'93 Mighty Morphin Power Rangers Morpher Restoration Project.

The next time I do a blog, somebody remind me to take more pictures, kay? LOL, anyways, welcome to a new blog about a recent project I undertook. Awhile back while I was cleaning, I found my original '93 Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers Morpher. It had a lot of good memories so I held onto it. Recently, I learned of people undertaking restoration projects to not only fix the look of their Morpher, but also make it more TV accurate. 

So, I read. I spent weeks researching, reading other people's blogs, seeing how it came apart, what type of paint to use, etc etc. Couple weeks ago, I finally decided to undertake the project.

I forgot to take a picture, but mine was in pretty much the same condition. The black stickers were peeling and the red had faded somewhat and there were various nicks to the paint. Only difference was that my speaker (the disc in the middle behind the red plastic) was out of its round holder.

The one major problem I had to fix was the sticker placements when I replaced them later. 

The TV show Morpher, both in Japan and in America, the handle and the buttons were at the bottom, but Bandi America for some reason decided to have it at the top. It's a easy fix, just got to turn it upside down and place the new stickers on correctly. That however, is later on after I get all the painting done.

The first thing I did was remove the silver plates. Once those were off (again, I didn't think to photograph this process), I found that the red plastic had two screws. I removed those and carefully pulled up on the red plastic because the wiring is old and I didn't want to damage it any, I just wanted to fix the placement of the disc. After carefully maneuvering it into place, I gently replaced the red plastic and after making sure it was aligned properly I screwed it back down. I then took a q-tip and some rubbing alcohol and cleaned the red plastic itself as it had some dirt and dust built up from over the years.

The next step; sanding. I acquired a sanding block because I thought it would be a lot easier to use instead of sandpaper. It took me about an hour, but I managed to sand away the paint, any nicks, and any leftover sticker residue.

To the left is the plate I sanded, to the right is the one I haven't done yet, but did take the time to remove the stickers first.

I then started on the second one and found it just as easy.

The plates after sanding, I test fitted them back onto the morpher to make sure I didn't warp them while I was holding them and sanding. Yes, I know there's still silver around he edges, but every photo I found on the web on painting this thing they had the same lines, so I figured it was okay.

From here, I realized that I needed to go ahead and order new stickers. Thanks to the various blogs, I found a site that was recreating the stickers for the Morpher, in various styles. The original, TV show recreation, and the original Japan Zyuranger version. I opted to recreate the TV show, so that's what I ordered.

Next I had to figure out how to paint these evenly. In one blog I read, the gentlemen used hot glue and skewers to hold up his plates during plating. I didn't really want to go this far, because I was afraid I wasn't going to be able to get the glue off. So instead I took a couple tooth picks, cut the tips off, and stuck them into the mounting holes on the back side of the plates, once I stuck them into a cardboard container it was as good as any stand and I didn't have to alter the plates any to do it. Again, I forgot to take pictures :-/.

So after setting them up, I went about painting them. I did both the front and the back. The first one turned out wonderfully and after I let the paint cure for a couple of days next to my heater (I wanted to be sure) I decided to go ahead and sticker it up since the stickers came in.

Shiny.

The second one though, something went wrong... not sure what but there was runs and a couple bad spots. So I sanded it down again and tried painting it again on the next nice day I had.

This time, I had another problem, some kinda runny wrinkle effect. After asking on my page what to do, because I didn't want to sand it down again and ruin it, I set about trying to find something to take the paint off but without damaging the plastic. 

Somebody suggested paint thinner, but all that did was move the paint around. I was going to try paint remover, but before I tried it, I googled it and it turns out paint remover will eat through plastic. Knowing my luck, I would ruin it, so I said no to that. I then spent the next hour in google and to my surprise I found several sites saying that oil based paints can be removed with rubbing alcohol. I had my doubts, but I decided to give it a shot, I had nothing to lose after all.

To my utter shock, the paint actually came off. It didn't just come off, it practically slid off. So I was back to what I had originally sanded down and was happy I could start again. However, it was several attempts later and a couple of rewashes before I finally got a coat on that I was happy with.

Awesome.

Once I let it cure for a bit, I went ahead and got it all stickered up.

Niceeeee.

