The shoulders on mine were so tight i thought the joints were going to break but after going back and forth a few times they both turn smoothly now.

 

Has anybody considered headswapping Earthrise Starscream's dome onto Sandstorm?

 

This is an amazing repaint! Makes me really want an Acid Storm.

 

G2 Desert Storm Ramjet is awesome!  

 

I’ve been keeping an eye out for a junker screamer in hopes to do that. Not sure how hard it is to remove the head though.

 

Being a military member I love his camouflage. Another conehead added to the collection. I rotated his wings to cover the outside of legs for a more armored appearance. I think he will be known as Desert Ramjet.

 

Found this guy at a semi-local comic shop, grabbed him for the heck of it. I'm okay with him being a seperate character, perhaps a rogue decepticon acting sort of like how Thundercracker did in the IDW comics, no longer really a Decepticon due to disappointment in their message but unwilling to fight against Megatron. Partly out of old loyalties, and partly because he saw how Megatron deals with bots he considers useless traitors.

Anyway, joints were great on mine, though one of his nullrays was INCREDIBLY difficult to get out of the plastic shell, and of course because I have the dexterity of an upset bison sometimes, bent it enough that a stress line showed up. I'll be careful with it from here, yeah, oops.

paint is good, love the camo, could almost see him flying low over a dessert kicking up an actual sandstorm behind him.

 

My Sandstorm arrived from GameStop earlier today. I don't have Classics Ramjet with my so I'll be comparing it to Classics Thrust and Classics Dirge. This is also my first experience with Seeker/Conehead molds after Classics, the first MP Starscream, and The Unicron Trilogy.

Cons:

Something is wrong with left shoulder (right shoulder if you're looking face to face). It feels like it's trying to shear off. I know that sounds weird since it connects via a mushroom peg but, that mushroom peg is pinned onto the beige/tan plastic that flips into the chest cavity. The mushroom peg turns slightly when I try to rotate the shoulder up and down before the shoulder starts to rotate. It looks like the pin wasn't driven in all the way but, you can't get the shoulder off of the mushroom peg without unpinning the beige/tan shoulder plastic from the black shoulder plastic that clips onto the mushroom peg to get to the mushroom peg's pin. The column/pillar/post that the mushroom peg pin goes in has a stress near the bottom edge where it meets the side panel that flips into the chest cavity and, I'm not sure if it was from assembly or shoulder rotation. It's a terrible design flaw, the mushroom peg should have also been keyed/slotted and glued to prevent an issue like this if the pin wasn't right. I would be a lot more willing to knock the pin out if it was a normal pin and not one of the pins that has a large flat surface on one end. I know they look horrible but, I miss screws and toys that aren't glued together as they are vastly easier to repair and parts swap.

The right/3/starboard/passenger side (you're right if you're the pilot) doesn't want to clip in (something is pulling it away from the fuselage). I might be able to fix this issue with heat/tension/cooling.

Pros:

I don't have any other issues and this is great deco that will look amazing next to my army of RID2K desert camo Obsidian (basic sized BM Obsidian redeco) army. Speaking of which, those make me wish that Sandstorm had been brighter and vastly more saturated but, I understand why it isn't.


Obsidian - RIDForever


Closing thoughts (engineering flaws):

The classics Coneheads have a better cockpit/nosecone/chest transformation. Sansdstorm would lack a ball jointed neck but, it would look so much cleaner.

I loathe the plastic flexing that is required for the chest clips but, at least Sandstorm doesn't have any paint to worry about. I don't really see a way that pegs/tabs could have worked given how the chest swings down on a hinge but, there had to be a better way than flexing the plastic. The Classics chest transformation is much cleaner. However, they clearly wanted/needed the back to be thicker and more sturdy than the Classics toys were due to the size and weight of being voyager. The Earthrise Seekers/Coneheads have a far better arm to chest cavity collapse as a result because, the panels that flip in have a larger surface area where the ins are. This change along with the back now hinge down a full 90° compared to the limited range of hinge down chest and all the extra plastic in the center of it on the Classics versions) also makes collapsing the cockpit into the chest a vastly easier experience (as does being a voyager). This would honestly be far less of an issue if all the Seekers/Coneheads had their chests cast in the appropriate colour rather than relying on paint but, flexing plastic is cheating and it's terrible for longevity and it needs to stop being used.

No waist articulation (which was also the number one complaint with the Classics version). I could be more forgiving about this if the Siege Cybertronian Seekers/Coneheads (which I do not own) didn't have waist articulation. It's a huge step backwards. I feel like they could have section that the hips attach to longer, put a waist joint in that, and then shortened the legs to compensate for that. However, the wings would need to be altered and the tab from the cockpit that clips into it would have to be altered and the hips would sit too far down, and on and on and on. Without having a Siege version in hand, it's hard to speculate on what changes resulted in losing waist articulation.

I don't care for the pegging system to lock the knees into the lower legs for robot mode as it was pretty difficult to get the back tabs in, It's better than telescoping like the Classics versions or the lackluster tabs that Kingdom Tracks has. The ease/difficulty probably varies from copy to copy though just like anything else with tabs/pegs does.


Closing thoughts (aesthetic flaws):

The nosecone on the back looks bad. It honestly looks way worse on the Coneheads than it does on the Seekers because, the Calssic Coneheads had the actual nose cone transform into the head. It also adds a substantial check of kibble that eats up a large amount of shelf space because the entire piece sticks out further than any of the other kibble (other than the tail fins if you fold the wings onto the sides of Sandstorm's legs). Anything would have been better (including popping of and fitting onto the hand like a drill or splitting in half and pegging/tabbing onto the sides of the jet engines).

