# OoB Review: Moebius Jupiter 2



## Model Man (Oct 1, 2007)

*OoB Review: Jupiter 2 /DVD Series Info*

I had this posted over in sci-fi, as I thought it would get wider exposure for Moebius, but there didn't seem much interest, so moved it on here.

I'll be starting a build of this in the immediate future and will start up the thread here. On with the show...
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A little behind the marketing curve, but here it is fresh off the uploads. For anyone still on the fence about this kit, maybe this will push you one way or the other. 

A big skill level 3 kit like this needs a big review and this clocks in just shy of 24 mins, broken into 3 parts.

Part1: Unboxing and overview.
Part2: Directions and the small parts trees. 
Part3: The hull and closing remarks.

















This is the first Moebius kit I have worked with so had no expectations on that front. All the glowing comments here did skew me to expect gold. Overall, I was not unimpressed. 

Lots of great parts, lots of solid plastic and a beautiful, well packed, full-to-the-brim fitting box. Decals are tight and strong looking. A four page full color instruction manual is a nice touch rarely seen for American companies. I remark that I've never seen a color manual before, but I do have several bandaii kits with glossy color instructions. 

Where things did lose points in my book is that the outer upper hull and the main floor look like space gremlins had a meeting of their local space chapter. There are dozens of scratches, scuffs, and sanding marks all around the surfaces. on the underside of the upper hull there are shallow gouge marks that look like a skipping space dremel danced over the surface. 

I don't know if this is my kit that was involved in a space fight or if it is in the molds and therefore indicative of all kits. I expect it is random, but disappointing either way. The damage is likely easily repaired with minor sanding and primer. At least I hope so.

Overall, I was impressed. This is a must have for any LiS fan and a classic design worth a definite look for the general sci-fi fan.


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## BruceDownunder (Aug 25, 2008)

Great vids which are very informative and in-depth. Thanks so much for uploading these and also thank you to the kit donator.


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## Model Man (Oct 1, 2007)

BruceDownunder said:


> Great vids which are very informative and in-depth. Thanks so much for uploading these and also thank you to the kit donator.


First: 
Indeed, yes! Skinnyonce is the doninator and this would not have occurred without him. He and I both agreed that for a kit review, his name was not necessary in this case; though his modesty further suggested he not be mentioned in the build thread coming up at all. However "This program brought to you by..." will be going first and last in this build and his name tops that list.

That being said...

For those not in the know, this kit will be the basis of a *How-To/Now-Not-To build the Jupiter 2 video series*. 

All my build vids will be posted on youtube *FREE* for all to see. The HD masters will be collected at the end of the project and assembled into a dvd for convenient viewing at your work bench tv. I can't burn blurays at this time, so it's dvd for now. But the master files could be turned into bluray down the road.

The dvd project will include: The entire build series in dvd format and all the master vids for easy 1920x1080 computer playback. The vids will be done up with proper graphics and notes as appropriate. A possible bonus disc of material will include any and all reference material used in the project. This would be free bonus material as none of the © would be owned by me and I don't know at this time that I could even distribute it as such, so that's the hinderance on that.

The project will cover everything from start to finish, all supplies needed and every possible nuance of what it takes to build a model -including lighting this sucker.

This project, with all the post production included, is literally going to be hundreds of hours of work and while the youtube vids are *FREE* to all to see, the dvd series will have as modest a cost to it as I can swing. The video tests I've done indicate this could easily be a 20disc set now. It's going to be huge and the cost to anyone who wants it will be minimal as possible.

As the doninator, skinnyonce gets the dvd series free. Anyone who steps up with aftermarket parts will also get the dvd series for free.

*This Program brought to you by:*
Any aftermarket parts donated by an individual to this project are considered for exchange of the dvd series. The only caveat is that you cannot simply donate 'a' jar of paint for example, the contribution must rise to the level of skinnyonce's. In his case, it was the kit itself. So the full set of required paints likely rises to the same level, possibly with some basic supplies, for example

PM me or ask questions here. There are plenty of aftermarket parts for this project.


***Should an aftermarket supplier choose to donate their wares, they will get special commentary and their product lauded throughout the project as much as I am able including links on a dvd webpage to be created -and of course, youtube exposure. At 1,000 video views per day and nearing 400 subscribers as of today, my YT channel has gained significant popularity and continues to rise. 

If someone _other than_ the kit maker supplies the same aftermarket part, only passing mention and no links or other pointer info to the product will be made mention of, other than to say along the lines of _"This is an aftermarket part available on the web. Try searching around for 'aftermarket part, Jupiter 2, moebius'."_ Something like that. This is not to be a jerk, this is business and an opportunity for an _advertising budget tax write-off_ for the aftermarket supplier.

Construction is set to begin next week, I am looking at Feb 1 as a soft start date. This is not a hard deadline for any donations, but the more work that gets done, the less the opportunity for aftermarket parts to be added. Act now! Don't delay! Limited time offer!

---
Thanks to all for watching, I appreciate all the feedback I've gotten over the last year and a half. I look forward to serving the community as best I can by "Screwing up models, so you don't have to".
-t

EDIT:
Should no aftermarket parts be donated to this cause, none will be mentioned and the build will be a straight-up oob.

