From: Hasegawa Hobby Kits
1/20th scale
Stock Number# HSGS4112
Skill Level 3
189 parts
Length: 5.4 in (138 mm)
Width: 4.4 in (113 mm)
Price: $41.13 AUD
Product Link @ Hobbylink Japan
Build Guide: Maschinen Krieger Moon Type MK44H Prototype Limited Edition
Build time: Give it the weekend to have it ready to paint...This kit is a direct conversion of the 2014 release of the MK44 Ammoknight, also from Hasegawa. This kit's lineage goes back to the 2014 MK44 Ammoknight Smartgun Equipment Type, the Hammerknight MK44 Ausf.B with what looks a little like it is holding a Bazooka, to the Lunar variant called the MK44 H Black Knight. In the MAK universe, these MK44's were apparently designed to eliminate mechanical life forms that appeared on the moon.
We thought we would build it up step-by-step for you in our guide. The box opens up into a mix of duck egg blue and other smaller various coloured sprues, a double-sided card with four colour options and lastly the light grey paper instructions.
Having never put one of these MAK kits together before, I was pretty concerned about getting everything just right in the build, so I followed instructions pretty much faithfully from start to finish. The Light grey paper is smartly decorated by Hasegawa, and it follows their normal, logical approach to modelling which is welcome on this, my "maiden voyage into M.A.K."
Different but familiar construction
A little on the type of build. If you are au-fait with the Gundam Mechas and the newer Bandai Star Wars figure kits you are in a familiar place with this build. The arms, legs and other parts of the suit are meant to be posable after construction, so they are joined with socket and polycap joints... These are easy to put together, and they leave you with a great flexibility to be able to pose the kit how you want it after construction finishes.
The joints are hidden cleverly int he outside armature of the suit, and the only real problem I had with the kit is that the seams that are left after putting the kit together are pretty big unless you use a fair bit of glue and a lot of pressure. The edges of the parts that make contact to be glued are a little too thin for my liking, which makes the joints sometimes in need of a little filler. A minor gripe, and one that will not at all be a problem if the modeller chooses to texture the surfaces of the kit with putty for that roughly cast metal look.
On to the first steps...
Steps 1-4 cover the making of the suit's feet and rocket thrusters. These are a simple affair, and they can be put together in short order, leaving the tripod-loke high heel feet with the cylindrical rocket thrusters at the rear of the feet. Notice the treads on the bottom of the feet? something I have seen also on the Ammoknight kits and a good feature especially if you want to make tread marks or show the suit in flight with rocket smoke or flames flying out of the vents (my imagination is going off right now).
Steps 6 & 7 are concerned with a left and right lower leg construction. The parts are similar for each leg, and I was already shifting off my original promise to myself to take this slowly. You can see here the two sides of the legs in the instructions for both sides, with the poly caps to make the sockets and the plastic for the kit to make the "stumps" to fit into these articulating joints. It is with these lower legs that I first noticed the nasty seams that are left when these parts are joined together - glue and sanding a little on each one make it an easy fix. The feet can pivot at what you would call the ankle joints also as a point of interest, while the power (?) popes which go from the lower legs to the torso can be placed in the sockets now, or later and do not need glue to secure them. Best you do not cement them in there right now - I stuck mine in - to be glued later when I was sure they would be propperly aligned
Step 8: The "thigh" parts go together in a similarly simple manner to the "shins", the two halves secure a poly cap on the inside makes make a posable joint. do yourself a favour and seperate the two thigh sides before constructing them so you do not get parts of either side mixed up! Once they are together - and you sand off those seams - you can place the two legs together - they stay together, fully posable, without glue.
Step 9 sees you put together both halves of the suit's pelvis, in that same two halves and poly cap construction manner, and then you are ready to go on to the longer and more detailed construction of the upper half of the suit.
The face mask/visor go together next in step 12. These are a simple process again, and for now, I secured in the inside of the visor with the internal screens and parts. Notice that this rather simple construction is in two parts? All of the bumps, lumps and extra detail parts are a detail of the construction that requires some fine snips to cut them from the sprues and some fine work and close control of any parts that PING! off into the distance.
Here they are - inside and out of the face shield in close-up and all of the lumps and bumps added to the exterior of the faceplate...
The top of the MK44 suit is constructed in steps 13-17. here you see all of the parts for the front of the suit laid out on each of the sides that they will be applied to. SO many of these part - like the interior details of the power suit, simply slip into place - the engineering of these parts is just so pleasing to make, the part simply sliding into position is so satisfying. I think I need a cigarette!
Here is the inside of the suit - with the two holes for the arms of the pilot to go into and the interior of the face shield/ visor there to see with the two movable hinges that simply secure in a manner illustrated in the instructions very clearly. The four plates on the bottom of this picture are the lower body armoured plates that flap and move around if you want them to once constructed.
