Transformers : Toys, transforming, tantrums and triumphs!

[The Doctor]

Let us not speak of it again.

-Ralph

[Philip Ayres]

Actually I think there were at least 6 of us, possibly 7 (Martin & Matt, me, you4) and it took longer than an hour.

And then there was Jetfire.

It knocks Ralph's RID Ultra Magnus experience into a hat.....

.... F*** I've just said RID Ultra Magnus. RUN!

[The Doctor]

Oh FFS! It's been over 10 years! 10 years! Let it go!!!

-Ralph

[dyrl]

Jazz - the original Jazz. I got him in 1992 as part of the uk classics line. I was used to the scramble city and post movie Headmasters which were much simpler and more kid friendly than diaclone. Jazz was amazingly complex for me - compared to, say, Motivator Lightspeed...

[Benn]

so.... what is the problem with Breacher? I have no issues with him at all.

[Philip Ayres]

The original comments appear to be off board... but Breacher's Review Thread has a few hints

[blueshift]

Jan 2, 2013 22:59:22 GMT Philip Ayres said:

The original comments appear to be off board... but Breacher's Review Thread has a few hints

He's fine!!!

[Philip Ayres]

One of my friends at church was having trouble with the Voyager Optimus she'd bought her son for Christmas. It had taken her 40 mins. I got her to bring it to church today and it took me 5 without the instructions

[Bogatan]

WFC Prime and Bumblebee. By far the most stupidly difficult to align.

[kayevcee]

I did a presentation on the history of Transformers at KAUST in one of our weekly piss-about gatherings. I had a few figures from home with me and I brought them along for afterwards. I recall the sight of three engineering graduates standing around a confused tangle of yellow limbs followed by a cry of "Nick! What are we doing wrong?"

Engineers. Three of them. Couldn't do WFC Bumblebee. I'm just saying.

-Nick

[Toph]

Can't remember if I said this or not, and I'm too stupid to backtrack and re-read my own posts.
Deathstar Vader.

And oddly enough, any transformer that turns into some facimely of a ball is at least tricky. Unicron, Primus, BWN Deadend. Wouldn't rank them as the most difficult, but they're all tricky enough to be counter intuitive to what you'd think.

[Bogatan]

Yeah, Bee is the worst. Normally a toy that is hard to transform gets easier with some practice and once you remember the order of steps. Bee seems to be in a permanent state of flux, its never the same order and sometimes its just too big to squash together

[KoshNaranek]

WFC Prime, MP Megatron, Alt's Grimlock and Wheeljack and Deathstar Vader are the only ones I've transformed once and couldn't be arsed to do again.

- Tony

[Philip Ayres]

If you recall I was forced to issue a RID Magnus warning on the WFC Prime and BB to stop Ralph buying them!

[The Doctor]

That fucking toy!

-Ralph

[Philip Ayres]

The last few days the Generations Ultimate Giftset RTS OP has been tasking me somewhat.... the problem was only solved today when the original RTS carded one arrived and I could see what it was supposed to look like but even then I can't quite get everything to line up right

[Deleted]

prob already mentioned but...Leader Class DOTM Sentinel Prime & Star Wars Transformers Death Star Vader! the Death Star is a major pain in trying to line up all those panels

[Pinwig]

(was Unfathomable transformations)

On my slow crawl through cataloguing my boxes of tatt Transformers I'm beginning to see the bell curve in the complexity of transformation that peaked a few years ago and prompted Hasbro to go for this simplified approach. I mean, I can pick up Beast Era stuff which I probably only ever transformed once anyway and instinctively know how to transform it back and forth (the only one I needed to find the sheet for was Magnaboss), but I do find toys of the last few years less instinctive to transform. I even struggled with ones like Scorn. But - the question here then. Have you got any Transformers you have never managed to totally turn from one mode to the other and back?

My candidate here is ROTF Leader Jetfire. I will hold my hands up here, I have never managed to successfully get this figure into his blackbird mode. Nearly, but it never quite fits together. I had another go yesterday and gave up again. The instructions are rubbish. I must have a look for a youtube video. 

[Dezzeh]

ROTF Prime and MP Megs - Though the Megs is more because I expect it to fall apart when I touch it.

[Shockprowl]

Yep MP Megatron for as well, and for the same reason. I had The Fear, Man, I had The Fear! And I still got The Fear!!!

MP Megs sits safely in his box in the loft.

I get stuck on the Bombshell part of Tripredacus. Got him loose, no instructions, so still never done it right.

The UTTERLYSH1TYSH1TIHATETHEMIHATETHEM 'Classics' Ironhide/Ratchet freakin' broken egg shell CRAAAAAPPPPP-Former piece of filth. AAAAARRGGHH!!!!!!


And that Horse......

Dear God the Horse......