Should multiples of the same aftermarket part, but from different vendors be donated, an unbiased "pepsi-challenge" will be set u pwhere they are put up against each other and may the better man win.

*Jan 27, ADDITIONAL:*
The aftermarket parts are queuing up and the opportunities dwindle.

*Contributions so far:*
*Fusion Core:* Eliot Brown of www.warmplastic.com

*Decals:* Paulbo of http://www.paragrafix.biz/

*PhotoEtch:* Paulbo of http://www.paragrafix.biz/

*Painting Masks:* Paulbo of http://www.paragrafix.biz/
*
Landing Gear:* Paulbo of http://www.paragrafix.biz/


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## bert model maker (Feb 19, 2002)

Great job Model Man. I am curious about all of those scratches and gouges in your model parts & hulls. maybe someone bought this one & returned it to the store or wherever you got it from. those clear parts will make lighting easy. what do the decals look like and do they go on top of those clear radar screens ? I wonder how you would paint the radar screens and still light them up from behind ?


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## Model Man (Oct 1, 2007)

bert model maker said:


> Great job Model Man. I am curious about all of those scratches and gouges in your model parts & hulls. maybe someone bought this one & returned it to the store or wherever you got it from. those clear parts will make lighting easy. what do the decals look like and do they go on top of those clear radar screens ? I wonder how you would paint the radar screens and still light them up from behind ?


Thanks for the compliment Bert (and Bruce!!!) 

The box looked factory sealed, so it likely wasn't opened and resold. If no one else's looks like that, then this must be random damage occurring at the factory.  It was disappointing to see. I didn't think it was standard issue. Maybe Moebius himself will stop by for a look. 

There is a very clear shot of all the decals at the start of the 2nd vid. 

I haven't dug into this full throttle yet, so don't have a definitive plan of attack as of now, but will develop the lighting plan soon.


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## Moebius (Mar 15, 2007)

Just a quick note to address a couple of the things mentioned in the video. The scratching is just one of those random things. If you've seen how these are pulled from the tooling, scratching is inevitable. Some of the marks, such as the stress mark shown on the upper hull happen with packing and shipping. The slightest pressure causes a locator to bend, making a white crescent moon mark on the outer hull. All marks are pretty easily fixed with a quick 600 scuff or primer coat.

Holes on the bottom of the hull. Those are designed in. You'll see a clip every once in a while on the show where it looks like they're firing thrusters. But you never see where they are on the ship. Gary decided to add them for a little more realism, even though they're not really there in any of the props.

Landing gear. The aftermarket gear isn't more accurate, it's a different version. If you watch the show close enough, you'll see there are two different sets of gear depending on which prop is being used. For us to put in variations of this would have been too costly in terms of additional tooling.

Availability. Not sure where the rumor started, but we have never been sold out, nor even close. We expected demand, and have put in enough stock to be sure there are no gaps in availability. If you can't find one, let me know and I can direct you to someone with available stock.

Past that, fun video set. Looking forward to the build!


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## Model Man (Oct 1, 2007)

I will annotate the video post haste. Thanks for the personal reply! I didn't think there would be too much difficulty in eliminating the marks, it was just odd to see so many. Cheers and thank you for such a massively cool kit!

If you happen to read this post, I would like to contact you regarding this video series I am about to start up. Thanks very much!
-tom


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## MonsterModelMan (Dec 20, 2000)

Model Man,

Nice job on the review! I also noticed the LIS soundtrack or voices going on in the background...nice touch!

I've been collecting the kit and parts needed to put this model on the bench...soo much aftermarket stuff to choose from and hope to begin this kit soon.

MMM


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## WarpCore Breach (Apr 27, 2005)

I read over at CultTVMan's board that the Moebius Jupiter *needs* to be washed before assembly- of course, every model has mold release agents on the plastic during the molding process but the one example I heard about has this kit with perhaps a rather large amount of release agent on it. The normally clear washing process actually tinted the water brown! So... clean your model before you start! LOL!

EDIT:

Okay, watched the vids! Thanks, those were very informative! The model has only shown up in only 1 store here so far... at a price of $130 Cdn! Ouch! I think I'll wait till I see it in a few more stores before I decide to pick one up....! In the meantime, I do have my Lunar kit if I need a "large" Jupiter 2 kit!


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## Model Man (Oct 1, 2007)

MMM. 
Thankye. I threw on "Derelict" as it seemed an appropriate start. I didn't wanna go 2nd or 3rd season and have spontaneously spouting Smith'ism's shouting in the background, that ninny!.  

Warp.
Indeed yes. I had read that somewhere and will be doing so as well. I normally don't do that for plastic kits, only vinyl or resin, but I'm gonna do this by the book.


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## Model Man (Oct 1, 2007)

Something of a post script to all this. 

I was just contacted by a member who wishes to contribute to the cause, but seemed perhaps unsure of me and my intention. Thus please allow me to publicly clarify a few points for all who haven't seen me around hobbytalk, resinilluminati, Atomic City, the ODEC or even SSM, (though I haven't been by there in a long time).

