First, I will state my opinion about a few items, might not be everyone's preference but I feel like some things should have been done by Hasbro. First, it's the eyes. ER OP is a mess for the blue face and blue eyes thing, and they should have NOT listened to the people that complained about it... the yellow eyes matched the G1 toy and stood out very nicely, and the blue face simply makes everything flat and dead. So I fixed that. I hate, HATE that Hasbro went with gluing the head together instead of using a screw, as that would have made this 100x easier. Some have taken the trouble of taking the head apart, but I was afraid to miss doing it right and damaging the head, so I went with a very thin Tamiya brush and Tamiya (note that I only use Tamiya paint in my projects) yellow paint and holding my OP very steadily, wearing some reading glasses that I wear to magnify detailed items, I went it and attempted this. It took a while, I had to clean up a few times and restart, but after a bit of time, I managed to get the paint on the eyes as best as possible. While at it, I decided to touch in a bit of silver paint for the "nose" and define the face better, and retouched any signs of yellow that I had touched on the sides of the eyes, with a bit of blue as needed. Second, the legs.. Hasbro was cheap again, reusing molds and giving us legs that did nothing, and was too cheap to cast in blue. So I attacked the legs with blue (Tamiya blue paint) and got rid of the pointless grey that was an eyesore. I had purchased a spare Cog to be a substitute for Roller, and the other parts would work as accessories, and mainly a jet-pack for OP. Getting all the parts in the trailer is a challenge worthy of an advanced Tetris game. So, now the third thing, it was the trailer that is insanely bland (shame on you again Habro, for the price that you're selling these). This Cog needed some details and paint to really stand out as being a "true" ER OP accessory So some red for the "Roller", the trailer got some "wear" using some wash and paint, and also some black wash to the outside wheels sections to add a bit of details. I did the full trailer (insides only) with a black wash, which I simply dilute a few drops of black paint with standard medical type alcohol (50%). I don't really measure, I just mix a tiny glass bottle worth, and then test if it's dark enough. This gave the inside of the trailer a worn and metal look to it. I did a silver wash on the metal "flooring" sections (where the wheels of "Roller" are)... and then black on the flat panels. The repair unit, I did the canopy/glass section with a blended blue (used for my Siege Frenzy project) and decided to go with the unit being full gunmetal, using silver as the main paint, and more of my black wash for the details. Worth of note is that since ER OP didn't get a proper shield, the new "Roller" does do a decent job as one and adds an extra twist on it. (and yes I know that the trailer door is supposed to be a shield, but seriously, it's just freaking terrible...) It took me a few hours to get all this done, but in the end, I am very pleased with the results. I still see a few things that I do want to improve, and I'll post the finished results later.
Nice work. I was thinking a Cog would make a decent roller stand-in as well. And using the legs portions to stow under the trailer as stabilizers.
This looks really good. There are more mods around Radicons that you could consider. Heavy/Scratch: - ER Prime Tailgate Replacement (Shapeways) Minor/Repaint: - Earthrise Optimus - Faceplate Mod It's excellent on its own, but you could be interested in these.
Dayum, Prime be looking fresh af all it really needs is more yellow on his crotch and it should be smooth sailing from there (Jesus my entire post sounded so wrong, I just can’t take it seriously)
Just X-4 with some adjustment with mixing in a bit of white (X-2). Note that it's hard to get a perfect match as dry looks different than when put on, so it is a bit of a darker shade of blue, but still looks 100x better than just gray. I don't spray, as I find that Tamiya is so liquid that it does an amazing job with brushes, plus allows for detail work.
I forgot to add that I did do another tweak as the trailer doesn't turn as it's just too close to the truck. It is inspired from what Nonnef did, but as he released his kit after I bought another, I just needed such an adapter so I built one. Simply done: I cut a piece of plastic (cover of a margarine pot), then using a 5mm drill bit, cut the holes. Then cut a piece of a 5mm bamboo knitting needle (as 5mm sticks have been wicked hard to find, and these fit perfectly), glued it (can't remember if just regular Gorilla glue or their super glue) and once dry, painted it. I did two holes to see how the distance would look as the further it is, the better the turn ratio.
And lastly... The ZXB-01B kit added, which I find really helps give it a much more "finished" look to the trailer. Note that this kit is 3d printed, so it has a bit of a gritty feel to it, and the axe it comes with is fine, but mine broke at the connector.. re-glued it and it's ok-ish but not something that I'll probably use much. If I was to state my biggest annoyance with it is that the legs are slide-out, BUT they didn't do any clipping in place design, which means that they cannot provide much support as the friction isn't enough... I tried to modify them to make them hold a bit better but no luck... I have the idea of maybe doing just a small hole to put some pins in... hmm.. maybe a small chain to have the pins as part of the trailer.. that could be stored under.... hmmm.. I think that I just convinced myself to do this! I'll post when it's done!
As mentioned, I went ahead and did execute my plan about the chain and pin. The issue is how the kit is built, so I had to see what approach would work best. The main issue is that the "foot" part is as such... so I figured that the pin would have to rest in the middle, so using a triangular file, I did a small notch that the pin would slide into. Results: So I got a small link chain from the hobby section, which looked "right". The pin is simply some 26 gauge stainless steel wire that I twisted and cut. Now for the other end of the chain, it had to go somewhere, so I heated up a large needle and created a small hole on the side of the trailer and another piece of wire to secure it tight. So when rolling, the pin is easily slid into the panel and holds just fine, and it looks like similar truck/trailer setups that I've seen in real life, so it does not look out of place at all. So there it is... my solution for the "feet" that do not snap in place and were simply cosmetic. Now they do hold in place and do support the side panels when folded down in the "base" mode.
