1/72 IMAI VF-1A and BANDAI/REVELL VF-1S "VARIABLE TYPE" models

[Shaorin]

hey there, gang.

here's my old 1/72 variable VF-1s, both of which i had picked up at a collector's toy shop in PORTLAND, OR.

("Billy Galaxy" LONG GONE, AFAIK)(TAKE THAT BACK, HE'S STILL AROUND: http://www.billygalaxy.com/index.html )

in a trade deal, back around 2001/2002ish.

i had a moderate sized lot of TRANS FORMERS that i did not want, and B. GALAXY had an unbuilt variable IMAI VF-1A

and built-up but unpainted BANDAI variable VF-1S that i very much wanted at the time.

he traded me a value of $125.00 credit in his shop, and i used it for both of these kits, in addition to a handful of other items.

i recently picked up an unbuilt REVELL/CEJI ROBOTECH "VEXAR" IMAI VF-1S repackage, due to sentimental reasons,

and decided to combine it with the finished BANDAI 1S to make myself a bit of "sentimental fanservice"

like i said, i painted and decaled that built-up 1S, and hung on to the IMAI VF-1A until about four years ago,

during a boring period, when i went ahead and built it up.

here are the results, though surely nothing to wet one's pants over...

the worst things about these are that whoever had built the 1S had installed the die-cast MAIN landing gear

backwards, so i had to pry the legs open to fix that. further, he/she had ALSO managed to glue one of the two

said bays shut, and i had long since busted the hinge, i had thought irreparably, in order to fix the gear.

years later, i returned to it, and managed to rebuild a fully functional hinge into the door.

i had applied the included fully unused decals on the 1S, and sealed them in with

some of my father's old dullcoat lacquer, which, as you might have noticed, has rather yellowed badly

in ten years...

now the IMAI VF-1A i built from the parts-runner up.

i attempted to do as good a job on it as i knew how, however, i was forced at the time to implement

some rather questionable flat white paint that dried with a decidedly ugly finish, ruining any chances

if anything evenly remotely approaching a semi-pro like paint job.

to hell with that, i decided, and just finished the damned model. i started decal application,

and, after somehow barely managing to successfully apply the "PILOT-MAX-GENIUS"

on either side of the finished canopy, i couldn't get the U.N. SPACY kite emblems to take hold,

and they got ruined.

i gave up on the old decals, and left the model as-was, until i found that, after finishing

decal application on my YAMATO 1/60v.II, that there were just enough of the right types of decals

left on it's sheet to fully replace the bad waterslides on that old IMAI 1A.

the result, of course, was seen up above...

Edited January 26, 2011 by Shaorin

[jardann]

Those look pretty darn good! I love those old kits. They manage to keep some nice proportions throughout the three modes IMHO. Possibly still the best model kit for Gerwalk mode. It's a bear trying to match the tan color of the VF-1A though isn't it!

Looks like you did a nice job on them. Keep it up!

[mslz22]

Nice job...I too have a soft spot for these old kits...if i only had time to dig into my stash....

[AcroRay]

Sweet! Very very nice.

I love those old kits. They're not too badly made, and they've got a HUGE amount of nostalgia value for me.

I've got a Vexar waiting for a build someday, to replace the original one I had back in high school in the 80s.

[newca]

Really very nice work.

This is my first VF-1 model back to 10 years ago, and even with so many Hasegawa kits on hand, this version is still my best choice in 1/72nd scale.

Edited February 27, 2011 by newca