MG ZAKU II MS-06S - CRYSTAL VERSION - PART THREE: Shoulders & Arms

SHOULDERS
Shoulders are really simple to asemble just attention not to scratch the plastic too much.


The parts look like this when completed:

After applying dry transfer

ARMS

Arms are a little bit more complicate, but just a bit!



Policaps are extremely hard and generally are wider that the housing holes, so a little bit of sanding is necessary.
Extremely odd are the fingers of the hands, three of them are made of clear plastic but two are solid black, i really do not understand why they made them different, the look of the hand is not so nice and not "crystal"







After assemblying the different parts i get this

And finally i can put all together

Flexibility is not bad, the elbow is double jointed and can move quite a bit, all parts can turn 360°.

MG ZAKU II MS-06S - CRYSTAL VERSION - PART TWO: Head

Let's start building the kit.
Usually i follow the instruction manual order, so i will start from the head.

HEAD

These are the parts that compose our head.
Parts n° 1 and 2 have an optional variation in the sprue.

Most annoying parts to prepare are the little cylinders that will create the tubes on the sides, they are small, they are a lot, tend to roll under the couch and due to their shape is almost impossible to hide the nub mark (if present).

I made a little modification, instead of putting the pink decal on the eye, i painted the part with a Gundam Mark red, in this way i keep the transparency of the part and it looks better (in my opinion).

TIP: in order to make the paint form the Gundam Mark spread uniformally on the piece i use the marker sliding the side of the tip on the surface i paint, in this way with just one pass i can cover the eye and the color is even.

 
I proceed with the assembly of the inner part of the head.

The visor is a little bit wobbly, it will stay put when armor is on.
Now I do the tubes, assembly is really easy.

It is a bit difficult to put the tubes inside the armor, i suggest placing the plastic+spring without the clear parts first on the bottom part (lower part in the pics) and add the clear part.

Now let's move on the armor itself.

The head armor is composed by these pieces

 

Assemblage:

Top Fin

Helmet

Respirator Complete

Head Complete

MG ZAKU II MS-06S - CRYSTAL VERSION - PART ONE: Opening the box

Ordered at the end of December with a bunch of other Gunplas finally my Zaku has arrived.
This Crystal Version was part of a set of three MGs, RX-78-2, ZAKU II MS-06F/J, and my ZAKU II MS-06S. The set came out in 1996 so I will work with quite an old model.

Let's take a look at the box:


Inside the box are 10 runners, 5 springs, a set of water decals, a set of stickers and a set of dry transfers.

dry transfer

stickers

water decals

Naturally there is also the instruction manual and a very nice manual about the Crystal Versions released.



Unfortunately some parts broke from the sprue during the transportation and this could be a mess because everything is made of clear parts that, if not treated correctly, leave an horrible white damage after removing the nub.

From a first look at the runners I have to say that i am impressed y the amount of details of every piece.
Being the skeleton transparent too I thought that it was less detailed.

Instead i am not so happy about the parts that are not transparent (hands mainly) they are made of a soft plastic and they present imperfections (little holes).