Still waiting for verification email from them to start making orders. Resent it 30 times now from site and not a one has appeared.

 

I saw your post, went straight to show z at 230am west coast time and boom

 

24 hrs within 24hrs?

That's like 576 hours

 

For those waiting for a Taobao PO, they might not come now. Most Taobao stores cut their POs years ago, because they POed the whole group. What I expected, as I also do not have POs for Viper and Jester, is that some stores will open new POs near release, which as been happening a lot lately (either new stores, or older stores that got another batch from FT).

 

HOURCEPTION.

 

Collectible transformer toys, action figures,children toys,China toys supplier/factory,retail,wholesale here's the legs.

 

I'll keep you in mind before listing them, gimme awhile though. I'm getting over COVID right now and I'm too tired to box them up.

 

Is the bombusbee website a good store? Can they be trusted? I never bought from them.

 

They’re legit

 

They’re pretty good. I got acoustic wave, the tapes, Rig and Soar from them in the last 3 weeks.

maybe AW was longer ago… I forget

 

Just a reminder of the possibilities...

 

My guess is Viper as well because on my confirmation email, the shipping cost is slightly more than Jester.

On a side note, is this the joint that will be used for shoulder articulation? I am concerned that this connection may not be able to support the weight of the whole arm.

 

The Maverick transformation is all wrong.

I think you have the other 2 right. Were you able to get the little rear wings to tab in on Iceman? I had trouble with that.

No. The chest opens on each side and the are sliders there. The head just folds down out of the way.

 

Coincidentally, that is also the head  

 

I think those renders of the combined mode while cool, are out of date. There's a big chance that a big part of how these guys combine is changed. I'm hoping on a full grey/partially colored prototype, of both teams, so we can see how it all fits together. And, more importantly, how the stability and posability is.

 

For sure! I hope you get better soon

you can DM me when the time comes

 

I don't think that is a joint itself.
I guess the head is supposed to be hidden in the actual shoulder joint, that's part of the combiner skeleton:

 

The entire head will go into the shoulder, and there are several points (tabs/pegs) on the shoulder part of the skeleton that will connect to the torso of the limb.

 

Fireflight/Viper is FT-30D that will come out before Slingshot/Jester FT-30E that will come out last with the combiner skeleton. Both jets were shown simultaneously so there is no significance to the timing of how they were shown. As to skeletons, as far as we know Bandit will come with a trailer that transforms into the Menasor skeleton. The skeleton that will come with Jester is anyone's guess. It will be a lot like Zeta Superion I imagine as we saw from the initial renders. I doubt it transforms into anything so it might be easier to finish than Menasor. Like Roadking, it appears Maverick sits lower in the torso with the combiner head and shoulders above performing the locking and torque features of the combiner to give weight to the torso. I think they sat it much lower to lower the center of gravity.

I still think with both, even with prototypes to test the combiner, it is quite likely they had design issues. Prototypes are lighter, more rigid, and flimsy so you have to be careful with them. As we have seen with the final products they are beefy, much heavier, and have more flexible joints that take more torque because of tolerances and the requisite force deflection. Rightly so in manufacturing, we always commend FT on build quality. To their credit, they overcompensate not wanting this stuff to break. When I look at the combiner skeleton for Superion with those heavy arms and robust looking shoulder joints it convinces me all the more that the torso shell had to be bulked up with secure connections to lock in Maverick and stabilize the torso to handle those arms. I think the prototype with different materials, tolerances, and ginger movements did not fully mimic the weight and torque issues on the legs and stability that would be exacerbated in a production release. This screams Berserk to me and you can't really blame them. They err toward a design and then in production don't skimp on build or quality and sometimes it pushes you over the design constraints and you have to go back to the drawing board.

The chest panels on Viper and Jester open and hinge back which are obvious connection ports for the shoulder joint.

 

Not mine, they are from Chinese boards. But yeah, as I mentioned, they are possibilities...