JoeDeclassified.com

there's a guy from China on ebay right now running multiple accounts who has put up some weird body swap combos lately.

for example:
http://cgi.ebay.com/LOT-5-1985-GI-JOE-T ... 5d2e4ce58d
2002 con Tomax with both gold shoulder pads instead of one


http://cgi.ebay.com/LOT-5-Gi-Joe-COBRA- ... 43a67ef34f
The Imperial Procession Baroness head with the body of the 2002 con set Baroness (and yes I know that's entirely the body of the imperial procession baroness too, but the paint job is not imperial procession, it's the con paint job)



http://cgi.ebay.com/LOT-5-PCS-1989-G-I- ... 3cb70fb404
Winter operations Stalker with Con mercenaries Coil trooper body


http://cgi.ebay.com/5-Night-Creep-G-I-G ... 3cb70fb20e
DTC Hiss tank Night Creeper upper body with ATV Cobra CLAW's legs.


Now he has at least 100 of each from what he responded in mail. Given how little these sell for, and how immensely time consuming it would be to tear these all apart and assemble them individually, it would seem he purchased these in bulk as we see them like everything else he does on his ebay store.

Now I'm not at all saying these are variants, they are just swapped parts. But given the number of them that were pushed out, it leaves me wondering:
Was the Tomax an error in the run that they had to toss out because they put the two gold shoulders on instead of the one?
Was the Baroness the first run of the Imperial Procession and then they realized the colors were the same as the con set and changed it?
(this one was Gyre's idea) Was that Stalker originally supposed to come like that, was switched out to go in the winter operations set, and the joe club picked up the body and put a new troop builder head on it for the con set?
The Night Creeper one makes no sense to me given the Night creeper was a straight repaint anyway, unless this run was just to see if they could make him look more like a driver and less like a ninja? I dunno.

There's too many of 'em for the guy to have put 'em all together himself, especially at the price he's selling for.


You might be on to something...

I actually kind of like the Stalkers...

They look fun. I have been eying these.

If you look at some of the pictures of this group, some have different arms and paint apps.



Would I be incorrect to surmise that these auctions are for items that fall below the QC that hasbro wanted ?

You wouldn't be incorrect to surmise... and while that is a very logical and often times correct affirmation in regards to these types of things...
there are exceptions obviously.

So we're sure these are Hasbro-made and not kitbashed by the seller?

Pretty positive. With the sheer volume of figures he has it would be counter productive for him to have kit bashed all of these figures on his own at prices he's selling them. Also add to it if he had 100 Tomax's and 100 xamots why would he ruin 100 xamots just to take their arm off and put them on Tomax. If he did that you'd be seeing 100 xamots with no gold shoulders as well.

But again, this is just a curiosity of the production process if anything at all. These figures are no more valuable than the actual production piece and more than likely even less so.

..with that being said ...since the figures has to be assembled anyway could the stalker head figure been made headless then a "overstock head" be attached ?

After all since the head was a new item, the head and body may not have been produced at the same plant/time as the body was .


??????

I dunno. I wouldn't think they'd push out an order for a partial figure when the head wasn't determined til a later date. I guess we'd have to know more about the production process at the time.