Given how the grey paint seems to like chipping, I hope Takara doesn't decide that a Return of Optimus Prime Hate Plague Metal-Coated edition is a good idea for a repaint. lol.

 

I’d love to buy a v3 Optimus zombie edition... missing arm an’ all... anyone agree?

 

I held off on really watching any review videos until Emgo put his out (he does a great job, IMO). After watching his video today, I can’t believe there aren’t MORE QC issues. The sheer number of tiny flipping rotating swinging sliding pivoting plastic bits in this figure is nuts. Love it or hate it, it’s a feat of TF design ingenuity.

 

Here’s the paint mixture for the grey I came up with. Here’s the comparison. Left unpainted, right painted. Sorry for taking so long :/

Paints required:

Mr. Color Light Grey (97): 4
Mr. Color Black (33): 1 or 2
Mr. Color Silver (8): 1
Mr. Metal Color Rough Silver (GX 208): 1/32 (little bit)
Mr. Color Blue FS15050 (328): 1/32

 

Thanks to everybody's help, I was finally able to unlock that ab joint. Holy cow, that thing must have been painted shut out of the box. Unlocking it the first time was scarier than the first transformation and testing the knee ratchets combined. It opens very smoothly with minimal force now though. It's harder to dislodge the front and back tabs than it is to pop that ab joint open... which is exactly as it should be.

 

Repainted little matrix crystal (deeper blue looks better and more accurate to me)
Topcoated the matrix

 

Seems like they overpainted the red and under painted the gray. Kind of reminds me of the crappy chrome on HR, IBM, and Ratchet, it just h ad that look it wasnt applied right.

 

that's truth. but that also means a different group of customers too. if H/T stick with their old market, that's fine too. someone like this will pop and open a new field. again, it could be manual, auto, remote control, sound control, phone control, whatever, a lot of options. not everyone wants to manually transform it all the time, it would be cool to have that auto option. and it's different level of engineering and way to have fun. just like painting and photographing. you can spend all the time to paint a view, or you can take a old fashion pic and develop a film in the dark room, or you can take a pic with one click with a phone.

 

You did an absolutely amazing job matching that grey. I build automotive and resin/vinyl figures and color matching can be a real pain. Great work!

 

If someone here is gonna toss your box, pm me. DHL decided to play kickball with my package and the box is bashed in.

ARGH

 

MP44 is such an action hero!!!

Does the inner crystal just slide out with pressure or did you work on it? If it’s easy, I might put MP10’s clear crystal inside.

 

Slides out exactly like MP-10's crystal. Push it out with a Q-tip, or it might risk paint scratching on the visible areas.

 

Thanks so much, DHL:

 

Yeah, I just don’t see it man. There’s a steady growth and development to the MP line, and MP-10 and MP-44 are clearly related. Remote control is a whole other thing, like the difference between Generations and Masterpiece.

 

Sorry about the package. Is the figure okay?

 

I’d invoke a Wrath of Khan, but I don’t think even a sympathetic joke is right here. I’m so sorry.

 

Can you get some insurance money?

 

So here is a couple things I noticed on MP-44, like how to keep from chipping his crotch paint.

I had taken his legs apart as the upper "hip" on his right side was missing the ratchet for his side ways movement. So I turned both legs into nice tight friction joints now stronger compared to the ratchets.

But while doing this I figured out what was scratching his crotch paint.

When you first open Prime you will notice there is plastic all over him, and some sitting over his crotch. It is there to keep it from being scratched so. There is the two bars that the Matrix Chamber sits on that sits over the crotch in Truck mode. Take some felt of something soft and wrap around those bars, and it won't scratch the paint if you transform it.

If you seen how it was to fix FansToys Hoodlum, it is more or less the same thing. The way the bars sit in truck mode, it scraps on the paint. It you can put something soft on the bars, like felt or something like that, it won't scratch it any longer.

Best Regards,