Volks 1/100 "The Bang"
First, I don’t really know why Volks calls this kit “The Bang” when in the manga there’s more than one and they’re called “bang dolls”. Maybe that sounds too sexual.
Second, I’m apologizing right now about the quality of these pictures. As I’m about the describe, I was just overjoyed that it was in one piece and had to snap a few pictures to share. I didn’t even have my nicer camera with me at the time, so I had to settle with the one on hand. Just FYI, the first picture accurately shows the colors on him since that’s how I arranged the lighting the best. The other pictures are just to show you other angles.
I could go into the specifications on the machine, but you might as well just go to this page:
http://www.gearsonline.net/fss/mh/bangdoll/bangdoll.php
if you’re interested. He’s from the manga “Five Star Stories”, which you should all read. Suffice to say that it’s one of the most powerful machines in the series, and the pilot of the one seen in the series is pretty bad ass as well.
This was an early Christmas present from my girlfriend and I want to point out first that I do love the kit and the mech itself because I’m about to complain for a while.
Now to the details of the kit. It was a pain in the ass! Seriously, I haven’t done a PG Gundam model yet, but I assume they are for the most part easier than this. First, it doesn’t snap together like a Bandai kit. Every piece is held together by a generous amount of plastic cement. This wouldn’t be such a problem, but he does end up seeming fairly fragile. At any one point it seems like he could fall apart. I know he won’t but still. The main problem with this is that sometimes the pieces don’t even feel like they fit together properly. So, you have in your hand a fragile piece, and then you’re jamming another piece into it. Something is bound to brake.
I actually lost a incredibly small piece on the underside of the headdress that holds those “floating” pieces in. I was jamming the metal piece in and the really small hole piece flew off somewhere. Why couldn’t they have just build the hole into the main piece? Why did you have to cement a piece that small onto a larger piece?
But the worst part, by far, is the fact that they wanted to make the piece movable. But it didn’t work, they joints that are supposed to be movable just fall apart when you’re trying to move them even a little bit. It actually took me like an hour and a half to put the arms on and attach the shield/sword. This really should have taken like 5 minutes.
Then there’s the fact that he won’t stand. Hence the box he’s leaning on. What I’m going to do is try my hand at making a diorama for him. I had him standing for a minute but then a small bump into the table made him face-plant.
But again, don’t take all this as meaning that I don’t like it. Quite the opposite. It’s a great kit and I had a lot of fun putting it together. I just think Volks could have done some things better.
And, as you can see, he still isn’t “finished” I need to do some lining and touch-ups, and then of course the decals and the diorama. But I really like him, so I wanted to share :)
design wise, those five star stories kit are just for standing purpose
i can't even imagine a robot still able to walk with those... hair contraption?
how is the manga fight anyway, super robot like isn't it?
and don't mention about the price of that item... i usually seen them sold for 20000 yen at the lowest, or highest, not sure
Nah, it's not that expensive. He's just an injection plastic model.
http://www.volks.co.jp/JP/fss/ims_bang/index.html
He was 8000 yen, which is pretty reasonable.
But yeah, I wish they had just made him in a fixed pose and had him more stable instead of messing with trying to make him pose-able. It really just didn't work.
its called artist tweak LOL
there's a phrase says "the more joint a structure have, the more chance it will failed" or something like that
but joints do sells aren't it?
also, this kit problem seem to be MUCH more lethal than kotobukiya injection kits, they aren't not really made to be snap fitted and played
The "hair" bits which touch the ground are meant to be sensors. Supposedly, mortar heads use the data from then to balance themselves and whatnot.
As for the manga, it's closer to real robot than super, but a single mortarhead is pretty much an army in itself. Some later MH also show some super robot abilities such as controlling the weather but it's bases on sound scientific tech from that universe. No "it's getter rays" explaination.
And 20000 yen is about average for a 1/100 resin kit which is what most kits are. My knigt of gold set me back around 28,000 yen. For the most expensive, that is definitely the jags mirage. You'd be looking at a 150,000yen+ monster which would be over a meter tall when fully equipped.
Well, if you're looking for FSS kits which are easier to put together you can always try the Wave kits. I haven't tried them myself though.
The thing here is, this one doesn't really seem to be a snap fit kit. Looks like it's a more traditional injection model which requires more work on the side. Well worth it though. Mamoru Nagano might just be one of the best mechanical designers this world has seen.
may be a powerful mortar head but I bet I wouldn't be able to stand against the mirage series of the AKD!
And I'm sorry to say but pretty much all the FSS kits are exceptionally hard to build, injection plastic or not. That's the tradeoff for the insane level of detail in each one. That and, structurally, most of them should be impossible to create anyway!
I wonder if there's a bang doll kit out here which tranforms from he ugly husk seen while it's transported...
True, but then again it wasn't funded/designed by a God either ;)
Again, I'm not so irritated by the difficulty. I had fun with it. My main problem is just that I wish they made the moving parts actually work. I have to force in one arm and then when I'm forcing in the other it pops out. I have a feeling that when I get it into a diorama I'm going to just cement it into place.
You should've tried military and car kits. Compared to them, this relatively new kit is a walk in the park. I've built stuff before where I had to attach individual nuts and bolts without any indentation or marker to indicate where to put them o_0