Site Index

Quick Links

Email me!

arvlim@samsung.co.kr

This is the MG Char's Zaku, one of the very first Master Grade models released by Bandai way back in 1995. it's actually pretty advance for it's time, and featured some internal structures on the head torso and lower legs.

I got this from my friend Benj, after I got into an accident that left me with a crushed index finger :P. He gave it to me as something to look forward to when my finger finally heals.

The construction is pretty simple and straightforward. It actually featured some nice engineering too, like movable shoulder joints and double jointed elbows. However during construction I noticed some major flaws in the MG Char's Zaku's design that greatly limited it's poseability. So I decided to modify some parts as I went along the construction, and aimed to build an MG Zaku with an overall improved poseability.

(note: The pictures for all the descriptions go from left to right, top to bottom)

Having recieved this from my friend, I found out that it was missing a couple of parts, namely the cable mount and cable springs for the head, the monoeye lens, and the clear visor. Being a tightwad myself,I decided to make some replacements from household materials instead of ordering the missing parts from hlj. ^_^

1. The monoeye
Since the monoeye lens was missing, I replaced it with a 5mm red LED. I sanded away about 1.5mm off the lenght of the original monoeye lens mount, and sanded the LED until it was about 4mm in lenght and cut away the LED's terminals. Afterwards I test fitted the the LED and the monoye mount making sure that it didn't protrude through the head, before finally glueing them together.

2. After sanding the LED, the surface was left relatively rough and dull even after sanding it down with a 1200 grit sand paper. In order to remedy this, I very carefully applied a drop of liquid cyano acrylate glue on the surface, making sure it was levelled and let it dry. This gave a shiny finish to the surface of the LED. I then tinted the LED with some clear LED to enhance the sheen of the monoeye.

3. The Head Cables
The original cable mounts and cable springs were some of the parts that got lost. To replace this I got three 0.8mm copper wires and braided them together to form a diameter thick enough to house the cables.

4.To replace the springs I housed the braided copper in some heat shrink tube, I used a lighter to heat up the tubes so that it will conform to the braided wires shape.

5. Finally I shaped the new cable mounts to conform to the shape of the zaku's head. It actually is a decent replacement to the original cables.

6. The Shoulder joints
In the pictures above, you can see that the shoulder joints allow the zaku to make double handed weapon poses, but it is somewhat hindered by some of the internal details, namely the large screw shaped joint on the torso, and on the square shaped detail on the shoulder block.

7. To remedy this, I flattened and filed down about 1mm off of the side of the screw shaped detail on the body, and also filed away the square detail on the shoulder block making it L shaped. This made more room for the shoulder joint and allowed it a larger range of motion.

8. You can see the difference between the range of motion of the modified and the original shoulder joint on the last picture.