SSC: Swamp Police Helicopter (30311)

For my weekly Mobile Frame Zero Single Set Challenge, I'm doing Swamp Police Helicopter (Set 30311). 

And when I say weekly, I don't mean "whenever I feel like it." From now on, I'll be posting weekly.

That said, here's the review:

When I saw this set, I knew I wanted a couple of them. The round brick with the hole through the side is new. And the price per piece is really good. But the usefulness for MFØ is questionable.

Others had said this lack of useable pieces meant arms are difficult to make, so I decided to use parts from the pontoons for the arms. He ended up with an overhead railgun as well, leading him to be pretty serious on the weapons front.


Pics on Flickr

I like him a bit, and might get another one to make a clone. I'll probably modify him somewhat; the connection for the railgun needs to be upgraded, and the railgun itself could definitely be shorter.

Again, the set has probably doesn't have much for MFØ, but those pontoons just screamed arms to me. I took another person's writeup of this set as a challenge.


Next up: A MFØ article to finish off the week, then a single set challenge for the Mixel "Scorpi" on Monday.

Here's a link to the Single Set Challenge guidelines.  

SSC: 41510 Mixel Lunk

For my weekly Mobile Frame Zero Single Set Challenge, I'm doing Mixel Lunk (Set 41510). 

Looking at the packaging, I knew I had to use those things coming out of his nose as a sword, and I put together what I think is a nice little frame. The legs can be adjusted a lot more than I would have expected, in the photo album there are a few pics of him running.

Picture album can be found here

My only regret is not getting more of this set when I could. I'm not sure I've seen that sword anywhere else, so having only two of them is only gonna lead me straight to Brink Link.

I'm going to call this guy Sneezy in honor of the sword. The only thing I'm going to change on him is the claw. I'm going to rotate that 90 degrees.

Here is a link to an explanation of the Single Set Challenge guidelines.

Next up: I'm not going to predict what is up next, but I'll post it before Monday night next week.

SSC: 76010: Batman: The Penguin Face Off

My next Single Set Challenge for Mobile Frame Zero is, as promised, the Batman set featuring the Penguin. I played around with this a bit, and behold, I present to you, DuckBot.

More pix can be found here

I tried to use some of the “signature parts” that came in the set, and I think I captured it well with the fins (flags) used as feet and the “tail” piece actually used as a tail. The set contained enough pieces to make two copies of the laser cannon, but I like asymmetric builds. Though I like the minimalist nature of the legs, I will likely be changing them at some point. I want to keep the flag usage, but I’m going to have to cram a knee joint in there somewhere.

I really liked this build. The scuba flippers will be the first to go, but I think I may add the waist/hip joints to my bag of tricks.

The Anti-Climax

And now here's a another SSC: the Mixel "Nurp-Naut" (set 41529) from Series 4.

Nurp-Naut

I tried and I tried, but I couldn’t come up with a use of the huge trans-clear domes that came with this guy. I tried to at least use the round piece for the top of the bot, but it just isn’t turning out. Overall, I’m not very happy with this frame. I figured I would take pictures, but now that that is done he’s gonna be parts. If I was reviewing this Mixel for use as a frame, it wouldn’t get a very good grade from me. Sure the price was great per piece, but all I feel I got out of it was the two mixel joints and a couple of clear domes that can be used for stations of some sort.


I can't really call this a "bonus," but I'm throwing it in here because I really don't think it stands on its on.

Here are more pics, for the sake of completeness.

Here is a link to an explanation of the Single Set Challenge guidelines. Thanks again to Mantis King for reminding me where it can be found.

Next up: Mixel Lunk (Set 41510)

SSC: 79001 Escape from Mirkwood Spiders!

So, I read about the Single Set Challenge on the Mobile Frame Hanger forums, and decided that I’d like to try it. So I did a couple of small sets one, a Mixel, one a Chima set. These have been done by others as well, and the results are about what you would expect. I really liked the challenge of building a frame from a very limited to parts selection, and I found that it really challenged me to think outside the box. The Chima one in particular led to some things I may try to replicate on a larger scale.  I’ll post those other SSCs separately.

What I want to talk about right now is what I’m calling the Mirkwood Squad. I had a copy of Set# 79001, “Escape from Mirkwood Spiders.” Fresh off of completing the first two, I decided to SSC this bad boy.

I opened it up, and right out of the box I knew what direction it was going. Those two spiders have a combined 16 legs, all with the same click hinge setup. The last batch of frames I built falls over a lot. So I decided to try to build four identical four legged frames. I got the legs done, and then a funny thing happened. I made two into matching soldiers, with a sensor array on the head, legs for the movement, a medium autocannon, and a shield. Then I made a hand to hand specialist and an artillery specialist. Both of them needed something more, but I liked where they were headed. I like the look of my artillery piece, but I wanted to try to build something else out of either it or the HTH specialist. As I was messing around trying to come up with a better build for one of them, I ended up creating a squad leader for the bunch. Thus was born the Murkwood Squad. 

In my next skirmish (4 players that turned into 3), I fielded both the soldiers, backed by the artillery frame. I was point, and I managed to seize enough stations to finish first. Part of it was strategy, but part of it was these guys just being all around sweet frames. And I loved the stability of the extra legs.

I also built a station and some cover. I had enough slopes to throw together a ship for IO, should I decide to branch out once we’ve got a lot of MFØ played.

Though I may change a few things, I’m going to keep the color scheme and most of the set up. I like the four leg setup, but the torso connections can be a bit fragile. The HTH specialist is most likely to see change, and the fragility of the squad leader’s shield demands reinforcement. But overall, I’m going to end up with a unique squad with a very interesting back story.

Here are the pictures of the squad. 

Next up is set# 76010: Batman: The Penguin Face Off, which looks promising before I even open up the box.