Ssber Tiger WIP part 3: waist

I actually finished this last night but I was a bit too tired to put it up so here it is now.

Picking up from before the part we are going to look at is the midsection. Its are rather small part but nonetheless Kotobukiya has packed it with smaller pieces. The 2 long pipes and the 2 curved parts at the top are made from the soft PVC material so its quite flexible and despite what I've heard I have not had any dodgy fitting pipes which like to wriggle around. Lucky me =P

From Onderon's gallery

It looks like something from a motor cycle doesn't it? The connection peg at the front and back is what connects that section to the front torso and the hindquarters. The back peg which is the one pointing down is on a swivel joint which allows for some degree of movement between the sections. There is a similar joint at the base of the front torso as well.

From Onderon's gallery

From Onderon's gallery

After that is the waist or the hindquarters and again its rather straightforward. A not of interest is that the hydraulics this time are stationary so its just 2 parts stuck together unlike the others in the kit. I guess one of the reasons for this is that it serves no real purpose for the model and its just some extra details as a bonus, the hydraulics get covered up by the red armor and later hidden by the legs anyways so its no big deal.

From Onderon's gallery

Because I forgot to talk about the front shoulder joints I've included the ones for the back XD. both front and back joints are really similar so you can probably guess at how it comes together from the parts picture 1 WIP ago.

From Onderon's gallery

The red armor pieces gave me some trouble as they were reluctant to fit into place but it was more of a bad peg positioning where I couldn't tell where the hole was rather than bad QC.

From Onderon's gallery

From Onderon's gallery

See that hole? its where the peg I mentioned earlier fits into and just underneath that are 2 square openings for the PVC tubes to fit into.

From Onderon's gallery

And here's whats been done till now and its coming along heaps well.

From Onderon's gallery

From Onderon's gallery

Counting the grid on the cutting mat might help you appreciate the size of the saber tiger.

From Onderon's gallery

Slaps some wheels on it and its a kickass motorcycle lawl.

From Onderon's gallery

The underside of the zoid is abit plain atm but thats to be expected since theres suppose to be a chest cannon mounted there.

From Onderon's gallery

Expected the legs to go up sometime this sunday and thats it for now.

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Saber Tiger WIP Part 2: Torso

From Onderon's gallery

Ok so heres the next part of the review and build up. For those following my progress I think you'll be as excited as I am. So without further ado lets dive in!

Immediately after the head is the neck. Simple affair with plenty of details and the first use of the chrome gold parts which are the hydraulics and the H shaped part is made from soft vinyl which are the mesh piping we'll see throughout the kit.

From Onderon's gallery

We are starting to see the streamlining of the Saber Tigers body already with the neck which tapers to the base and curves inwards at the throat.

From Onderon's gallery

From Onderon's gallery

The torso which is the largest section of the kit is composed of 55 parts. The picture I took is missing about 25 pieces cos I'm an idiot and by the time I realised my mistake it was too late to fix (read: too lazy.

From Onderon's gallery

For something made of so many smaller parts it is remarkably strong and here we can see the first example of moving hydraulics in the kit which slide in and out as the shoulder joints move. Ignore the giant gap in the middle as that's where the zoid core fits and we'll get to that in a sec.

From Onderon's gallery

From Onderon's gallery

Once the torso is put together it resembles something out of a tank with its bulk but the curvatures of the armor lends it the sleekness and rounds off the rough edges. Despite what the pictures look like it is much rounded in person and pictures just don't do it justice.

From Onderon's gallery

From Onderon's gallery

Here is the zoid core which I have to apologize for forgetting to take a pic of the parts but theres about 7 parts in total including the red orb.

From Onderon's gallery

Opens up so the core can be removed and played around with?

From Onderon's gallery

Here's whats been done so far.

From Onderon's gallery

Although its too dark I think it captures the Saber Tigers aggressiveness perfectly despite it being an amputee atm.

From Onderon's gallery

I also want to mention that the armor on the side of the torso can also shift around depending on shoulder movement.

I'll leave you guys here for now so sit tight for the next part!

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Saber Tiger WIP Part 1: Head

Ok ok, I know that I said I'll start the WIP on Sunday but I'm weak so forgive me =P To make up for it I'll stage the build into parts and starting with just the head today.

I couldn't be bothered with taking a picture of all the parts pre-assembly so you'll have to take my word for it when I say there are 30 parts just for this section. Pretty big if I must say so myself.

First up is the canopy which is comprised of only 3 parts and 1 of the 2 transparent parts of this kit.

From Onderon's gallery

The 'skull' is fairly straight forward a solid construction and a really nifty feature is the dashboard piece which is heaps detailed.

From Onderon's gallery

From Onderon's gallery

Here we have the zoids namesake. The teeth are actually more of a creamy color than white and the only problem here was the smallest grey piece on the left which didn't fit properly so I had to bust out the hobby knife and make it fit lawl.

From Onderon's gallery

...and believe me when I say that the teeth are sharp

From Onderon's gallery

Finally some semblance as to what it should look like. The cheeks each are made up of 6 parts and here we also see the 'scruff' which is also molded in the reddy orange

From Onderon's gallery

Here is what the head looks like when completed and it is breathtaking. The red armor are loaded with minute details and it captures the fierceness of an over grown mecha tiger.

From Onderon's gallery

Nom nom nom nom nom...

From Onderon's gallery

I forgot to mention that the part count does not include the pilot cos I think its kind of lame to stick one in but if u must know the bugger consists of 4 parts torso legs and each arm.

Stay Tuned for more!

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Saber Tiger

After many months of drooling and temptation I've finally got my hands on the 1/72 HMM Saber Tiger by Kotobukiya. As some of you may know this would be my second foray into these beautiful kits. If the Cannon Tortoise was any indication then I wont be disappointed.

First off, the box art is amazing. It effortlessly captures the aggressiveness and grace of the zoid. Just one look and you know the Tiger means bussiness.

From Onderon's gallery

Despite what Tofu says about the box being the size of a 1/144 I think the following picture gives us a sense of how immense the kit is.

From Onderon's gallery

I'm impressed with the amount of runners, with a staggering 32 runners, the last MG i built being the Sinanju only had around 23 and only topped by the MG EX-S at 40+.

Here are scans of the front and back of the manuals with what the Saber Tiger would look like when complete (although it is heavily painted with some moderate shading) and it certainly does not lack in the details department.

From Onderon's gallery

From Onderon's gallery

This is probably my favourite page out the manual. Nothing beats kickass lineart imo.

From Onderon's gallery

And to round off this part of the preview here's a close up of one of the armor runners. The shade of red/orange is almost perfect although a certain somebody will probably complain about the picture being too dark but what the hey the light in my room sucks so tough luck.

From Onderon's gallery

Stay tuned with a proper WIP by Sunday.

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