[Llama God]

I have managed RotF Prime in the past - it's mostly his chest pieces that fox me. ("Pull these tight tabs out of his chest, supressing your fear that you will break this expensive piece of plastic!")

My own personal unfathomables are mostly to do with panel-formers, and the completely inability to get all of the internal pieces to line up in such a way that all the panels snap together smoothly. On this front, RotF Prime is actually fantastic - once you figure out the fiddly bits, his panels all lock into place at the last moment. Clever, that. The two worst offenders of this though are Leader Sentinel Prime, who I've never gotten into fire truck mode completely, and Trans-Scanning Optimus Prime, whose truck mode I was only able to complete by removing all the truck panels from the inner skeleton and assembling them separately...

[Bogatan]

Beyond that one stupid bit of design on the chest theres nothing that hard about ROTF Prime.

For me the unfathomable ones aren't the hard ones, its the ones that I can't transform without something popping off, either I haven't worked out the right sequence or the design is poor/tolerances too tight. In that category I would list the Universe Prowl mould, those doors are a nightmare not to pop off. MP3 has those little pegged on bits on the side of the intakes and theres a bit on Megatron that is very hard to avoid popping off.

I used to have trouble with Big Convoy but after checking about 500 Ultra Mammoths, okay more like 6, but thats still a time consuming endeavour, last year I come to see it as surprisingly easy.

Having said that I would still rate Takaras Beast Wars output as the toughest of the tough. ROTF overall second, but not for the leaders. I've always thought of Jetfire as one of the easier toys in the line. The Constructicons (aside from the big combiner ones) are a challenge as are plenty of the deluxe cars.

[Philip Ayres]

There's similar other threads on the board. Bear with while I hunt them down and merge them

[Pinwig]

Jul 31, 2014 14:58:36 GMT Bogatan said:

Having said that I would still rate Takaras Beast Wars output as the toughest of the tough. ROTF overall second, but not for the leaders. I've always thought of Jetfire as one of the easier toys in the line.

Right, there's a challenge. Come here Jetfire, let's have another go.

I thought there might be a thread on this already; interesting reading looking at the patterns.

[Shockprowl]

Jul 31, 2014 15:53:03 GMT Pinwig said:

Jul 31, 2014 14:58:36 GMT Bogatan said:

Having said that I would still rate Takaras Beast Wars output as the toughest of the tough. ROTF overall second, but not for the leaders. I've always thought of Jetfire as one of the easier toys in the line.

Right, there's a challenge. Come here Jetfire, let's have another go.

BUT WHAT OF 'THE FEAR'?!?!

DON'T YOU HAVE 'THE FEAR'?!?!

[KnightBeat]

I struggle with ROTF Prime's robot-to-vehicle conversion. It takes ages to get the various arm components to line up to create the front section.

[Pinwig]

Jul 31, 2014 16:18:46 GMT Shockprowl said:

Jul 31, 2014 15:53:03 GMT Pinwig said:

Right, there's a challenge. Come here Jetfire, let's have another go.

BUT WHAT OF 'THE FEAR'?!?!

DON'T YOU HAVE 'THE FEAR'?!?!

I certainly have the FEAR of wasting hours on trying. I haven't got to it yet. What I'm finding funny is that the ratchet joints in his knees seem to have gone a bit, so very characteristically, this Jetfire can't stand up properly because his knees have gone.

Now I did lol at that. Lovely figure this, so full of character. I remember why I bought it now while the rest of the movie stuff sucks.

[Pinwig]

I did it! Oh yes, I overcame the fear! I transformed Jetfire into his Blackbird mode without the use of Youtube! I sat down last night with a slow documentary on the TV and it only took me 70 minutes, and I didn't get annoyed!

This is one big accurate looking plane. Very impressive. I also discovered the point that I gave up last time and the reason why; there was some mould flashing on the plastic that stopped some of the panels forming the body of the plane. I'd not noticed that. However I certainly got the fear trying to work out how his arms should rotate so the cockpit section would fit together, and what the hell is the rubber band bit for? is it used when he combines with Prime? it serves no use in robot mode and just gets in the way when you're trying to fold up the legs into plane mode.

I was doing this to pack him away in a box, but that plane is so impressive that I want to leave it out for now! But if this point, along with leader Prime, was the pinnacle of difficult transformations I can see why the change happened. There's no way a kid could do this unaided. No way. It nearly broke me, those arms almost had me giving up, especially when the rest of the panels kept popping out, but I got there!

Do I get a badge?

[Shockprowl]

You do indeed, intrepid transformerer of difficult Transformers!

I nominate ye for no less than TWO badges!

The Conquerer of RoTF Leader Jetfire badge, and the TMUK Inner-Zen badge for overcoming THE FEAR!

All those in favour?!

[kayevcee]

Sounds reasonable.

-Nick