I wasn't done yet though. I took both halfs of the plates outside and cleared coated them to make sure the stickers don't peel and to help protect them. After I let the clear coat cure, I put everything back together.

Ah, but something's missing. I lost the original coins that go with this. Kind of pointless doing all of this work just to not have a coin in it huh? So I loaded up ebay, there's a seller on there selling metal replicas of the original coins. I managed to find these weathered ones that looked awesome and I bought those, I managed to get four out of seven, figured that'd be good enough for now.

Which one to pick though was the question. I decided to go with my favorite color blue, so I picked the triceratops coin.

Thus, the project is done. It was pretty fun while it lasted, and now I have my original morpher restored like new again and I'm going to proudly hang on to it. Eventually I might acquire another Morpher and repaint it gold and get the Dragon and Tiger coins, but that's another day! 

I hope you enjoyed reading about this project as much as I enjoyed doing it and writing about it. Hopefully I have inspired you to do some kind of creative project of your own. If I have, share it with me on my page! I love seeing stuff people come up with.

Until next time folks, same Nerd time, same Nerd channel!

My review of the Limited Edition Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase One Avengers Assembled collection.

When I first heard of the Phase One collectors set, I got excited. From the promotional picture above, it seemed to me that it was going to come in a replica brief case from the Avengers movie, with all the movies, including case files on the different Avengers. Without hesitation I preordered it, it was due out the same time as the Avengers was slated for a home release so I figured why not?

To my (and others) dismay, the release was delayed and instead I received a bluray copy of the Avengers free of charge courtesy of Marvel and Amazon as a thank you for my patience while they fixed whatever was wrong with it.  I honestly forgot about it until about a week ago when I received a email from Amazon reminding me that they will be shipping it out on April 2nd. Again, I got excited, thinking it was going to be one of the top Marvel collectibles out there to date. I mean after all it's description was quoted with;

"Collectible packaging with exclusive memorabilia (prop reproductions and artifacts) from the motion pictures"

So, I waited.

 Finally, it's the second! My package arrived via UPS and from the size, I got excited. Thinking surely it was a full size briefcase replica.

 Instead, when I opened it, I was a little let down. I was expecting a full size briefcase, but instead I am greeted with a 12x9 case. I still holdout hope for it, because it looks shiny so surely it must be brushed aluminum or maybe even diecast right?

 Oh, a try me button, wonder what it does?

 Ah, it lights up the Shield crest on the outside, that's cool, now let's get it out of the box and take a looksee

Another disappointment. The case feels like cheap plastic, like a grade above the toys you get out of the dollar store. Again though, I brush aside the disappointment, after all I was promised movie prop replicas and stuff, so how bad can it be if the case was a little cheaply made?

 Oh! Looks like it has buckles, nice!

Let down again, the "buckles" are the same cheap plastic as the rest of the case, and very thin feeling at that. I am afraid at some point in the future they are going to get snapped off. Let's go ahead and open it though, surely it gets better.

 Oh, very nice looking, the cube is the centerpiece on what looks like a motherboard, the movies are to either side, and case files are in the lid. Also, there seems to be a keypad, maybe I can push in some keys? Seems cool.

Another let down. The "holder" for the case files is a tad loose, I am afraid that if the case gets opened wrong, the contents of these files will spill out and thus be lost or put back wrong. 

 The tesseract is removable, so I took it out to see what was underneath. Couple LED's, nothing more, just to make the cube have a glow when the case is opened. The circuits look kinda cool though.

Upon closer inspection of the circuits, I can see that they are just painted molded plastic. So far this has just been one big of a let down as far as collectibles go.

Even the keypad is molded on and the numbers unpushable. Really, how hard would it have been to just put a dummy keypad on? It didn't have to do anything, but it could still allow you to push some buttons.

The entire "circuit panel" lifts out and as you can see, it's just one big piece of molded plastic, with that cheap feel to it.

The only purpose lifting out the board does is to allow you to change the batteries on the LED's, I thought maybe I could put the files here so their contents wouldn't get scattered about, but if I did that I couldn't put the movies, nor the cube, back into their proper place.

This is the lid without the files in it. The logo is semi transparent and when you have the cube in place and activated, you can close the lid and see the glow of the cube flickering through the shield.

The movies, in gloss hard stock sleeves. The artwork I like, so no complaints about that.

