Shipping options for Fortress Maximus

[jop]

Hi all,

I know a lot of you are keen to get your hands on the encore Fortress Maximus (I know I am!) and I was curious to know how everyone was getting it shipped and how much it costs.

I have ordered mince from eToysJapan as I have had good experience with them in the past. I received the following email from them yesterday:

"We are trying to find a good way to ship your Encore 23, but because of size limitation of Australia postal service in parcel (both air and surface), the only option is by EMS SpeedPost which would be around $123.00 (Encore 23 + MP-15,16). However, if we can ship only the Encore 23 and pack it with in the size limitation, then the air parcel would be around $86.00, and by sea would be around $45.00 (take 2 months).

Allow us to elaberate. The size limitation is:

Length 1.05m, length and girth combined 2m (s)

Encore 23 on its own is 595 x 402 x 228mm, (s) is 1.855m. It is o.k .to wrap the item with brown paper and ship, but then the box will be destroyed for sure.

The alternative plan here is to add 1cm of material each side for protection and ship. Then (s) would be 1.961m, and still o.k. to use parcel service. Now after saying all these, we do not know what material to use (except styro foam) that can achieve this and the protection might not be very good. Shipping MP-15,16 separately would be $13.90 by 1st class airmail."

To be honest, I can wait 2 months for sea post to receive this item while I make space in the collection for it (Still not sure where to put it as it's just so huge).

I thought i'd hear what everyone else thinks about this and how you have gone about shipping issues with this monster of an item.

Thanks in advance

[DELTAprime]

Robot Kingdom has had similar size constraint issues. Sounds like the only way Australia Post will accept a Fort Max sized box is EMS.

EDIT: I asked the guy that delivered it whats the size restriction. He's been delivering parcels for Aus Post for maybe a decade so he has some idea of whats going on. He said there should not be any problem from Aus Post point of view. He has to deliver much bigger items than Fort Max all the time.

[Omega Metro]

I'm interested in getting a Fort Max also but the postage seems to very high. Is EMS the only option or can I risk paying standard postage if its available at checkout? Been looking at Robot Kingdom, Chimungmung and BbtS.

[GoktimusPrime]

Guys, remember that with Japan Post when it comes to large packages shipping by EMS isn't much cheaper than surface. They won't even bother offering surface anymore for very large packages since it's not longer cost efficient (re: economies of scale). In any case, I was charged $88 for my Fort Max EMS postage, which is actually pretty good IMO.

[Omega Metro]

Guys, remember that with Japan Post when it comes to large packages shipping by EMS isn't much cheaper than surface. They won't even bother offering surface anymore for very large packages since it's not longer cost efficient (re: economies of scale). In any case, I was charged $88 for my Fort Max EMS postage, which is actually pretty good IMO.

May I ask where you got yours from? Robotkingdom is charging $138 postage by EMS which seems excessive.

[GoktimusPrime]

HobbyLinkJapan.