SSG's Monthly Hasbro Q&A - March 17th

[bigbarada]

This is a problem that drives me nuts as well. Perhaps Devo can explain this better than I but on quite a few of the astros that share the R4 body the center leg is attached backwards. While it looks pretty symmetrical front to back you can tell it's backwards because of the range of the "foot". On the ones that are backwards, the foot achieves a greater angle behind the droid than when extended in front of the droid. The reason this all bothers me is because it when the droid is displayed rolling in its "three-point stance" it requires the droid to have a more upright posture than depicted in the films (the droid actually achieves a more accurate position rolling backwards than forwards). As far as I've discovered there is no easy (or any) way of popping of the leg and turning it around.

I've actually never bought a single droid, based on the R4-G9 mold, that does not have the backwards foot problem. It totally ruins the aesthetics of the figure and you can't flip the foot around without breaking it off. That's why I will never buy another astromech based on that mold and I'm very glad to hear that we are getting something new.

[Mad Slanted Powers]

I guess I don't understand what is backwards about it. It looks like it swings the same amount in either direction.

[JediTricks]

Questions from other sites has been posted. 2 per site has made this somewhat draining more than usual.
http://www.sirstevesguide.com/index....articleid=2676

This is a problem that drives me nuts as well. Perhaps Devo can explain this better than I but on quite a few of the astros that share the R4 body the center leg is attached backwards. While it looks pretty symmetrical front to back you can tell it's backwards because of the range of the "foot". On the ones that are backwards, the foot achieves a greater angle behind the droid than when extended in front of the droid. The reason this all bothers me is because it when the droid is displayed rolling in its "three-point stance" it requires the droid to have a more upright posture than depicted in the films (the droid actually achieves a more accurate position rolling backwards than forwards). As far as I've discovered there is no easy (or any) way of popping of the leg and turning it around.

Hmm, interesting. Thanks for the info.

No, there wouldn't be a way to pop it out, it's in a track, you'd have to unglue the figure's seams. How is it that folks assume it's the leg that's the problem though and not the foot? And what about carving down the receiver slot inside the foot, has that been tried? I would think the worm gear inside would make the center leg completely symmetrical, while the foot itself has a slight variance inside the receiver.

I guess I don't understand what is backwards about it. It looks like it swings the same amount in either direction.

That is what I thought too. If you pose R4-G9 backwards, so he's in the 3-legged pose with his back facing out, it lines up perfectly. Yet if you look in pics of this mold like so:
http://www.rebelscum.com/photo.asp?i.../tlcDF-201.jpg
there does seem to be a problem (and I checked, other pics from other sites are the same way). Notice in this group pic of all the repaints of R4-G9, you can see the problem on the front row because the ARC-170 fig on the left doesn't have it:
http://www.rebelscum.com/photo.asp?i...edi%29%3Cbr%3E
Here's another group shot where you can see it in play:
http://www.rebelscum.com/photo.asp?i...eastrocomp.jpg

So what does this mean? Well, it could be that there's a slight difference in the height of the foot mounting, that would definitely cause this, but that first pic suggests it's mounted at the same height as my R4-G9 (and mine even has a little flash in the foot causing hitting, but not enough to cause this).

But the figures all seem to align the same when the leg is withdrawn. My theory is there's excess flash in the foot which changes the amount of travel allowed by the ankle. Alternately, the peg or receiver hole could have been moved but that would have changing tooling on 2 mold halves across all 8 cavities each side. I am sticking with excess material in the foot itself, the leg appears completely symmetrical. R4-G9 can look the same backwards as forwards so between that and the retracted pose, the idea that the leg has a side that works and a side that doesn't should be discounted. That leaves the foot, which is glued shut, so that's why I think shaving down that receiver slot in the foot should fix this problem. But it won't be easy without something like a dremel, there's almost no room to work.

[DarkJedi5]

Hmm, interesting. Thanks for the info.

No, there wouldn't be a way to pop it out, it's in a track, you'd have to unglue the figure's seams. How is it that folks assume it's the leg that's the problem though and not the foot? And what about carving down the receiver slot inside the foot, has that been tried? I would think the worm gear inside would make the center leg completely symmetrical, while the foot itself has a slight variance inside the receiver.

That's my bad, every time I said leg I meant foot. The foot is the problem, the leg is simply straight up and down. I have looked to see if the foot could be popped off but I've applied just about as much pressure as I'm comfortable with and never got it to come off. I assume that there is a hole through the leg and two posts on the inside of the foot that just pop into the hole but I can't be sure. Carving down the back side might be the best option.

[JediTricks]

That's my bad, every time I said leg I meant foot. The foot is the problem, the leg is simply straight up and down. I have looked to see if the foot could be popped off but I've applied just about as much pressure as I'm comfortable with and never got it to come off. I assume that there is a hole through the leg and two posts on the inside of the foot that just pop into the hole but I can't be sure. Carving down the back side might be the best option.

I've seen a mountain of complaints that the leg is backwards though, you're not the first to use that term. The foot itself cannot be mounted backwards, it works the same way forwards or back on R4-G9, so the most likely issue is build variance in the foot.

I believe the foot has a peg which is glued together upon assembly physically running through the ankle, so the only way to remove it would be to break the seams which would result in a piece this small in shredding the foot, obviously no help.

If you have any luck with carving, sanding, or grinding down the slot in the foot, let us know, I'm sure a lot of folks out there would like to hear there is a doable solution to this issue. Theoretically, that should fix it no matter the cause of the problem.

[Darth Metalmute]

I found it interesting that when talking about EU, Hasbro themselves brought up Bastila Shan, without being proded.

Edit:
Nevermind, didn't realize this was already announced.

[JediTricks]

I've seen a mountain of complaints that the leg is backwards though, you're not the first to use that term. The foot itself cannot be mounted backwards, it works the same way forwards or back on R4-G9, so the most likely issue is build variance in the foot.

I believe the foot has a peg which is glued together upon assembly physically running through the ankle, so the only way to remove it would be to break the seams which would result in a piece this small in shredding the foot, obviously no help.

If you have any luck with carving, sanding, or grinding down the slot in the foot, let us know, I'm sure a lot of folks out there would like to hear there is a doable solution to this issue. Theoretically, that should fix it no matter the cause of the problem.

An update on this, I remembered finally where I saw that mold being assembled, it was posted in response to the R2-KT charity figure:

http://www.r2kt.com/hasbro/actionfig.html

Those are shots of it in their assembly jigs. As you can see, the center leg is externally a symmetrical design, it has to be in order to allow the worm gear to raise and lower it. Even if it weren't assembled forward AND the worm gear didn't traverse it all the way down, that wouldn't affect the angle of the foot.

The center foot also appears externally symmetrical, but internally is asymmetrical and could be assembled onto the leg backwards. If this is the cause, shaving down the track would address this asymmetry as I suspected as that is the only difference, but since R4-G9 doesn't have this problem forward or back, it would have to mean the foot AND the leg were both assembled backwards, and then we have to assume that something in both of those is off enough to cause this. Having looked at R2-T0 pics as my chief example of the problem, I'd say the middle foot design doesn't match from cavity to cavity, so they're mixing sides from different cavities, causing an asymmetrical final foot which blocks travel. Shaving down the track should alleviate the problem, but could be troublesome work. I suppose I should add this to the Q&A question about Cody's belt.