or-less the same size.

@MechTech -- I have a special arrangement and pay substantially less than I should be for prototyping these. Cost depends on process used (not all RP processes are the same), material used, height of model (which effects time to build) and the house doing the job (some really try to gouge people). Breaking the kits down into many smaller pieces actually decreased the build time, which further reduced the cost. You basically need to shop around, and be willing to show them your model, to get quotes.

I started a Macross Minis Yahoo! Group specifically for these kits. There's a poll about scale. Sorry, but Yahoo! insists that only Group members be allowed to vote. So you could join, vote, and leave in about 2 minutes.

Edited August 21, 2007 by Justiciar

[MechTech]

Thanks man. That's cool! If I had the cash, I'd be getting my own prototyping equipment! - MT

[jardann]

Wow, that was way more in depth than I was expecting!

But I see now what you are talking about. CBT changes the sizes of the mechs so much that keeping a constant scale is difficult, as well as the fact that the heights for CBT are radically different from the "true" heights according to Macross.

Well, no matter what, your Tomohawk looks super cool. If your primary point is to use these for gaming then I see how keeping them sized similarly to each other may be more important than true scale consitency. Like I said before, it's your baby so do what makes you happy!

Thanks for all the info!