Well, I managed to get a HA Soundwave for a decent price...all things considered. While not the BEST HA figure it is certainly decent imo. As I think everyone feels, SW is top heavy and his legs kinda gimpy. I am still looking into beefing them up a bit, maybe moving the doors to unpin and hook on the feet so he still can transform. Just still looking into that idea. As for his repaint, almost done. Still working out the front headlights as I dislike the clear blue. Overall I am pretty happy with SW. I tried a more G1ish approach the first time and it just does not go right with the silver so went with more onscreen movie look.
As for Laserbeak, probably the WORST HA accessory, I did some modding to him. Much like the deluxe figure, they both needed some work. While Deluxe LB mostly got his legs fixed and slimmer guns for his wings, the HA one needed more.
For those that dont have him, let me explain something. Because of his "gun" mode, his neck and head are molded to the body. No articulation. The legs are attached via balljoint to each wing so when the wing moves, so does the leg. Also, because of how they set the wings on the balljoint, they only rotate down, not up. Simple fix. Just carve out the part on the body that the balljoints attach to. Gives LB up and down wing movement.
Next step, the legs issue. Thankfully LB has that somewhat covered on another simple fix. I cut off the part that attaches the the balljoint to the wings. Then I drilled a hole in both balljoints as well as in the centre of LB (where I was planning to place his legs). Used a pin and that's it. His firing mechanism still works except I cut that up for neck and head articulation.
This part is a bit more tricky. I cut off the neck, just made cuts with an exacto until I could pretty much snap it off, then I did the same for his head.
With the missle itself I used that as my articulation. Originally I was gonna balljoint it but I got lazy in all honesty. So I stuck a pin through it to attach the missle to his neck. He has up and down movement. Next for his head, I used a spare joint from DOTM Deluxe Crankcase, the part that holds his blade...wing...things. I attached it, glued it, used a but of sculpy to fill it and bam! After that I just used a ball-end bit and my dremel to make LB's head balljoint. While the toy itself still blows, I like him more now that I can pose him a bit more interestingly than before.
Anyway, still have some touchups to do but pretty happy with these two overall.
Sorry for HA LB pics. I used my Blackberry instead of my good camera. I'll have to take better pics tomorrow.
I still need to finish painting Deluxe LB. Looking at my one pics I see parts I wanted to fix and just haven't. Meh, at some point. No rush
