MK44 mods

Well it's been a while since my last confession, but here's another update on the MK44 build... Quite a lot has happened even though not a lot seems to have changed.

The main build is done, but when I finished it there was one thing that just annoyed me to bits.
And that thing was the gun.
Not so much the weapon itself, but more the limited and frankly stupid way, the suit was able to hold it. Movement in the arms is so (limited) that it can hold point the gun to the side. To its left side.
That was just too dumb. This is supposed to be a machine of war.... in space.
Anway I decided to scratch it a new gun and I decided to integrate it into it's left arm. Like the smaller Ma.K suits.

It took a few attempts before I settled on a design I though best followed the lines and flow of the suit.
The first attempt I use the cap of a Copic marker and some of the remains of the original gun but this one looked too much like a pirate's peg leg:

Then the second attempt adding a more asymmetric element... didn't really solve the problem:

Then a builder friend of mine noted to lack of continuation of the lines of the arm.. and I had to agree, so I scraped the whole marker cap approach.

Third attempt was getting somewhere but still a little boring. I used acrylic nails, styrne tube and Aves putty for this.

The final design was close enough but had a little more detail:

So that was the weapon sorted. Then there was the issue of the shoulder plates. These things... what can I say. The didn't fit right, didn't fall naturally, they hit the top of the lower arm, the just looked off.

So I got rid of them. I tried shortening them but it just didn't work, so I chucked them.

But now the shoulder joints were too exposed, which wouldn't make sense on a futuristic space war machine... so I scratched him a couple of shoulder cover type things.

I think they work. Someone on Maschinen Kreuger's forum said it made him look less "Ma.K" which I get, but I decided not to care.

After a lot of ooh-ing and ah-ing I decided I was going to be presenting this guy in a garage / maintenance type of situation. The cockpit turned out pretty well and I don't think I have the guts or the talent to ever take a hacksaw to a regular Ma.K kit to scratch an open suit version so I figured this was going to be it. An open suit. 

This will need some further detailing/modding/scratch building. 

I want him connected to a good few hoses and wires eventually and a logical one would be a fuel hose.... but where would it go. The only really logical spot was und the bulbs cap on the back of the fuel tank. So I pried it off and turned into a petrol cap with a tank opening under it. 

The hose will have nice nozzle on the end of it eventually...

And then there was some further work to be done on the cockpit. Apart from som more painted details that I plan to do the armholes needed to be more like actual holes.

They are pretty shallow in the orginal kit so I took the dremel to it and deepened the holes. The I was satisfied with the depth (or rather when I was afraid got any deeper in fear of the arms falling off) I made some paying on the inside with Aves putty.

I nicked the left 'leather' part of the arm hole so this will need some further restoration and a new paint job but I'm pretty happy with the results thus far.

In the meantime I've also started work on an Oskar but I'll show you more of that next time...

Until then... meet Eddie. He's got asthma....

Thanks for looking, let me know what you think in the comments below.

Cheers,

Martijn

MK44 White Knight

The Snake Eye has been put on hold until I have gathered the motivation to build it a vignette... so I started building this new thing. The MK44 White Knight a collab of sorts between Ma.K and Battle Robot V... google will teach you more.

A Hasegawa kit, which means this thing just builds itself. It's got a lot of options and features in terms of posing and detail. You can leave the suite open or just the hatch and you can (with a little added detailing) even leave most of the engine exposed.

I'm still building it so I haven't decided on most of these options yet.

So far the build is almost done and the cockpit is neigh on complete as far as paint.

One thing about this model that I don't like is the weaponry... to be honest it's kind of a pet peeve of mine about the quite a few Ma.K. models. The weaponry doesn't seem to be related to the size of the machine. In the suits it's not too bad, but in most of the bigger machines (Krote, Gans) the weaponry seem way to light to justify such a big machine carrying it around.

Anyway I think this guy need a better and less clumsy gun... or laser canon thing (it's a space faring unit). I'll probably sacrifice his left arm for it.

Here are some process shot... excuse the quality, they were shot with my phone.

 

 Added some decals and a simple wash to the cockpit.

Snake Eye chipping and first stain

So here's another quick update.

After some deliberation amongst the members of the newly form modelling club I'm part of I decided to repaint the cockpit.
The way it was it lacked a certain 'pop'.
I repainted the metal parts a 'cockpit' green and gave the cushioned parts a more modern rubber look instead of the traditional leather. Added a small decal (hardly visible... oh well)

Now the cockpit has a more interesting contrast with the exterior.

After that I added some paint chips. Painted this time again. Sometimes I actually scratch the pain off, but with that wimpy Vallejo primer under there I didn't want to risk it... about Vallejo, I sent them an email to ask what I was doing wrong (all over the interwebs there's people talking about it's durability but it just falls of the plastic when I use it). I'm going to properly test it out in a later post.

Anyway chips painted on by hand. Then a coat of gloss varnish and the first thin sludge wash... The guy whi expained this technique to me (who is himself a master at it) calls it a stain... so I think I'll start calling it that too. Symantics.

Anyhow have a gander.

Cheers,
Martijn

ps: pics taken with my phone; lazy.

Snake Eye Decals

The decals are on. I had to source most them from other kit's decal sheet as most of the Snake Eye ones are a dark grey... useless on this red one (especially after I'm done putting the washes on).

It's very shiny from the gloss varnish I put on for the decals to stick better (less chance of silvering) and to help the oil washes (next up) to flow into the various nooks and crannies.

That's all for now.

Snake Eye Base Paints Done

This is this is the base paints done.

I added a last layer of lighter orange reds and some white banding.

Usually you don't see this strong banding on the Mercenary machines but I'll be using decals from Strahl kits. So the back story is that this is a captured Mercenary machine, repainted and deployed in some Mars sabotage mission... hey it's called styrene DREAMS for a reason.

Anyway, I added white banding and next up will be the decals (really this time).