Medicom Woes

[KillingYouGuy]

I have nine Medicom Stormtroopers that I have had posed with their arms behind their backs for over a year in a Detolf. I took them out to dust them and no less than THREE have broken shoulders (one has both broken). The screw fix is not going to work as the plastic is now so brittle it just falls apart like stale cake when the screw tries to bite in.

Obviously, I can save one of them by switching the shoulder that didn't break on one... over to the other one with one good shoulder. I ordered two new Medicom Naked2 bodies, question to anyone with experience in replacing MediBodies- is the swap difficult? I know the wrist pegs no longer meet up which is extremely annoying. Are the medicom troopers easy to swap though?

The thing that has me questioning this is the torso armor / black body suit. The suits are getting old and may tear and the torso armor is tight, I fear that even with copious application of a hair dryer's heat - it's going to be difficult. Also, does anyone know if Medicom actually used plastic that will not deteriorate as fast on the Naked2's?

Lastly, has anyone ever successfully contacted Medicom support? I cannot find any information on the web to this end, my question to them was going to be do they have replacement shoulder parts.

 

[galactiboy]

Wow man, sorry to hear that. You might also check in the Star Wars customs sub-forum. I know some mods have been done on the Medicom figures; but not sure the extent.

 

[KillingYouGuy]

Thanks I forgot about that sub - forum, I did find pics where someone swapped out the Medi with a TT Slim, but to me it looks like the armor is too small then. I may be one of the only people that actually likes Medi StormTroopers just the way they are... without broken shoulders of course.

 

[galactiboy]

Yeah, not to mention the slims can be pretty pricey.

 

[user 2216]

Lastly, has anyone ever successfully contacted Medicom support? I cannot find any information on the web to this end, my question to them was going to be do they have replacement shoulder parts.

I once tried contacting Medicom support directly for an issue I had with the Akira Kaneda bike, and received a reply and help from Sideshow, who I guess was handling their customer service requests stateside.

 

[galactiboy]

BTW; don't know if its the same body... but I have a partial Jango Fett; I think the shoulders are good. If you want them they're yours

 

[thenammagazine]

Might just be easier to buy new RAH bodies or if you want to ditch the Medi bodies all together (highly recommended), pick up the HT Sweeny Todd bodies (Slim TrueTypes) and port them over.

 

[madcy23]

After a couple of years the plastic gets super brittle. I have a Boba with 2 bad shoulders and 2 Clones and a Boba with bad hip/leg. Good news is, I now have 1 complete and unbroken Boba. :-(

 

[KillingYouGuy]

Yeah, not to mention the slims can be pretty pricey.

Yeah, I am not dropping $400 into a replacement for all nine.

I once tried contacting Medicom support directly for an issue I had with the Akira Kaneda bike, and received a reply and help from Sideshow, who I guess was handling their customer service requests stateside.

Well, its good you got a response, do you recall the contact info?

BTW; don't know if its the same body... but I have a partial Jango Fett; I think the shoulders are good. If you want them they're yours

That's great of you to offer, let me see if the Naked2's work and if not I will send you a pic of the piece and if it jibes up we can work something out.

Might just be easier to buy new RAH bodies or if you want to ditch the Medi bodies all together (highly recommended), pick up the HT Sweeny Todd bodies (Slim TrueTypes) and port them over.

Yeah, I just wish I could get a body that is the same as the original sans crappedy plastic.

After a couple of years the plastic gets super brittle. I have a Boba with 2 bad shoulders and 2 Clones and a Boba with bad hip/leg. Good news is, I now have 1 complete and unbroken Boba. :-(

Yep, my Boba needed a hip replacement, but luckily the screw/nut fix worked as it was a pass through and didn't need the screw to bite into the plastic.

 

[galactiboy]

If the shoulders work you can have them... I've just kept it around to give out the parts if someone needed them. So far I've give away a hip joint and the feet

 

[Natrix]

I replaced the body on my ESB Medicom Fett when the hip broke from just bring in a standing pose with the newer Medicom massive 2 body. It was a pretty simple swap other than having to drill out the holes in the arms to a larger size to accomodate the Fett wrist pegs. The new Medicom body seemed to be made of a better plastic than the old ones.