Moore lumps and bumps go onto the shell of the upper armour, the thin snips I use need a little trimming with a sharp scalpel before I secure them in place with the knife's tip, and then fill the space with thin cement. The best way of not losing the "rivet" bolts that are so tiny and hard to handle.
In Steps18 through 20 the pilot's compartment goes together. The pilot's seat is a nicely detailed piece that looks like it came straight from a 1970's bucket seat from your dad's car. There is plenty of detail around it and I would think you can add your own wiring looms on either side, that would add to the makeshift cramped nature of the cockpit.
Step 21 sees us putting together the "sack" on the rear of the body in three main parts. M14 & 15 go together in the weirdest of cack-handed ways, and then when they join to the third part M2 there is a seam line or two that needs filling. none of the lines are rigid so you cannot apply pressure to them and so you probably will need to fill that rear "sack seam". More lumps and bumps go onto the shell at this point also.
We thought we would build it up step-by-step for you in our guide. The box opens up into a mix of duck egg blue and other smaller various coloured sprues, a double-sided card with four colour options and lastly the light grey paper instructions.
Having never put one of these MAK kits together before, I was pretty concerned about getting everything just right in the build, so I followed instructions pretty much faithfully from start to finish. The Light grey paper is smartly decorated by Hasegawa, and it follows their normal, logical approach to modelling which is welcome on this, my "maiden voyage into M.A.K."Different but familiar construction
A little on the type of build. If you are au-fait with the Gundam Mechas and the newer Bandai Star Wars figure kits you are in a familiar place with this build. The arms, legs and other parts of the suit are meant to be posable after construction, so they are joined with socket and polycap joints... These are easy to put together, and they leave you with a great flexibility to be able to pose the kit how you want it after construction finishes.
On to the first steps...
Steps 1-4 cover the making of the suit's feet and rocket thrusters. These are a simple affair, and they can be put together in short order, leaving the tripod-loke high heel feet with the cylindrical rocket thrusters at the rear of the feet. Notice the treads on the bottom of the feet? something I have seen also on the Ammoknight kits and a good feature especially if you want to make tread marks or show the suit in flight with rocket smoke or flames flying out of the vents (my imagination is going off right now).
Steps 6 & 7 are concerned with a left and right lower leg construction. The parts are similar for each leg, and I was already shifting off my original promise to myself to take this slowly. You can see here the two sides of the legs in the instructions for both sides, with the poly caps to make the sockets and the plastic for the kit to make the "stumps" to fit into these articulating joints. It is with these lower legs that I first noticed the nasty seams that are left when these parts are joined together - glue and sanding a little on each one make it an easy fix. The feet can pivot at what you would call the ankle joints also as a point of interest, while the power (?) popes which go from the lower legs to the torso can be placed in the sockets now, or later and do not need glue to secure them. Best you do not cement them in there right now - I stuck mine in - to be glued later when I was sure they would be propperly aligned
Step 8: The "thigh" parts go together in a similarly simple manner to the "shins", the two halves secure a poly cap on the inside makes make a posable joint. do yourself a favour and seperate the two thigh sides before constructing them so you do not get parts of either side mixed up! Once they are together - and you sand off those seams - you can place the two legs together - they stay together, fully posable, without glue.
Step 9 sees you put together both halves of the suit's pelvis, in that same two halves and poly cap construction manner, and then you are ready to go on to the longer and more detailed construction of the upper half of the suit.
The face mask/visor go together next in step 12. These are a simple process again, and for now, I secured in the inside of the visor with the internal screens and parts. Notice that this rather simple construction is in two parts? All of the bumps, lumps and extra detail parts are a detail of the construction that requires some fine snips to cut them from the sprues and some fine work and close control of any parts that PING! off into the distance.
Here they are - inside and out of the face shield in close-up and all of the lumps and bumps added to the exterior of the faceplate...
The top of the MK44 suit is constructed in steps 13-17. here you see all of the parts for the front of the suit laid out on each of the sides that they will be applied to. SO many of these part - like the interior details of the power suit, simply slip into place - the engineering of these parts is just so pleasing to make, the part simply sliding into position is so satisfying. I think I need a cigarette!
Here is the inside of the suit - with the two holes for the arms of the pilot to go into and the interior of the face shield/ visor there to see with the two movable hinges that simply secure in a manner illustrated in the instructions very clearly. The four plates on the bottom of this picture are the lower body armoured plates that flap and move around if you want them to once constructed.
Moore lumps and bumps go onto the shell of the upper armour, the thin snips I use need a little trimming with a sharp scalpel before I secure them in place with the knife's tip, and then fill the space with thin cement. The best way of not losing the "rivet" bolts that are so tiny and hard to handle.
In Steps18 through 20 the pilot's compartment goes together. The pilot's seat is a nicely detailed piece that looks like it came straight from a 1970's bucket seat from your dad's car. There is plenty of detail around it and I would think you can add your own wiring looms on either side, that would add to the makeshift cramped nature of the cockpit.
