Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Poppa's got a Brand New Bag!

My BattleFoam Pack Max came in yesterday...

How do I sum it up in a few words ?

GIANORMUS...TITANIC... LotR: Two Towers : the Directors Cut..... ( sorry had to... lol :) )

If any one has seen the 1520's and though wow that is huge , I can now say you were incorrect, it is "just" average.

Review...

The Construction (bag) : 5 of 5
The bag us up to the standard over kill Battle Foam standards, but turned up to 11! Oshkosh needs to learn how to build MRap's like this. Take the standard tough as nails bag, and make it stronger... Yeah apparently the walls, top and bottom are all extra reinforced with WOOD. So in addition to the plastic to stiffen the walls it now has some armor to prevent punctures, even though one would have had a hard time even with the "old" bags. This is not a case you would take with you to the air port. Even if checked you most likely would be charged for it being over sized. If I did not get some of the foam cut the way I did , I'm 100% that I could fit ALL 25,000 points of my Dark angels in it ( 10 built Land Raiders & 100 Termies...so far)... As I said HUGE!
This case was made to keep and transport the "Show Case " type models. No I'm not talking Gw plastic Super Heavies, I'm talking $600+ Fw models. To transport any thing less is total over kill.
This case would have been perfect for my Reaver project Last summer, to bad it did not come out till Xmas time.

Edit:
The weight of this big ol' bag is 15lbs empty (the wood panels are where most of this come from).... so loaded out it will be fairly hefty.There are no Back pack straps that "pretend" (see some one wearing a 1520 in to the store, it's fairly funny due to the weight and size of the bag) to carry all the weight, just the Condura nylon handles that go all the way under the bag to support the weight, not ever manufacture does this. If a strap tears loose you stuff is SOL, and this is just another feature to emphasise these are the Rolls Royce of Army transport bags. There is a name tag/business card holder that has a plastic window on the top of the bag for identification ( not that there are a bunch of these running around right now, but you never know).

The color choice... OD green, in fact I don't think there is an option for other colors ....yet ( the C4 case comes in black now I think).

There is a Pocket on the side that looks small, but I assure you will hold a standard GW Codex in it.

The Foam: 4.75 of 5

It is top notch as ever. I still wish it was a tad bit more rigid, but the case more than makes up for it. There was a bit of fraying from being recently cut, but nothing really bad.
As you can see from the picts below, this case I had made to transport my Death Wing Termies.
When I ordered it , I talked with Romeo about what I wanted it to hold.. and there were some changes to what we discussed, but I'm still ecstatic about it.
There are 4 trays..
2 Termie trays
A Thunderhawk tray
and a Thawk tray extender.

The Termie trays were originally to be 4 of the standard All termie trays with extra Foam inserts to make them snug with the case (around 140 total), since it is much larger than the standard BF tray size. Instead I got 1 tray that holds 84 Termies, with no inserts, but still room for customization if some one wanted. 84! so with the two trays I now have room for 168 terminators..... I bit much even for me, so some of my larger more dynamically posed standard base models will go in. I still have plans for around 130 or so Termies, so don't be surprised if I fill it up, but it will take some time.

Here is like 60 plus Termies with 3 Hq's in Termie armor. Still 20 spots left, and this is just one tray!

Now the Thawk tray
Well it holds a Thawk ( mines in the process of being built , but I hit a road block ( another Puppy) and like 4+ Rhino's stacked, 4 Land raiders Stacked, and 6+ Dreadnoughts Stacked.
No I know some would say "Stacked?" , well Battle Foam was nice enough to include Foam dividers for every slot , cut to match the trace. The only issue would be if you have alot of non removable items sticking up off the models. This tray configuration is different than the "Standard" Thawk tray. The Standard one has one slot for the big bird, one slot for the rhino, one slot for the Land Raider , and one Standard Drop pod slot (GW troop). I really don't use regular drop pods ( have one for Sternguard Surprise atack formation) and Don't have a single Rhino in my entire force ( do have 3 Razor backs and a Damocles) but I can use the Rhino slot for Dread weapons and missiles , turrets etc from the Land raiders.

My only real gripe about the foam , is the inserts/ spacers for stacking, the ones I got were , for lack of better term, Shaggy. They are also kind of thin to be put in between Land Raiders and Dreads, So may end up ordering some 2x thickness ones just to be safe.
The extender tray is exactly the same as the Thawk tray but just add more caring capacity. It is about 1/3 as tall as the main tray below.


Overall 5 of 5
Only Catch... it will put a big ( and I mean it literally) dent in your pocket book. I got a steal on it since I bought it on Black Friday ( the day after Thanksgiving in the USA, and the traditional "Start" of the Christmas Shopping season, usually most stores have Big sales). The Discount was 25% off the total case. So the regular price and shipping were to be ... just a FEW dollars Short of $400... I ended up paying about $300. Still not an easy pill to swallow, but as the saying goes you got to pay to play. With the several very large and very expensive FW models I have it was a necessary Evil in my book. The other plus is I can Almost fit 100% of what I usually play Marine wise with the Thunderhawk in this case. I can trade in my other cases and get some more foam cut for the rest of my ground ponders and customised Tanks, and some normal trays for the 1520...

I think I will leave my Tau stuff in Army transport cases for now, but when I start building my IG I will keep these trays in mind.

I'm looking forward to the PACK 720 that is said to be carry on luggage sized but larger than the 420 sized bag... 6 weeks is the ETA right now on the release.

If you all got questions, or would like more picts just ask.

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