Dave's Exo-Force Rantlet 8106 - Aero Booster See http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Lego/Exoforce81 for general line comments. Permalink: http://www.eyrie.org/~dvandom/BW/Lego/8106 I finally bought this set once I found it on clearance at K-Mart for $18. Unfortunately, it was part of K-Mart deciding to no longer carry any of the bigger Lego sets. CAPSULE I'd classify this as a "vehicle" set, since it's really a $22 booster pack for an $8 mech to ride on. It does have some nifty Gundam-ness to it, but I'm glad I waited for it to go on clearance. Mildly recommended. $30 price point, I got it at K-Mart on clearance for $18. RANT The 8100 series sets lack the techspec panels found in the 7700 series, so I'm making my own names up for weapons for those not listed online, and making up my own armor types and thicknesses. There is an official alternative model, instructions online only. One booklet of instructions, three numbered bags of pieces, one un-numbered bag with some large bits, and three loose fan pieces. The comic in the instructions is the multilingual one also seen in the Golden Tower set. Unit: Aero Booster Pilot: Ha-Ya-To Pilot Hair Color: Red Main Mecha Colors: Blue and gray, white on boosters Weapons: Two heavy laser cannons, one missile launcher Armor: 5 inches zaylium Power Source: Magnetized oroniate Sensors: Enhanced sensor package: night vision, telescopic zoom, infrared vision, 360-degree vision, mobile targeting array Unit Designation: A.12 Unit Type: Air Nickname: None Bio: Built by Ryo from designs downloaded from the golden computer, Aero Booster is a standard battle machine body with a massive, detachable rocket and weapons pack. This amazing piece of machinery allows the Aero Booster to achieve speeds even exceeding that of the Sky Guardian, as well as giving it weapons power superior to any other battle machine in EXO-FORCE's arsenal. Piloted by Ha-Ya-To, it is the most powerful defender of the golden city. Build Time: Bag 1 is the $8-sized mech, bag 2 is the core of the booster pack, bag 3 is the two flanking boosters. The three fans and the three biggest verniers are separate, as are two big flexible hoses. Bag 1 - One sub-bag, Ha-Ya-To is in here. 3 minute sort time, 12 minute build time. Not too surprising that it was fast, given that it's essentially a simplified Claw Crusher without the claws, but with hoses connecting torso to hands (gotta open up the bag with the hoses and large verniers). Bag 2 - One sub-bag. 3 minute sort time, 15 minute build time. Bag 3 - One sub-bag. 5 minute sort time, 17 minute build time. So, all told, 11 minutes sorting pieces, about 45 minutes building. The Aero Booster is built along the lines of the GP03 "Dendrobium" from Gundam 0083. There's a small "stamen" mech that clips onto a huge "orchis" section with giant boosters and oversized weapons. Dimensions: The stamen mech is 5.5" (14cm) tall. The orchis booster is 9" (23cm) long and at least 14" (36cm) wide, but can be made wider by extending the airbrake verniers a click, bringing it to 16" (40cm). The maximum armspan of the weapon arms is 18" (46cm). Attaching stamen to orchis brings the overall length to about 10" (26cm). Colors: The stamen is mainly blue and gray, with silver Devastator arms for fingers, a white code brick (a rare departure from yellow for the heroic ones), and yellow cone bits. The orchis is predominantly white with red accents. The fan pieces are swirled gray and blue, while the weapon arms are various shades of gray. The weapons themselves are mostly black, with a few splashes of red or yellow. The code brick is white, a rare departure from the yellow used for most of the good guys. Stickers: No translation of the minimal Japanese text. Red, silver, blue and black dominate, with a little bit of gold. The only words in English are "CAUTION" and "WARNING FLAMMABLE LIQUID". Articulation: Stamen has ball joint shoulders, hips and ankles, hinge fingers and thumbs, opening cockpit. The elbows and knees are fixed in position as is common for this line's smaller mechs. The orchis has Knights Kingdom ratchet joints for shoulders and elbows of the weapon arms, similar joints for the roots of the side thruster pods, and five ratchet hinged vernier panels. The turbo fans don't spin, they're firmly attached by peg holes on the rim. Weapons: The only weapons built onto the stamen are three yellow cones which are probably meant to be close defense lasers. The heavy weaponry is all on the orchis. Central to the orchis is a soft-head missile launcher like the one on the Iron Condors. There's two arms on the orchis, using Knights Kingdom joints for shoulder and elbow. The right arm terminates in a 4.5" (11cm) long multi-barrelled laser with green tips on the two central long barrels and red tips on the four flanking shorter barrels. The left arm ends in 4" (10cm) long megalaser with a single thicker barrel. The missile launcher can be fired by using a pistol grip built into the central pod of the orchis. Note that the missile launcher has a nuclear trefoil sticker on it...Aero Booster's got nukes, dude. Other Features: The left "arm" megalaser is designed to come off and use a barrel piece clipped to the cockpit area to be held in the left hand of the stamen mech. Pilot Figure: Ha-Ya-To is mainly white with black hands and pelvis, plus red hair. His torso is printed with gold and blue with black outlines. Dave Van Domelen, might also get to the Hybrid Rescue Tank this week.