[MOC] Mobile Suit RX-78-2 Gundam

[Phoxtane]

It's done!

It's been extremely cold and snowy outside recently, so I figured it would look pretty nice standing in the snow.

I'm a recent convert to a Gundam fanatic - I've only seen Gundam 00 and Gundam Unicorn as of yet. I have plans to watch Gundam SEED and Gundam Wing soon though. I was going to build one of the Gundam mobile suits from Gundam 00, but since that's a much newer show they're extremely greebly and have tiny bits sticking off in every direction. RX-78-2 is much more iconic, and consists of quite a bit more flat surfaces, so I figured I had a better chance of building it with the limited parts collection and time I had. In fact, I decided I wanted to build a Gundam for a LUG display this year... three weeks before the show was scheduled. I figure that I put anywhere from 25-30 hours into this MOC, and I'm quite in love with the results.

In fact, it looked quite good standing in the middle of our display:

(I did hear more than one comment to the effect of 'That Transformer looks cool!' )

Though I did hear one 'stoic' applied, so I guess that evens it out!

Of course we need to look at it up close...

I had to apply two chest reduction surgeries to make everything look right

I was originally going to go for the fancy rocket-backpack that my reference images had, but I eschewed that as I needed something sideways to hold the top onto the bottom apart from the few studs-up connections in the torso. A good thing too, because it hasn't fallen apart since! (This was an issue in the WIP model...)

Possibly the one thing within the Gundam series that's more iconic than the titular mobile suits themselves: the Beam Saber!

Let's not forget the accessories either:

The Beam Magnum!

The Medium Shield!

The Beam Saber! Nothing too fancy here, this was the last item to be put together - it was the night before and I had to get up rather early... but it does its job!

An accessories-only shot appears to be all the rage with Lego mech stuff nowadays, so here's one!

And let's finish off with some more images:

Some final thoughts...

I did design it with full mobility in the joints, but it's just too heavy to really be posed in anything resembling an action shot. This is due to the weakness of the ankle joints, which are just standard Lego ball joint bricks; they're too weak to stand up to the weight and as a result the whole model is extremely prone to tipping over. To help counter this, I added some bricks surrounding the joint, but the result is that I can't really pose it in a proper action pose. In addition, the knee joints have limited travel due to the pieces I used to attach the short cone-like round pieces that you can see in the images.

The arms are also fully poseable, but due to the fact that the armor pauldrons are attached to the body with a single Technic friction pin, there ends up not being enough force inherent in the joint to hold up the arm. The arm itself is attached to the pauldron with a ball joint and is therefore independently poseable from the pauldron.

The next time I build a mobile suit or mecha on this scale, I'll have to look into increasing the poseability dramatically. I was starting to run out of tiles at the end and had to do some clever things to stretch my supply enough to cover the arms. Going studded was *not* an option!

Overall, I feel that this project was well worth the time and effort I put into it. It's going to stay together for a long while, I think!

The WIP thread can be viewed here: http://www.eurobrick...howtopic=101957

Edited November 18, 2014 by Phoxtane

[Zerobricks]

Looks a bit erm... chubby, but besides that its quite awesome. Can you post the reference picture here too.

Edited November 18, 2014 by Zblj

[Phoxtane]

These are also visible in the WIP thread.

[Mestari]

it looks great in the middle of the city, like it belongs there ;)

[Jared]

Very nice, but I have some small criticism. You definitely stayed true to the show's tendency for simple animation and making the suit look bulky, so I commend you on that! That's also the problem, it's definitely a bit too wide. Otherwise, some solid detail. Hope to see an improved version soon!

[Only Sinner]

The suit looks good, I especially like the head. Nice detail with all those accessories, too.