knock off thoughts

[Dominic]

The fact that I am reviewing a pile of knock-offs before I review the recent Jazz and Tracks figures says as much about how much I agree with JT and Prowl as it does about how highly I think of one of the items that shipped to me last week.


CHMS Sunstorm:
Back in 2000/2001, when I first began customizing action figures, (albeit with some breaks), I had an informal rule about never customizing something that had been officially released. (This was both a question of economizing my efforts as well as not presuming to be able to do it better than Hasbro.) I applied a similar standard to buying custom figures.

Over time, I modified this rule, allowing myself to customiz proxies of rare/expensive items such as green Transmetal II Ramulous or (more recently) BC10 Sideswipe. (A few weeks ago, Thundercracker using the modern Decepticon plane mould would have been on this list. But, an upcoming official figure will more or less nullify the need for custom Thundercracker figures.)

Typcially, knock-off toys are characterized by low quality. In some cases, the toys are made using bastardized designs cribbed from legitimate toys. And, they almost invariably use lower grade materials. However, in recent years, there has been a change in the caliber of knock-offs. Quality and design improved, making the distinction between legitimate toys and knockoffs more a question of copyrights and licensing than of quality. In some cases, modern knock-offs could be seen as mass produced custom figures.

The CMHS Sunstorm is a perfect example of this sort of knock-off. This figure is based on the moulding used for the 2006 Starscream figure, (officially recoloured as several other characters over the last few years). While the mould itself is not perfect, it is one of the best representations of the original Decepticon body form. While Hasbro is finally releasing a Thundercracker at mass retail, (albeit very late in the game), it is unlikely that they will release a Sunstorm (or Decepticon trooper) using this mould. (The mould is several years old, and looks dated when compared to moulding from the past year or so.)

In other words, the only way to get a Sunstorm using the 2006 mould is to purchase a knock-off or customize one at home. (The sheer amount of yellow paint the second option would involve make it more appealling to purchase a knock-off.)

The CHMS Sunstorm is made to blend in with Takara'sHenkei figures more than Hasbro's American release figures. It looks to be a straight palette swap of Henkei Thundercracker and Skywarp, complete with chromed and Takara-Tomy style packaging.

Over-all, there is really nothing one could find to complain about with this toy that would not be an issue on any number of legitimate figures from recent years. There are some joint tolerance issues, (being too tight and too losse in a few places), and a bit of paint schmootzing. (Truth be told, my copy of Sunstorm is actually better made than my Henkei Thundercracker and has better paint than some Jazz figures I have seen.) If one did know know that there never was a Sunstorm made using this mould, even a collector would have a difficult time spotting it as a knock-off.

I paid ~$30 for my copy, (after splitting the shipping with a few friends who also ordered copies), making Sunstorm much cheaper than some legitimate Henkei releases.

Grade:
If there were an official toy, I would likely give it a B.



While KOToys.com aggressively markets a number of high-quality knock-offs, (such as Sunstorm), they also sell more "traditional" knock-offs. I ordered a number of these in an attempt to get some cheap custom fodder. The results have been mixed at best. Of the seven other knock-offs, 2 broke within a day of me opening and sorting the boxes contents, and six were mis-assembled.


Ramjet:
Orange and white knock-off of the 2006 mould. Besides using lower quality plastic and gaudier paint, this figure has fewer rivets and pins than the legitimate toy. The rivets and pins are replaced with plastic pegs. One of these pegs broke during an intitial exploratory fiddling. I can salvage something from this by mixing parts with other figures, (see below), but the toy is a loss.
Grade: F The base price (before shipping) is close enough to US retail that there is no reason for the toy to be this fragile.


Optimus and recolors:
I picked up the knock-off of Optimus, Nemesis along with a blue and white recolor with Decepticon sigils on the shoulders.
-Optimus has a red head.
-all 3 have slightly deformed faces.
-Nemesis Prime broke less than 24 hours after coming out of the box. (Fragile side panels.)
-all 3 had backwards fists. (This was easy enough to fix.)
-the smoke stack guns have loose joints and come apart easily.
Grade: C/D Nemesis Prime breaking is a serious problem. The plastic is actually flaking around the break point. And, there is no way to avoid putting stress on the part. Still, there is some use for cusomizing.

