Complete Newbie here so let me say hi and introduce myself .

Jet Jaguar has always been one of my favorites since i was a kid.

5 or so years a go i had a chance to pick up this Billiken Model at a local screening of Godzilla Final Wars at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood.

I had no ideas how difficult it would be to assemble and i know i cannot find another one so i wan't to assemble it properly.

Problem is i can find no English instructions and the vinyl is super hard to break to pop in the arms and legs, etc.

Here is a like of how it looks assembled

http://homepage2.nifty.com/ms06/jetjagger/jetjagger.htm

I'm really having difficulty popping out those vinyl tabs to cover the arm sockets let alone the smaller hand sockets.

Deos anyone knopw an english instruction manual or should i just try to dremel out the vinyl and hope for the best. I'm reall lost as to how to proceed any help would be of immense help.

Like how to cut vinyl tools needed excetera.

Thank you so much in advance.

Gloomfrost

Welcome to the board Gloomfrost!

I'm not familiar with this model; though as many modelers will tell you; you can heat the vinyl parts with a hair dryer and they will pop on easier. This group is pretty resourceful and knowledgable- I'm sure someone should be of more help than I.

Gloomfrost, dont fret! Its actually very easy. All you need is a hair dryer and an exacto knife or something as sharp.

Heat the vinyl up until it is soft and pliable, dont worry, the paint wont come off unless you handle it very roughly. You want to cut the holes (plug holes) out where the parts should fit together and for the parts (plugs) that go into the holes you want to cut off the excess material (flash), it will make it much easier to insert the parts into the places they should fit. When you put it together the parts should be soft then too, that way its pretty easy to fit them into the holes. When the vinyl is hard you end up poking an jamming the parts together and that is a good way to scratch the paint so keep it hot when you are working with it.

Here is a picture, hope it helps!

Definitely. I never did get around to getting the glow. I'll need to do that one of these days.

The arms were the hardest for me as well. Make sure to attach them to the torso before the torso is attached to the waist. I think the instructions may actually say to glue the torso to the waist, but I'd skip the gluing if you can.

About the best advice I can give is to heat the vinyl as hot as you can with a good hair dryer and then get to work attaching limbs as quickly as possible. It cools quickly, and as it cools you lose the ability to work it. Be patient with it, though.

Also, when in doubt, undercut.

For those of you that never picked this one up, they recast both the regular and the GID in 2004 (for the Since Godzilla exhibit, I think) and they still surface regularly.

They are without a doubt two of the best JJ figures out there. I don't know what Billiken uses for its GID material, but it is FAR superior to any other I've seen. It holds light like crazy. You can see it glow here.

Wow! Thanks guys for all the fantastic responses. I must admit it seems like a bigger job then i was expecting. So when i get a free weekend ill get started on the project. I'm floored of the collections out there. Jet Jaguar along with Godzilla and Minya has always been my favorite. Thanks again for all the great pointers. One additional quick question do i heat up the vinyl before i cut out the holes? or do i only heat the vinyl to fit the sockets together?

Thanks again.

Both. Everything will be easier when the vinyl is warm.

Hi Gloomfost, welcome.

cutting a fresh exacto blade thru warm GID vinyl makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.

have fun.

Hi gang!

Well success! I finally have chance to do JJ today. Learned a lot. Used a brand new exacto knife and a heat gun. I went slowly and like you said to do undercut. The vinyl got incredibly hot quickly and the pieces fit together quite nicely. I hope these images work below;

http://usera.ImageCave.com/gloomfrost/jj.jpg

http://usera.ImageCave.com/gloomfrost/jjg.jpg

http://usera.ImageCave.com/gloomfrost/leaning.jpg

So i have some questions.

1.) The waist was the hardest part to fit and its still not as tight fitting as i would like. Could i glue the waist so it would not be loose and if so what kind of glur should i use (crazy glue?)

2.) JJ is rather severely slanted forward so much so that well he can't even stand by himself! I had to have Godzilla hold his hand for the pictures LOL! So my question is should i try to heat the ankles up with the heat gun and try to bend him back wards? Or perhaps i could weigh down his feet with sand or lead weights? Picture 3 "leaning" shows the problem

3.) Finally what scale is this JJ in? I have him next to my Godzilla from Final Wars but does the scale look right to you? Should I look for a Godzilla from the BILLIKEN 1998 line? Was there any made for the Godzilla vs Megalon film? I rather liked the pug dog face phase of Godzilla i wish BILLIKEN made one of those in this Scale.

Well thanks again for everyone being so kind to a Fresh Meat like me here. Thanks again!

Welcome to SB, Gloom!

Glad you got your JJ together. Just a few things to help you out:

1) You mentioned you used a heat gun to warm the parts up, but I would say just stick with a regular hair dryer. Not sure how hot your gun gets, but if its like mine it can easily melt vinyl if you get it too close or use it for too long. I cut a pretty good amount of vinyl, and I'd say the best thing to do is just put the pieces in a mylar shipping bag (like a USPS priority bag) and put the nozzle of the hair dryer in there set to its highest setting. A hair dryer won't be hot enough to melt vinyl, so you can let them get nice and toasty on their own and then pull them out to cut.

2) You can glue the waist, and crazy glue actually works pretty well for vinyl, but watch out you don't get any on the paint because it will definitely mess that up. Also, if the waist is loose now, gluing it down might not make that much of a difference as it won't change the shape of the parts. You could try heating up just the plug part of the waist (probably the lower half) and spreading it out to make it a bit bigger for a snugger fit.

3) Definitely heat up the legs/ankles with a dryer and then let them set in the position you want, that should help. But since its top-heavy, using sand or some kind of ballast would probably help. Might even want to think about a stand for 12" figures or dolls, those can usually be bought for pretty cheap at craft/hobby stores.

Good luck!

Thanks Velocitron for the for the tips. Yeah i thought the heat gun was a might to hot so i only used it sparingly and for little amount of time.

Im glad to hear about the crazy glue. The waist isn't exactly loose its just a bit wobbly the is a part that hangs over the back of the bottom piece and that was hard to figure out i had to cut a slit for it to mesh together. I'm still not sure if i did it right as its still a little wobbly hence my glue idea.

As for the legs im glad i can try to heat them up and bend them. As for ballast might something like plaster be better so it would stay in the legs and weight JJ down ? Thanks again.

Hey Gloomfrost,
Billiken made a Godzilla 1975 kit that is partially painted, it would like nice next to the JJ. Then all you'd need would be the Marmit kit versions of Gigan and Megalon (same scale as the B JJ) to make a realistic fight scene.

This sounds like a very good idea!