I'm Tom. My childhood hobby was models for a good dozen years until my college days. Flash-forward to Sept. '06, I stopped by a hobby shop just to look around and picked up my fave kit, an ERTL Falcon. Since then, I've cranked through just shy of 100 models and love this hobby more than ever, getting more complex with each build. 

I first kept a written log for several months before converting that to a website. 
http://www.twinlitworlds.com/modelwerx/index.html

With near 1,000 photos however many 100's of pages and tens of thousands of words typed, that method got to be too much, so ~1.5 years ago I switched to video logs on youtube. 

http://www.youtube.com/user/ModelManTom

From August 2008 through this week, I have upped 495 vids of 2 or 3 dozen models; My 400th subscriber is about to find my channel, with 2 subs/day being common lately. My 495 vids will break 150,000 views by this weekend. My daily viewership has been flirting with the 1,000 mark for the last month and is trending higher. Not much by some standards, but huge by others. The popularity and these numbers has been a shock to me.

Since youtubing, I have had a few dozen requests to make a dvd series of this or that model, or even compiling all my vids on dvd for folks. I shied away as it seemed presumptuous to think I had anything to teach. The other week here, several people bemoaned the lack of a how-to dvd series for the J2. Somewhat tongue-in-cheek, I replied "send me the kit and I'll do it". Skinnyonce 'called my bluff' and now it's on! This has turned into, perhaps a happy case of, 'me and my big mouth' syndrome, but I am looking forward to this challenge.

I am something of an 'information should be free' person, thus all video work will be available for everyone to see on YT. However, should anyone want higher resolution footage or be able to watch it on their tv, a dvd set will also be available. That will contain as much value-added material as I can to help justify whatever the cost will be.

*Most importantly to note:*
My motto" "Screwing up models so you don't have to."

I am not a pro-builder. My work does not rise to the level of museum or prop replica quality. I am just a guy who has been cranking through kits the last years seeking to hone my skills by learning from my mistakes. I look at every model as an opportunity to experiment and learn something new. 

This dvd series will not be a definitive 'how-to' of any kind. I will be stepping into piles of poo, by accident and deliberately, and sharing those results. I do not shy away from my mistakes, but relish them as the chance to learn. Viewers of this series will see me make those mistakes in HiDef glory and hopefully avoid same. 

Thus, this series is aimed at the beginner; a fellow who's been away and is looking to get back into the hobby; to the intermediate builder who has some good tricks up their sleeves, but is interested in seeing how someone of similar skills attacks a problem.

I do not think I'm a hot piece of dynamite. When faced with a new problem, I see how much trouble i can get myself into and then learn how to extricate said self out of that mess. And I've been in some doozy's as my publicly viewable history will show. 

The non-hobby skills that coincide with this project are that I've been editing video and doing graphic design for ~15 years; and am currently a visual effects artist out here in L.A. As you might imagine, a perfect confluence of skills for a project of this sort. This is not to brag by any means, simply to establish whatever credentials I may be considered to have.

I don't know that I can add more to that than that. And many of you are probably wishing you didn't just sit thru all this!  I felt it important to be thoroughly informative and up front about what this project is about, where it' coming from and who is delivering it.

Happy modeling! :thumbsup:


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## Punchcard76 (Jun 30, 2008)

Go Model Man !!!! :thumbsup:

Keep up the good work !!!

I can't wait for more great videos. :wave:


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## dtssyst (Sep 7, 2007)

As always, I look forward to your build and your videos.


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## bert model maker (Feb 19, 2002)

Moebius said:


> Just a quick note to address a couple of the things mentioned in the video. The scratching is just one of those random things. If you've seen how these are pulled from the tooling, scratching is inevitable. Some of the marks, such as the stress mark shown on the upper hull happen with packing and shipping. The slightest pressure causes a locator to bend, making a white crescent moon mark on the outer hull. All marks are pretty easily fixed with a quick 600 scuff or primer coat.
> 
> Holes on the bottom of the hull. Those are designed in. You'll see a clip every once in a while on the show where it looks like they're firing thrusters. But you never see where they are on the ship. Gary decided to add them for a little more realism, even though they're not really there in any of the props.
> 
> ...


Frank, what would make my upper hull looked warped & out of round.when i set it down on a flat table top ? 3 areas around the upper hull edge are raise up and don't even touch the table like the rest of the hull edge.. the worst area is from the hatch to viewport edge and i can easily slide a deck of cards under the edge between the table and upper hull edge. it sticks outward as well. i had a bear of a time lining up the locator pins and the ones in the area around the hatch do not line up at all. the upper hull pins sit in front of the lower hull pins while all other pins around the hulls are locked together. i had to push back on the upper hull to get them to drop in but i dont think that will last as the pins dont want to stay there once i took it apart to see if that fixed anything. It didn't, the pins just will not line up naturally, any suggestions ? I dont want to cement the hulls because i would lose detailed areas from view forever. sorry to interupt but i wanted to ask moebius about this. when i return this to the hobbyshop they will open all the other kits to check those hulls and if bad like mine they won't sell them because they don't want ticked of customers. 100 mile round trip to get exchange or refund.


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