G'Day fellow Transformer enthusiasts!

[FoxMalcolm]

G'Day fellow Transformer enthusiasts!

I am a Graphic Design Student currently living in Melbourne.
Until September of 2011 I hadn't owned a single TF since I was 12 [that's about 20 years ago].
I had ended up giving them away to salvos and lifeline . . . actually "giving them away" is such a strong description, a better one would be "blackmailed"!

My mother decided that I was too old for my toys and that I was "required" to fill two garbage bags of my toys [to be given to charity] or else Mum would go through and "fill" two bags for me.

Anyway, last Sept I was at the Camberwell Sunday Markets and I saw a guy selling a G1 Optimus Prime with Trailer for $15.
I didn't really look too hard at its condition or try and barter the guy for it, I just saw it and instantly knew I had to have one again.
The last OP I had was when I was 4 [back in '84] I had decided that Optimus Prime was the wrong colour and so I repainted him purple and green [hey I was 4!]. Speaking of which if anybody has ever encountered a prime like that I would be really interested to know, I was living in Redcliffe, QLD at the time.

Anyway after getting home I set about investigating his condition . . . not good.
This prime has had a rough life of neglect, his paint job was severely chipped and cut with deep scratches that cut into the metal.
His decals were so badly damaged that they disintegrate with the slightest touch.

90% of his chrome was gone and the front windshield had taken a nasty impact.
Ontop of that his arms and legs were so loose that I was afraid of transforming him. Also I noticed that he was starting to suffer from structural fatigue in the plastic parts.

That's the bad news, the good news is that his main body was intact with no warping, his head was virtually unmarred and none of his tyres had any damage [including dry rot].

It was at that point that I discovered I wanted to embark on a new hobby, to repair old TFs and to try and recreate my old collection.

At least that was my goal in the begining since then I have noticed that it has started to spiral out of control, its nigh on impossible or at least expensive to purchase replacement parts for a specific TF by themselves.
Usually in order to get the one part that you need you end up getting 3 or 4 parts plus one or two nearly complete TF's and that then means that you have a couple of new TF's to repair.

Currently I have about 12 complete TF's [including that first Prime who I have since repaired] and about 3-4 kilos of spare parts, lol!
My main area of interest is TF's from around 80's to 2000.

[Omega Supreme]

Welcome to the board!

[Verno]

Welcome aboard Mate!

That's an all too common story around here. Damn mothers whisking their toys off kids!

Get some collection pics up!

[LordCyrusOmega]

Welcome to the board!

Mothers huh? Mine gave away 2 boxes of Masters of the Universe figures, vehicles, accessories and the 2 castles to charity. But she held onto the broken play-do playset in the hope of grandchildren one day. Boggles.The.Mind.

Glad to see another rediscovered childhood favourite.

[5FDP]

http://img820.imageshack.us/img820/6158/drunkprime.jpg

[GoktimusPrime]

http://i6.photobucket.com/albums/y227/goktimusprime/avatars/wb_jetwing_dreadwind.jpg
Have you considered collecting reissues? They're much cheaper and you can collect them in minty mint condition. :) The majority of early G1 toys have been reissued.

[FoxMalcolm]

True, but it is more satisfying for me to repair and restore then to buy mint.
I have always preferred to assemble my toys rather than take out of the box ready to go.
If I buy mint I think the first thing I would do is alter and customise it cause in my mind that makes it more worthwhile.

[FoxMalcolm]

Mothers huh? Mine gave away 2 boxes of Masters of the Universe figures, vehicles, accessories and the 2 castles to charity. But she held onto the broken play-do playset in the hope of grandchildren one day. Boggles.The.Mind.
Yep, had a big amount of HeMan and SheRa stuff, one castle, I think, may have been my Brothers [but I kept pinching it], some smurfs , hot wheels and a really big collection of GiJoe [mostly Cobra].
Oddly enough the only things I got to keep were my model kits, remote controlled cars and all the stuff animals which were taken away cause they were all antiques anyhow.

[GoktimusPrime]

You should talk to kup. He's like Transformers toy MacGuyver - able to rebuild a junker with a paddle pop stick and paper clip! :D (I've seen him in action... it's an incredible sight to behold ;))

[FoxMalcolm]

wait I remember now, I also kept a few ninja turtles . . . . don't know what happened to them in the end

[FoxMalcolm]

You should talk to kup. He's like Transformers toy MacGuyver - able to rebuild a junker with a paddle pop stick and paper clip! :D (I've seen him in action... it's an incredible sight to behold ;))
Cool I look forward to hearing from other restorers.

[liegeprime]

Mabuhay and Welcome to the forum!