The legs are hella long and, it throws off the proportions. The massive knee/thigh armor from the shins might be the root cause of why it looks off but, I won't know until my Skywarp & Thundercracker pre-order is in stock and shipped or until my Coronation Starscream pre-order is in stock and ships. The Earthrise Seeker/Coneheads have a better thigh to lower leg length ratio than the Classics versions do though (as do the biceps).

Closing thoughts (purchase):

I don't regret the purchase. Getting it for a little under $23 before tax is a huge part of that (because it removed the s"do I really need this?" aspect) but, I don't think I would have regret a full MSRP purchase either. It's rare that we get anything in a desert camo and the deco on Sandstorm manages to stand out even among that small selection. There are things that could/should be improved but, it's a gorgeous deco and a sold toy that unfortunately has to be compared with items from Siege/Earthrise/Kingdom that are just on entirely different level and also trigger an overwhelming amount of nostalgia of wishing toys from your childhood of characters you had/have a strong emotional connection with were anywhere close to this level of engineering. The Earthrise Seekers/Coneheads could and should be better when it comes to the nosecones and no waist articulation but, they are the best mass retail release molds of them since the DW WW-esque Tetrajets in Cybertron from 2005/2006 (and the Supreme King Starscream that had revisions/improvements. Cybertron Stascream is still my favorite Starscream toy and it is the only Cybertronian version Seeker toy that I like (but the Titanium ones were decent). i will forever be dismayed that it was never redecod as Thundercraker and Skywarp and Sunstorm (or whatever it's called now) nor remolded into the Coneheads (I pretend the maroon one from the TRU 2 pack is Thrust). I would love to see a new version of it but all the legal issues, all of them . . .

My Classics Seekers/Coneheads will still be my display pieces since I didn't know about Earthrise and missed the boat on the Coneheads (the price gouging is wild AF). I might swap out the Classics Seekers once I get the Earthrise ones and justify the deluxe scale of the Coneheads as being Memba Berries and puny little sidekicks for Starscream to shitlord over. I really hope that there is an Earthrise Conehead triple pack reissue giftset at some point.

Ultimately, my biggest issues with exclusives (even shared exclusives) is that it's pretty much impossible to get an exchange due to their limited quantities which means I will either need to pre-order another Sandstorm at MSRP and hope it's fine or, I'll have to try and repair my copy.

All that having been said, I will not by using/displaying Sandstorm with its robothead showing because it will clearly be bleep bloop blop danger Will Robinson the one true king of the Classics Coneheads has arrived to overthrow Shitlord Starscream . . .

 

Got Sandstorm yesterday, snagged him for $22 during Gamestops flash sale!

I've not been a huge fan of the Seekers, or coneheads, but this deco is too good to pass on. I do wish the camo extended to the rear of the jet as well. My copy also has tight connections, the shoulder swivels feel way too tight.

Overall, for the price I'm glad I snagged him. Looking to get more G2 seekers!

 

Yes, he is awesome!

What are those black extra guns you are using for these photos from? Are those G1 Dirge's guns?

 

It's the G1 Conehead weapons from Nonnef, he still has some in stock:
Conehead Weapons

All his stuff is mold-injected and not 3D printed, so they do look official/authentic, and they go great with any of the Conehead Seekers!

He does ship internationally from the U.S.:
Shipping Information

 

Sure, everyone's experiences may differ, but my Nonnef set sucked for various reasons, including looking like curved hot dogs and had missing chunks from the surfaces where he tore the pieces off the sprues before shipping.

Tim Heada makes a generic Coneheads set. ZX makes my favorite individualized Conehead sets although I'm not fond of the stock paint decos. The Ramjet set's stock deco, however, does match Sandstorm very well.

Here's some pics I posted before:

Ramjet set on left. Dirge set on right. The dark gunmetal has a hint of brown to it, which goes better with Sandstorm. I eventually repainted the Dirge set in matte black and matched so much better afterward.


Has an interesting combo peg that allows storage on the back.


Alt Mode:

 

This is my first time having the earthrise Seeker/Conehead mold in hand, so here we go.
This is a pretty soild figure. Simple and fun transformation, good articulation (just wish it had waist rotation), looks great, poses amazingly, and looks great in your collection. If you are a seeker completionist, go buy him. Highly recommend.

 

So I got Sandstorm for Xmas. Just opened him 30 mins ago and didn't realize he was missing his crouch piece until I looked at some Youtube reviews. Now I have to ask the gifter, my wife to request a replacement sigh... Anyone have this issue?

 

@OptimusTarzan

I know this is a bit late, but I just ordered him today. Ill let you know what I find out when mine arrives.

 

I recently cancelled an order on Starscream, thundercracker and Skywarp because my spending was getting a little crazy lately , and I wasn't even going to bother with this guy until I saw he has a shark face in jet mode. Im a shark Fanatic, so I kind of felt like I had to have this one.

 

Thanks. But I got a replacement with the crotch plate.

 

I kinda figured you did at this point. Just wanted to be sure. Hope mine has it.

 

To anyone who has this, have yalls yellowed yet?

 

Has anyone who had this figure had there's yellow yet? Mines did but it may have been an anomaly. Might go for this figure again