 

[KillingYouGuy]

If the shoulders work you can have them... I've just kept it around to give out the parts if someone needed them. So far I've give away a hip joint and the feet

So nice of Fett, to have choosen to be an organ donor... I'll try to remember to send you a pic or two of the piece.

Another thing that crossed my mind was, is there any material you can cast that would hold up to the movement in the shoulder? I know my normal resin would not do it.

I found this shot on the net (at work right now) that shows the piece that broke, I believe the piece is ambidextrous and can simply be flipped to move from left to right.

BTW, this shot is showing how someone used two washers to enable a fix on that shoulder on the left, but my plastic was too far gone for it and the screw holding the arm piece in gets in the way of anything but a rather tiny screw at that.

 

[KillingYouGuy]

I replaced the body on my ESB Medicom Fett when the hip broke from just bring in a standing pose with the newer Medicom massive 2 body. It was a pretty simple swap other than having to drill out the holes in the arms to a larger size to accomodate the Fett wrist pegs. The new Medicom body seemed to be made of a better plastic than the old ones.

Good to hear, was the height and body thickness that much different, I would have thought the massive would not fit a regular RAH outift or is the new Fett already on that body?

 

[lerath666]

Just a thought

at one point in time, I contacted a machine shop about getting the medicom shoulders made out of aluminum.

They could do it, but the cost was going to be 1500$ for something like 20 sets., and they needed the 1000$ up front, to buy the parts they would need to make it.

They did say, that once they'ed made it once, they would do 500$ for each additional set of 20 after that, and that 20 sets was the smallest they would do at a time.

this was 3 years ago, so prices would likely have gone up.

 

[user 2216]

Well, its good you got a response, do you recall the contact info?

The email address I used was [email protected], which I got from a posting on the Mediworld boards.

 

[KillingYouGuy]

Ugh, I just tried porting a good arm / shoulder joint over to one of the one - armed figures and it broke just from putting it on, I now have three figures with only one good arm / shoulder. This is freaking ridiculous, hope those Naked2's work out...

The sad state of Stormie affairs:

 

[KillingYouGuy]

Just a thought

at one point in time, I contacted a machine shop about getting the medicom shoulders made out of aluminum.

They could do it, but the cost was going to be 1500$ for something like 20 sets., and they needed the 1000$ up front, to buy the parts they would need to make it.

They did say, that once they'ed made it once, they would do 500$ for each additional set of 20 after that, and that 20 sets was the smallest they would do at a time.

this was 3 years ago, so prices would likely have gone up.

LOL, not even near my budget and with our luck the whole figure would break around the aluminum piece good to hear efforts were made though, I guess casting resin-like materials is out of the question?

The email address I used was [email protected], which I got from a posting on the Mediworld boards.

Thanks I will give it a shot and see what happens - cannot hurt...

 

[lerath666]

Ugh, I just tried porting a good arm / shoulder joint over to one of the one - armed figures and it broke just from putting it on, I now have three figures with only one good arm / shoulder. This is freaking ridiculous, hope those Naked2's work out...

The sad state of Stormie affairs:

I've got a friend who is trying to cast from super hard resin.

Either or, should you decide you wanna sell some of those broken stories armor, let me know.

 

[Monger]

I just get Medicom's modern anime figures and my only problem with this company is that their exclusives are such a pain. Every season they release a limited expensive convention exclusive figure like Darker Than Black Hei or Part 6 Jotaro and they always go for so much. Aside from that though I've never had an issue with their figures.

 

[KillingYouGuy]

Well, I got in the two Naked2's (of course I need another one now because another shoulder broke ) and swapped one of the Stormies over. The one on the left is an original non broken Medi and on the right is the body swap. The swap is seamless aside from the hands, which as you can see I have not swapped yet. That will involve drilling out the forearm on the Naked2 to accept the thicker Stormie hands.

The height is perfect on these as is the thin body type, you literally cannot tell the difference when they are side by side. The only thing that stands out is that the figure body is flesh tone and you can see that around the feet so I will need to actually add black socks to cover that up. The height on the Naked2's is adjustable using one of three shin inserts and I went with the shortest which puts the body just under 11" - perfect for a Medi Stormie.

The poseability is great and the figure weighs less with the newer body making posing it extremely easy, I can only hope that Medicom used a higher quality plastic on these new versions, otherwise I will be in the same boat a few years from now...