Well you could say that prime you got was "Cartoon Movie accurate" ;);) heheh after a battle with Megatron....:D:D:D

So glad my mom isn't typical - she never forced me to give any of my toys away. She just tidied them up in a box until I remember and try to find it - she would just point in my cabinet where the big box is - "have a look in there" I dumped all your stuff in there" - of course it would be followed by the sermon of " honestly you should know better than to tidy up after you play =, your old enough to do that.. blah blah blah" but her not throwing or giving away my stuff is what Im so thankful for:D

Well if you have parts lying around you might consider selling a few bits and pieces. You never know a couple of people here may be trying to get parts to repair their own toys. As youve said it is quite hard finding the parts. I remember when I broke my Shockwave a few months ago:eek::eek::eek::eek: No matter how many superglue you put on it it just wont stick back - the plastic they used back then simply crumbles. Good thing Bruticus sold me a junker one to "harvest" the parts I needed! phew!


Do post up your collection pics please. We here love looking at other collector's/fan's collections. Big or small it doesn't matter... at all.

Are you only collecting G1s or you into any of the newer ones - Im talking about Classics/CHUGURverse ( none of that Bayverse crap heheheh:p)?

Hey A lot of people here collect Gi Joes too, I myself do on and off - well like you, mostly Cobra. Joes are boring, Cobra Rules!!

http://i205.photobucket.com/albums/bb313/liegeprime/Miscellaneous/2716745631-391bed4ba2.jpg

[FoxMalcolm]

Will do, I purchased a whole box of zip lock bags a while ago and organised everything into groups of like parts [once I identified them].
I originally was only going for G1&2 TF's but currently have cybertron, RID, animated, recent movie TF's and various crossovers [star wars, Igear].
Will let you know when I have upload them.

[FoxMalcolm]

Here are the pics (http://www.otca.com.au/boards/showthread.php?p=289219#post289219)

[KalEl]

Welcome! sounds like you had a diaclone convoy when you were a kid.

[liegeprime]

Here are the pics (http://www.otca.com.au/boards/showthread.php?p=289219#post289219)

Cheers :D You definitely have a lot of patience and skill to pull this off. I wouldve just gotten a reissue heheheh:D:D:D

[Hursticon]

http://i1032.photobucket.com/albums/a409/Darkone666au/Webpics/6.gif

Greetings and Welcome to OZformers! :D

2 questions dude :cool::

Who's your favourite character?
Which is your preferred allegiance?


Also, are you a Beast Wars fan by any chance? :o

Sad to hear about your Mother decreeing what she did, a number of the guys and gals around here have had that happen to them but it's good to hear that you've gotten back into them and also get a real kick out of restoring them too. ;):cool:

Quite honourable IMO as I like to think that each individual toy has a life of it's own (Though not on the level of Toy Story, it'd be kinda cool though :p) and the way I look at my own collection is that it is a sort of semi-retirement for them where they can enjoy being handled from time to time without having to be destroyed in the process. :)

[1orion2many]

Welcome to the board:)

[FoxMalcolm]

Who's your favourite character?

That's a tough one . . . when I was a kid, it was definitely Swoop. I remember running around screaming "Me Swoop no see nothing".
As an adult I cannot decide which I like most [they are all great], but if I was to chose which one best represents my character then it would have to be Wrekgar [TF movie '86].
Besides the fact that he repairs and builds from junk, there is just something about that line from the movie that just appeals to my quirky side "Yes friends act now, destroy Unicron - Kill the Grand Poobah! - Eliminate even the toughest stain!!
Which is your preferred allegiance?

Without a doubt -=DECEPTICON=-
I mean lets face it the Decepticons get all the best toys, there just simply is no room in the Autobot budget.
Also on more than one occasion both sides have lost their command structure, when that happens both sides wander around like lost sheep but only the Decepticons continue to do things [Get into brawls, get into personal sub missions, etc]
Also, are you a Beast Wars fan by any chance?

In short, no.
That being said, I used to be offended by the small amount of the TF animated series I saw [I could not stand seeing OP whining about how unfair it was being in charge] but after a while I sat down and watched it fully and by the end I no longer disliked it.
I imagine at some point I will do the same for beast wars

[GoktimusPrime]

Beast Wars won an Emmy Award.
Revenge of the Fallen and Dark of the Moon have won and been nominated for Razzies Awards respectively.

'nuff sed. :D

[FoxMalcolm]

Um, not meaning to be disrespectful or anything but winning first place in a race with no competition is not that big of an accomplishment.
According to imdb Emmy Award lists for 1998 (http://www.imdb.com/event/ev0000206/1998), there were no other nominees in the category, on top of that it wasn't even nominated in any of the other animation or children show categories.
Reading the records seams to indicate it was a publicity stunt, a political decision designed to generate more interest in the field not necessarily in the show itself.

