Build Me Like One of Your Chinese Models

While I do love me some Piececool, a chance spot of a cool looking little draconic sort of model on a UK reseller of Chinese metal model kits sent me down the rabbit hole looking at another brand that, surprisingly, had rave reviews from r/metalearth. The kits were praised for being well-made from quality materials and designed with the end user's enjoyment and buildability in mind.

Enter: MU.

Here is that first, small 60-ish piece model - the Spring Couplet New Year's Shrine.

This was small, and very well designed. Most of the curved parts - of which there were many - had some indicator via other parts they aligned with, or where they slotted in, of what the exact curvature needed was. That meant no guesstimating or under-bending just so it wouldn't look crooked once the piece was fitted in properly. I could bend as needed each time, and then carry on with the next piece knowing I had the shaping correct. Even the lanterns hanging from the sides you could use the top piece (and I have the Piececool extra toolset which helps a tonne too) to show how tight the curve needed to be to get that circle to close up neatly.

Really good quality, I had minimal issues with the paint coming off or broken pieces and tabs (thank goodness) and the thoughtfulness of the designs in terms of showing you the curvature, or making sure there are no symmetrical pieces that you could fit in the wrong way around, is second to none. The metal sheets are even numbered directly so no spending forever looking up the next pieces on a separate instruction sheet!

The only downside, of course, is not getting the lighting included with the MU kits because they don't ship the lights outside of mainland China anymore.

Instead, I had to learn some minor electronics, remember why I hate soldering, find a way to not need to solder, and lo and behold! Touch sensor lighting. It even fits inside the purpose-built lighting piece inside the model that slides out for easy battery replacement (thoughtful! +1)

The sensor is attached to a wire down the right-hand side of the model base so it's very easy to turn on and off, and the red sensor LED got to stay in place because it complemented the two warm white LEDs inside so well and gives the model some colour-accentuated mood lighting around the base that plays well against the interior lights.

I'm not going to lie, I am honestly super pleased with how this one turned out, it's small, but wasn't horrendously fiddly and it went together so beautifully.

Look at those engraved numbers. You cannot put a foot wrong unless you're not paying attention or incredibly sleep deprived, they even have a marking for when a piece has spares included so you can find them easily!

This little Devil's Eye model is part of a series of five, I only like this draconic little fella so I only got the one, but again: small yet not fiddly, thoughtfully designed, quality materials.

The intended lighting is not available again, of course, so that's why there's the unsightly wiring visible in a few places - I threaded two nano LEDs into the side of the central chamber and the switch and battery hang behind the little guy mostly out of sight now that it's installed in a display case, but you can catch a glimpse of the red and black wires in places regardless.

I will say, this and the following model, the hanging ones are a pain towards the later stages as there is no good way to rest them on a flat surface or even hold them securely whilst adding the last pieces in. It's an unavoidable consequence of that elaborate design and the dangly bits and natural/expected shape of hanging ornaments/lanterns but it does make for some mild frustrations towards the end of the builds.

By and large, though, I enjoyed the build. Not the lighting, but the build, yes.

The Devil's Eye spent a month or two in a large glass vase hanging from an old takeaway chopstick after completion, until a proper display place was found for it. That made photography difficult, so please excuse the pictures. I did photoshop the hell out of the vase one so although you can see the unedited photo, please admire this tiny terror in the third photo where I did my best to let its petulant aggression shine through unobscured!

This was on the whole another good quality, thoughtful design and build. Except. The lighting came with this one! Yay!

Not.

The lantern top and lantern body are held together by four magnets inside, two on the top and two in the body that will hold the pieces together. Except, they are not strong enough to hold the lantern together for more than a minute, and also the light is poorly made so it barely fits in and despite the ingenious design that should allow you to turn it in and off without opening it up... Well, you can't do that.

And then if you put the light in anyway, as shown in the gorgeously illuminated photos 1 to 3, the lantern body is extra heavy and the lighting metal interferes with the magnets and the lantern will promptly try to kill itself through flinging itself at the floor with zero hesitation.

I must have put one or more dangly decoration and irritating bead(s) back on at least 20 times.

The fucking thing was determined to die, it is a suicidal lantern that seeks nothing but to turn itself into a misshapen ball of smashed metal, glass and wood.

I had to take the light out and superglue the magnetic top to the magnetic body.

That held.

It still tries to reach the ground at high velocity - was just trying to get it fixed up after a loose ring on a dangly bit (three guesses what events loosened the ring) meant a decoration fell off and there it went again trying to perish in violent worship of gravity - and so it's now hung up and staying that way.

Forever.

And ever.

It will never be given the freedom to skydive again.

It does, despite the lack of lighting and the fact the magnetic hook it comes with is too damn deep to work in my display case, look lovely.

So there's that.

I have a Piececool lantern on a similar scale but with a vastly increase number of beads and bits and some strange translucent pieces that I don't know how well that will all go together, but we shall see which I end up voting as Most Frustrating Fucking Fthing when I'm done. I couldn't even make a bet as to which I will curse at the most, but I'm sure the PC lantern will finish up into as stunning a decoration as this MU has!

Stay tuned, but I have more ships in the meantime so don't stay too tuned! Stay a few notes off, my friends, a few notes off.

Please look forward to it.™️