The tesseract, seems okay, battery operated. The only problem i have is there is no on switch, you have to impact it fairly hard on a hard surface to get it to come on, and even then it just flickers, there is no solid on mode.

Sorry for the shoddy quality, best I could do.

Okay, it has a certificate, so surely my disappointment will lift now as I should be getting to the "movie prop replicas".

First up is a confidential letter from shield. Inside contained a overlay decoder and a shield keycard. So far so good, I am impressed with both of the items and the card actually feels like a real keycard.

Up first, is the Thor case file.

My first impression of the files, from the advertising above is that they were going to be real folders. Instead they are made of gloss paper, seems a tad cheap and disappointing to me.

Oh, look, goodies.

Thor's hospital bracelet, seems and feels like a actual hospital bracelet, that's a plus.

The drawing from the Thor movie, explaining the different planets and how they are connected. Instead of notebook paper though, the gloss paper is once again introduced. 

Photograph of Thor "landing" during the storm, this is also gloss paper, but since it's a photograph I didn't mind too much.

A page from the children's book Jane's father showed her about Thor, gloss paper here again.

Considering that Shield keycard actually felt like a keycard, I was disappointed to find that these were instead made from gloss hard stock paper. 

To save myself some time, unless otherwise noted, everything pictured from here on out is on the gloss paper, I will make notes of what the items are though.

'

Up next, we have Tony Stark's file.

A pamphlet from the '64 Stark Expo 

A page from Howard Stark's journal, referencing the cube.

Tony's note to Pepper saying they are no longer making weapons (this too sadly is gloss paper)

Tony's Iron Man prototype drawings, and yes when you press them together the entire armor suit can be seen just like in the movie. This is made from a waxy type of paper.

A blueprint of the arc reactor.

A (gloss paper) newspaper clipping as seen in Iron Man 1.

A ticket to the Stark expo.

A business card of one Aldrich Killan.

Up next, we look at the Hulk's file.

A research article from Culver University.

A redacted SHIELD letter about Banner.

A screw on plate for the lab Banner was working in. This is made from a very thin metal.

Blue prints for the vehicle weapons seen in the movie.

A replica soda label from the beginning of the Incredible Hulk. This is made from a sticker type material.

A newspaper clipping from the movie.

Up next, we look at Captain America's file.

A selective service certificate of acceptable card listing rejection for Rogers.

A photo of Rogers pre super solider program.

Captain America trading cards and a photo of his girl, all sadly made of gloss paper.

A notice of fraud committed by Rogers for falsifying his enrollment records.

A gloss paper notebook page of the drawing Rogers did inbetween shows.

Rogers' physical exam sheet.

And lastly, we have the "top secret" SHIELD file. Also, it arrived like this, nice quality control Marvel.

Black Widow's redacted SHIELD file.

Hawkeye's redacted SHIELD file.

A photo of the tesseract while it was in Hydra's control.

Agent Coulson's business card.

A photo of the tesseract powered up.

A redacted SHIELD evidence file.

Ah, but what's this? The decoder seems to go with this file. "Director Fury has ordered you be sent to battleofnewyork.net to receive further operational debriefing.

Ah, but what's on the site you ask? Just a video of the coming phase two project, with clips from Iron Man 3, Thor 2, Ant Man and brief discussion on the new Captain America movie. A video I'm sure will find its way on to youtube eventually. Nothing else.

All in all, I am let down by this whole "collectors" edition. I feel as if I paid for the movies only and got cheap memorabilia for free. I expect this kind of cheapness from a mass produced product, but not something that is suppose to be a limited run, limited collectors edition that came with a certificate of authenticity. If this is the quality of Marvels collectibles now, I don't expect I will be buying any in the future. Because I forgot I ordered this almost a year ago, the only Avenger movie missing from my movie collection was Captain America, if I had known then what I know now, I would've just saved myself the money and disappointment and just bought Captain America and cancelled my preorder. 

In my opinion, save yourself the cash and just buy the movies, you can probably get them for a whole lot cheaper then you would this. If you don't own any of the movies, then I guess you might want to give this a look at. On the whole it's nice, but I am let down because I believed the hype and thought that I was getting some awesome collectible and instead I got let down big time. 

In my opinion, Marvel should have gone with this, but that would be too cool now wouldn't it?