[GoktimusPrime]

In any case, it is an excellent show - IMO the best story ever written for a Transformers TV series and the second best story ever written for Transformers period (other than the G1 Marvel comics). The stories in Beast Wars are character driven - it makes you empathise and emotionally connect in many of the characters... like Dinobot vs all the Predacons or Depth Charge vs Rampage -- not just action packed sequences but very emotionally intense moments. Also, Bob Forward and Larry DiTillio were more creatively restricted with Beast Wars because the cartoon is essentially a series of adverts for the toys, which meant that Hasbro often gave them orders with what to do with certain characters (e.g. remove this character here, introduce this character there) - and sometimes with short notice, which made them sometimes have to come up ways to quickly dispose of or introduce new robots. In the G1 cartoon characters just randomly stopped appearing or just appeared as if they were there the whole time (hey Perceptor... so... where'd you come from?!); also the G1 cartoon eps were mostly isolated stories that didn't inter-connect whereas Beast Wars has a lot of episodes that are inter-dependent with each other as it forms a continuing story arc. Also Mainframe made a conscious decision to establish Beast Wars in the same continuity as G1 (and G2) - thus expanding upon (and enhancing) the G1 continuity family. BW also experienced budget cuts with each progressive seasons as well (hence why number of eps in Seasons 2 and 3 were half the number of eps in Season 1).

[Paulbot]

You don't have to like Beast Wars to be welcome here.

[Hursticon]

you don't have to like Beast Wars to be welcome here.

Exactly right, each to his/her own around here but in time I hope you'll be able to get around to watching Beast Wars and see what you think after a good chunk of it. ;):)

Much like yourself, I went into TF: Animated with great trepidation but after watching it with a 'fair-go' in mind and complimented with a particular Podcast on the series (For the 3rd Season anyway); I've come away still with a good disliking for the Art-style but with a great respect for it's narrative and nods to the franchise, it also took some characters in some really interesting directions (Such as Blitzwing) which has lead me to seek out nearly all of the Decepticon figures from the series. :D

Very glad to see you're a fellow Decepticon fan, as I too have always preferred the bad guys as they generally look far cooler yielding the better toys IMO: It's just annoying that there are less Decepticon figures than there are Autobots but the upcoming Generations toy line (http://www.otca.com.au/boards/showthread.php?t=12905) will be bucking that trend in it's second wave. :D

Wreck-gar certainly seems like a fitting choice for your favourite character/toy indeed, Swoop is also a cool figure and adds that much need Air-support to the Dinobots! ;):cool:

[GoktimusPrime]

It seems we may have different opinions but that's okay. Let's agree to disagree and welcome to the board. :)

[FoxMalcolm]

Thank-you
As I said before I may watch it someday, with animated I hated seeing OP act as a whining teenager, with Beast Wars I absolutely find the cgi offensive to the eye.
At the time I thought it was blocky and primitive and cheap . . . I made better 3d models in 96-97 for my PC classwork and it was my first time using 3d software.
So yes, I need to get over some artistic bias but I will get there . . . maybe I can watch it with the monitor off . . . joking.
In all seriousness I tend not to judge something [outside of initial dislike] unless I have experienced all of it, as a result I end up reading a book or watching a TV series I absolutely dislike but I will continue until the end, that way I know that I gave it every chance to redeem itself.
And sometimes by the end, I find I am now a fan where before I didn't like it . . . you never know . . .

[FoxMalcolm]

All in all thanks for the welcome guys, whilst I am sorry that the Beast guys can't count on me for support [at least for now], I am pleased to be apart of such a diverse and healthy community attitude.
I look forward to continuing that trend with you all.

[Golden Phoenix]

I have always preferred to assemble my toys rather than take out of the box ready to go.

You wouldn't happen to also be into Lego?

[Tober]

At the time I thought it was blocky and primitive and cheap . . . I made better 3d models in 96-97 for my PC classwork and it was my first time using 3d software.


Mid-nineties... Wasn't so much a matter of making better models (which were based heavily on the toys themselves incidentally). The reason a lot of it looked like crud, even back then, was to do with rendering times. Mainframe were under pretty brutal deadlines.

Beast Wars, I remember seeing it when I was doing CG work for Fox at the time and though it was rubbish. Wasn't until about 10 years later after a lot of recommendations that I gave it a chance and enjoyed it, especially the later seasons.

[The_Damned]

Yea welcome to the board dont worry mate i aint into beast wars either. I find the writing for the show terriable and cant bring myself to watch the second episode

[kristofferrer]

welcom aboard sir.
a fantastic hobby that is - you'll find lots of opportunities and great people in this forum.
have fun and i wish you all the best