Step 21 sees us putting together the "sack" on the rear of the body in three main parts. M14 & 15 go together in the weirdest of cack-handed ways, and then when they join to the third part M2 there is a seam line or two that needs filling. none of the lines are rigid so you cannot apply pressure to them and so you probably will need to fill that rear "sack seam". More lumps and bumps go onto the shell at this point also.
A close-up of the rear shell with some super glue on the inside to sturdy the joints up a little - you dont want a "crack in your sack" do you?
The rear has two sections of detail that will be covered by the sack or "scrotum?" of the rear shell. This can be simply slid on and off so you can detail this once your model is made to your heart's content by simply removing the rear. Nice.
It is time to start putting the halves of this MK44 together - starting at the waist. Our lower torso is already made up...
Lastly, a detail of the lower legs and detail on the feet.
The cockpit is joined to the legs - this cockpit only needs an outer shell now - the end is in sight. This point of the build was on Sunday at about lunch time- I started on Saturday morning, so my timetable of a weekend build was coming along on time so far.
Here we are with all of the detail laid out so far - only the arms and guns to come...
There are three mandible-like claw hands to be constructed in step 25. These are rather nifty in how they simply clasp into each other and kind of lock in place. The ejector pin marks on the inse of the fingers will need to be removed. One of these hands, the closed one - is meant to hold the large laser.
The arms are next - and you can see the construction method is the same here as we had when putting together the legs. Steps 28-30 have you simply putting together the two halves and poly cap sockets, don't forget to get rid of those seams on the arms kiddies!
These arms then go into the sockets of the front of the suit. They simply pop in there and they have a limited traverse that are stopped only by the body that gets in the way.
Here is the front of the Mk 44 suit - completed and ready to sit on the two prongs that it slides onto that secure it to the rest of the suit, all without glue.
This picture shows you the last step before you secure the front of the armoured suit. You can still pull this apart and paint it later if you like - but this is the point I would paint it all up.
The rear of the shell and that sack I keep on talking about - the shell simply slides on the rear of the kit so you can detail it at any time. A great selling point of this kit for me.
The great details that can be picked out on the inside and outside of the kit make this such a cool kit to paint and weather.
The detailed insides of the fighting suit of this White Knight Prototype.
A last close-up of the visor and the face shield of the armoured suit. Those with a little bit of engineering nouse would like to make a few lights for the inside of this kit - as it's my firs tI think I will limit it to construction. Maybe light him up next time I reckon.
Here it is from the underside in close-up on the far left you can better see the texture of the power line.
Here is the gun with the nylon braided hose that I would suppose be a power cable (do they still have these in the future?) The whole laser kind of reminds me of a large anti-tank rifle or something large like that - demounted and stuck into the arms of the pilot in his mechanized power suit. The braided plastic hose has a slight seam line on it - try to minimize that effect with a light scraping with a scalpel blade...
Here are all of the major sub-sections ready to go together. These parts simply fit into each other if you like, and they can be painted separately which allows you to further super detail the inside of the suit with extra wire and details if you like. I love this feature of the model.
Amazingly these parts you see in the picture below are the only spare parts after construction completed. I am so used to seeing kits adapted and with new tooling with lots of spare parts, IT is kind of refreshing to actually FINiSH a kit with all of the parts assembled. The completists will love this.
Here the kit is assembled together and ready to paint - the parts of the suit on the upper body can be pulled apart and painted - this was one of the things I was really hoping for when I started construction and something you should take note of - It is a great selling point of this kit.
Here is the suit, opened at the pilot's visor and the top half of the armour open so the pilot can enter or exit.
...and with the pilot in place and the top half of the suit closed with only the visor hatch open.
With the visor closed up and ready for a fight - the mind boggles with what you can do with this kit in paint and body additions and surface texture...here he is without his big gun.
Lastly with his big-assed laser cannon - I kinda like the bazooka and Hammerknight armament - however, this fellow is in space - so he needs a laser - and this gun's power is connected by that big cable.
The gaps in the upper clamshell are a little larger - they are naturally separated - but as this is not 100% secure yet the gaps prize open a little more - after the kit is painted you simply glue the stalks together and that allows the front hatch and also front top half of the armour to still open up to reveal the pilot.
That is finish for this kit - for now anyway. The real bonus, and the reason I wanted to make this kit to show you how it goes together, is the fact that its main parts that you would want to pull apart to paint them after construction can do just that. The engineering of the kit, the excellent fit, and the ease of the build all add to the flexibility of this build. The order you can build it can change around, only certain parts of the build are needed to be specifically done in order.
I love this kit, I thought I would not as I like some other M.A.K. kits better aesthetically. but the charm and the way it all goes together really won me over. This is also one of the cheaper kits of the range, and seeing it is from Hasegawa, it is easier to buy outside Japan as well.
Great work on this kit - we can recommend this kit especially, or the similar Ammoknight if you want to get into the Maschinen Krieger universe.