Skywarp, Starscream and Thundercracker:
These are not the CHMS knock-offs. Despite some really nice paint work on the vehicle modes, these are, to put it bluntly, awful. Here are some highlights.
-Between 3 figures, there are 6 fists. All but one of these fists is installed backwars, with thumbs on the outsidce.
-The 1 correctly installed fist, Thundercracker's left, is mounted in a right fore-arm, mounted on the left arm.
-Skywarp's right wing just falls off.
-Thundercracker's chest/cockpit feels ready to break.
-One of Starscream's launcher came apart in shipping, with the barrel of the launcher being more tightly connected to the missile than the launcher itself. (Incidently, KO Toys shipped the toys with the launchers loaded, which is a major no-no in mechanical terms.)
-Starscream has no face.
Grade: F The problems are not even consistent across the 3 toys, making these a bad bet even for parts.

[BWprowl]

So you'd recommend that Sunstorm, Dom? I was checkin' it out a few days ago, looks nice, and I craaaaaave a Classics Sunstorm. I might give it a shot.

Sad to hear about those other knockoffs though. There was this *awesome* pink Seeker I was looking at in KOtoys's 'regular knockoffs' section, and I could see in the pics that it had misassembled fists, but I figured it might still be salvageable. A shame that these things can turn out that bad, maybe I'll just forget about it. I friggin' loved the colors on that thing though.

[Shockwave]

I love knock offs. I found a Knock off Megatron (Classics version) last week and bought despite it not having the wings. I might mold some replacements for it.

[Dominic]

So you'd recommend that Sunstorm, Dom?

As long as you do not mind something being not completely official. Aside form some joint tolerance problems, (comparable to official toys), there is nothing really wrong with Sunstorm. (Neither of the two other people I ordered with have reported any problems.)

Dom
-sorely tempted to order some troopers.

[Dominic]

And....an update.


Yesterday, I cobbled together a custom Pre-Toy Fair 85 Ramjet from the knock-off Skywarp and Ramjet figures.

Ramjet, as noted above, broke only a few hours after I opened the box. Skywarp actually broke at some point in the last week.

Skywarp's engineering is more true to Hasbro's design, (with fewer multi-part components being moulded as one), and uses better plastic. But, the assembly was incompetent, complete with backwards fists and knees.

Ramjet uses shoddier plastic, (I actually ruled out using alchohol based paint for fear of disintergrating the figure), and has far more unified components. But, the figure was assembled more compentently.

Oddly, there were springs in the pile of left over parts that I cannot account for. All of the launchers were intact. And, I cannot think of anywhere the springs would have come from.


Dom
-would not recommend these for customizing.

[Tigermegatron]

I'm confused is this a thread asking about whether we like knock off's or not.

or is this a thread about the authors thoughts on his recent knock off's purchases.

At any rate i'm not a fan of knock off's.

in my area it's extremly hard to find the high quality knock off transformers.

in my areas the knock off's transformers aren't worth the cheap plastic their forged from.

a few years ago,I bought all 5 ,"so called high quality" knock off's G-1 dinobots in MISB condition. the boxes were smashed & in under C-8 condition. boxes were half sealed with cheap tape. the inner plastic bubbles were half attached to the card board backings. the toys themselves were a huge dissapointment,all the diecast metal parts got a extremly thin layer of paint on them. the layer of paint was so thin it looked like a white wash & felt like a kid used a crayon to color in the diecast metal parts. I eventually re-sold the stuff on the internet to someone else.

I did have a success story with the high quality KO G-1 1986 cyclonus & Scourge. these arrived in mint sealed condition. everything was properly sealed inside the box. since these toys had very little diecast metal parts it wasn't anything to worry about. since these diecast parts never got painted for the 1986 toys.

[Shockwave]

It's kind of both, or more accurately I suppose a discussion/review thread. Post your opinions and if you happen to get any knock offs, review.

[Dominic]

Yeah, this thread was me reviewing some knock-offs. But, it also works as a place to talk about knock-offs.

I generally agree with you that knock-offs are nothign to go crazy looking for. Most of them are junk. (For the record, the only good knock-offs I have seen have been on-line or at conventions.)

Packaging questions aside, those Dinobots you bought sound comparable to the original toys. (Have you ever owned original TFs? Most of them are pretty bad.)


Dom
-recently confirmed having a legit "Encore" Metroplex.

[Gomess]

My favourite knockoffs are the HK G1 combiner sets where they always get two of the limb-bots wrong on purpose and give them cracked names.

My girlfriend owns an "Abominus" (complete with Strafe and Lightspeed, of course), whose box claims that Hun-Gurr's name is in fact "Dragon Pearl".

DRAGON PEARL!

[Shockwave]

In all fairness Hun-Gurr sounds like something out of He-Man.