Monday, April 22, 2002

Specifications:
Model Number: RX-178

Pilot: Kamiru Bidan

Height: 18.5 meters
Weight: 33.4 tons

Fullroad Weight: 54.1 tons

Material: Titanium Alloy and Ceramics Composite

Generator output: 1,930 kw

Thruster general output: 81,200 kg
Armaments: Beam Rifle (1), Beam Sabre (2), Hyper Bazooka (1), Vulcan Pod System (1)

Total number of parts: 796: 623 plastic parts, 105 flexible capstan parts, 44 screws, 10 flexible, gold colored springs, 6 rigid metal parts, 3 springs, 4 sections of flexible electrical wire that are attached to 2 small lights, 1 white metal part along with a decal sheet (with peal-off decals).


The fifth Perfect Grade Gundam that Bandai released (just last year) is the RX-178 Gundam Mk-II. I obtained mine from the Hobby Link Japan Site. In addition to everything else, this model comes with its very own DVD!

After "sitting on" it and its P.G. Gundam counterpart (the W-Gundam Zero Custom), I decided to bust both out, taking an inventory of the parts, along with taking pictures of them and scanning in the pics, drawings and diagrams found in the enclosed Construction and Instruction Manuals. These were used in this Out of Box Review.

This Mk-II kit is a 1:60 scale representation of the "actual" Gundam robot, (just as is the case with the other P.G.'s). This puts the completed robot at between 12 and 14 inches in height.

Just as is the case with the other P.G.'s, you must first assemble the Gundam's dark colored endoskeleton before attaching the more colorful outer panels.

The kit's parts come molded in a multitude of colors that include Off White, Dark Gray, Dark Blue, Black, Red, Yellow, Orange, Chrome Silver Plated and Clear Pink. (Even though this kit comes molded in multiple colors, you really need to paint it to come up with a really good-looking robot).

There are probably more opening panels, doors and hatches found on this P.G. than on any of the other P.G.'s. Additional detailed features include individually jointed fingers, an in-scale seated pilot figure, and three "worker" figures. There are even two small lights that are installed into this Gundam.

The one potential "bummer" with this kit is its decal sheet, which appears to be composed of peal-off, stick-on decals.

The Mk-II comes packaged in a very colorful, impressive looking box. The dimensions of the metallic gray/blue colored box are 23 inches wide, 5 inches high and 13 & 3/4 inches deep.

The inside of the box is subdivided into three sections. There is a small, nice looking cardboard insert found in the middle, that shows the RX-178 positioned inside a bay of some sort; (this is the pic found at the beginning of this review).

As is the case with the other P.G.'s, this kit also comes with both a Construction Manual and an Instruction Manual.

The Construction Manual first shows the parts that make up this Gundam. Following this, the construction steps are listed.

Even though the writing is in Japanese, the easy to follow directions make building this Gundam a straightforward affair.

The Instruction Manual contains numerous colorful pics of the built-up Gundam in its endoskeleton mode, along with pictures of it in its fully assembled mode as well.

The kit's details, numerous accessories and working parts are also highlighted. There are also several "live shots" of the Gundam in action, (taken from the animated storyline).

As I mentioned above, there are just under 800 parts that compose the Mk-II. This is probably the largest Perfect Grade kit (part wise) that Bandai has ever released.

This kit can be assembled without using any glue. The snap-tite characteristics of the parts, along with the 44 small screws are what keep this baby together. (However, you may want to reinforce the attachment points with a bit of liquid cement).

Found below are pictures of the parts that compose this kit:

The parts are molded with absolutely no flash, no sink marks and no detectable pin ejection marks. In addition, the detail found on the pieces is excellent!

The completed Mk-II shows the Gundam in its "ready-to-kick-some-butt'" stance.

This is another fine release from the folks from Bandai!

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