I first bought Dreadwind in a toy distributor shop in Rochor Centre... I was digging thru' in the big bin of old toys when I founded him, as well as an old bootleg red colour Macross Valkyrie VF-1A, and a chapalang gestalt consisting of Hellbat, Gaihawk (Lio Caesar), Starsilver, Jetsilver (Silverion).. This is quite an old piece, considering the faded and tattered cardboard, and lots of dust... Anyway, liked it a lot... At home, realised the joints are loose, ad worse, the powermaster is non-transformable!! So, without further ado, lemme present you with the repairs & mods of Dreadwind:
Dreadwind:
I'll talk about the powermaster later. I did not mod Dreadwind to really have the real powermaster engine gimmick, just 2 small holes to allow the powermaster to transform into the engine to attach to the body. Below pic shows the robot mode, after I painted his head closer to the real toy colour scheme.
Few years later (I think), I bump into this "reissue" KO of Darkwing... Finally, Dreadwing (Dreadwind + Darkwing) is complete! Realised the arms are quite tight, since new ones, but the legs are too loose... so used some cardboard strips to toghten the inside of the legs so that they remain tight when slide out... work perfectly, and bonus enabling the click tight function!! Now Darkwing can stand tall & proud... Below shows the jet mode...
Edit: Took some pics of the internal repair that I did earlier... Stick (with thin double-sided tape)some cardboard strips (cut to size) on the 2 sides of each lower leg (also with thin double-sided tape). This creates a path & tigh friction for the upper leg to slide snuggly to form the legs and stay in place, as it enables the locking-mechanism to work well.
A close-up look at 1 leg opened up....
Hope this helps fellow KO collectors who bought this "chewy dog toy" version of Darkwing...
Below pic shows Darkwing, notice his the painted head...
Powermasters (Throttle & Hi Test):
Ok, purple on the left is Throttle (Darkwing) and on the right is Hi Test (Dreadwind). Basically, I cut out the legs, replace the tighs by some plastic parts, hollow the buttock ares in the body piece, and use Tamiya plastic connector pins to hold the legs in place. Since joints are quite tight, they dun come out even if you swivel the legs or tighs, unless you really force them out hard... Tight-fit 2 small pieces of the pins into the arms, to act as connectors to the main body... Sounds quite simple hor.. but hell, it is damn hard work... especially the 1st one, Hi Test, which I have absolutely no idea how to make it work and attach to Dreadwind... Throttle is easier, in comparison...
Ok, purple on the left is Throttle (Darkwing) and on the right is Hi Test (Dreadwind). Basically, I cut out the legs, replace the tighs by some plastic parts, hollow the buttock ares in the body piece, and use Tamiya plastic connector pins to hold the legs in place. Since joints are quite tight, they dun come out even if you swivel the legs or tighs, unless you really force them out hard... Tight-fit 2 small pieces of the pins into the arms, to act as connectors to the main body... Sounds quite simple hor.. but hell, it is damn hard work... especially the 1st one, Hi Test, which I have absolutely no idea how to make it work and attach to Dreadwind... Throttle is easier, in comparison..."Powermaster~!!!"
Powermaster brothers, united....
Joints are tight, nice superjet, in fact, the white+blue+purple colour makes it looks nicer than the original toys' over-variety of colours... (almost) Indestructible power of the cartoon powermasters' vehicles!!!!! hahaha...... I like this 2 KOs...
"Combine to form ~ Dreadwing!"
Joints are tight, nice superjet, in fact, the white+blue+purple colour makes it looks nicer than the original toys' over-variety of colours... (almost) Indestructible power of the cartoon powermasters' vehicles!!!!! hahaha...... I like this 2 KOs... More to come...
I know is an old post, but thank you for showing these KO TFs! I couldn't find anything more on the net. I just run into a Darkwing and Dreadwing KO set that looks like very similar to yours (the only difference seems to be some decals), but I wanted to know what to expect before buying.
ReplyDeleteMost welcomed. In general , for the KO transforming toys market, there are too many variants. It has been a long time I last involve heavily into the KO transformers, so not sure if this Dreadwing set has any new variants, what I can remember is if the plastic looks very "shampoo-bottle"-like, or the each TF have just 2 tones of colours eg. for mine is white,purple or blue ), then it is likely similar to what I have. Some people hate this type of plastic as it is not possible to use normal super-glue to stick, nor good to file. For me, I don't mind, as I also collect and display them for nostalgic purpose. Don't mind me nagging, after so many years (20+) of collection, I come to realise that "buy first, regret (and throw away) later" is better than "don't buy, (may) regret forever" as you may not be able to find that KO anymore, in this very volatile KO TF market. But in the end, it is entirely your freedom to decide and make the final call =) . All the best !!!
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