RG 1/144 Gundam RX-78-2 Part 2

Not the start I was hoping for
First review of the year, first Gunpla work in many, many months, not a good start unfortunately. ^^;

Besides a problem I encountered with the kit itself (which I will get into in a while), all the photos I took during the work progress were gone due to the portable hard disk problem I mentioned in mid December last year. ^^; All the usual step-by-step detailing, the look of parts as they go through said detailing, pretty much everything I captured on photos as I envisioned how the review should be written was gone. ^^; As such, I had to rethink the ways to review the work progress, while thinking about which photos to retake without needing to repeat too much work at the same time. ^^;

The damage of the data loss seems particularly bad considering there were some deviations (as compared to all the other Gunpla reviews I did in the past) for this RG kit, which I will cover last as well. ^^;

Then again, the problem does present an opportunity for me to explore new ways in writing reviews. ^^ Does having fewer pictures makes reviewing the work progress easier to do but covering the same level of details as seen in previous reviews? And is it something I want to extend to other kits in the future as well? ^^ I suppose this review will serve as a pilot attempt to answer those questions. ^^

Right off the bat, something different as compared to my usual detailing work: I went ahead and assembled the left leg immediately after detailing all its parts. ^^



The curiosity in trying out the Advanced MS Joint part got the better of me and I had to try out the assembly right away to find out its special points. ^^ Many of the parts were really tiny, so I took extra care during the assembly process in fear of losing or breaking any of them. Moving the pre-assembled joint to bend the knee was quite a gut-wrenching experience. ^^ The joint felt so tough at the beginning, and I was genuinely worried it would break before the 180-degree knee bend could be achieved. Eventually, I steeled my heart and bent the knee as slowly and as steadily as I could, and a full knee bend is indeed possible with the special joint. ^^





Knee bend with sliding thigh armor action. ^^


The exposed thigh and knee sections are designed to be rather hollow it seems. ^^
While the completed leg itself turned out fine, I had problems with some of its parts and one of the Realistic Decal pieces. ^^;


The bottom knee armor parts were cracked on their surface after the leg was completed - I have no idea that caused that. ^^; The problem was worsened when the cracks took in the panel liner's ink, which helped (in a super bad way ^^;) to "highlight" the cracks.


The parts were sanded using paper file, then painted using Gaia Color Military Series No. 223 Interior Color (previously used on MG Zeta Plus A1), Gundam Marker White (mixed very lightly with gray from Gundam Marker Gray), and Gaia Color 073 Neutral Gray III (mixed very lightly with white from Gundam Marker White) for the different panel sections.


The largest crack right on top the knee cover were covered up using a red clear sticker from HGUC Zudah.


One of the bent corners of the golden Realistic Decal piece behind the knee joint came loose not too long after it was applied to the part. The problem was solved by fixing the loose corner onto the part using superglue.
The left leg is the only component I assemble so far, as I was reminded of the reason I chose to keep all detailed and painted parts of a kit for a while before returning to assemble them: some of the freshly applied panel lines get rubbed off very easily when the parts are being assembled, and I had to keep returning to some of them to reapply the details. Everything was messy to say the least. ^^;

For that matter, the detailing work starting with parts for the right leg was much closer to my usual approach in Gunpla-ing, and a lot more organized to my liking as well. ^^


The Advanced MS Joint part for the right leg.



Trying out the knee bend with just the pre-assembled frame.


All the detailed parts of the right leg.


Parts that were detailed using a combination of normal panel liner and
Tamiya's Panel Line Accent Color (Black).
For uniformity, the right knee cover (bottom left corner) was given the same red clear sticker even though there's no crack mark on it.


Sharpened toothpick was used to clean out excess panel liner paint inside the knee joint's "buttons".


Panel lining on the dark gray parts were just as hard to see during the work as they are when the work is done. ^^;


Detailing on some of the other parts that were done using normal panel liner.


Panel lining for some of the parts extend to their sides, and even to the back.
Moving on the feet and arms next. ^^