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I've now aquired all three Insecticons, Kickback, Shrapnel and Bombshell. They're all in perfect shape, which has me a bit worried. Were these ever reissued or faked?
I'm aware they were reissued in 2004 in the japanese collection series, but those have different colours. Mine have the original colours, original stamps; infact there's nothing to discern them from the originals.
It's just their perfect condition that got me thinking 'fake'.
Oh and they were bought from three different sellers.

I'll post a pic of them later.

I was taking apart some bombshells to swap arms and some of the parts were different sizes. The arms could be swapped but are very slightly different sizes.So on one they are really tight and the other feels slightly loose. But the antenna is such a different size they couldn't be changed.

All are stamped takara with the same date, but the text size and foreign words aren't the same.

I just assume they are different production runs or versions from separate countries.

Congrats on getting the insecticons.
Perhaps this could be helpful, if you haven't checked it already that is:
Link

I know there's a Bombshell variation.

Minerva that's a neat web site. I liked seeing all the different versions.

Yeah, I like it too. It's sort of my bible

Well going by the picture on that website neither one of my bombshells is a reissue.


Do reissues have a different date stamped than the originals?

Hound wrote: Were these ever reissued or faked?

There were some "unofficial reproductions" (high quality KOs like the dinobots etc),released 1-2 years ago.

Oh-be-no-be, that's what I was afraid of...
Do you know anything more specific Charis?

Are KO's ever stamped with Takara?

LD2062 wrote:Are KO's ever stamped with Takara?

Yes they are. I haven't held in my hands the current fake Insecticons, but Prime says "Takara", France... And the others too.

Nevertheless - the Insecticons aren't hard to find in mint condition. Even before the official reissues, I saw heaps of dead mint Kickbacks, for example.

You can start taking a close look to the fine finish - i.e., silver paint on faces.

Hound wrote:Oh-be-no-be, that's what I was afraid of...
Do you know anything more specific Charis?

I know nothing more about the insecticons;but i do know that the quality of those KOs is good,they even have the official stamps on them.Thus,the term "unofficial reissues" is being used sometimes.
But i also agree with Jose,mint insecticons is nothing i haven't seen before.

I've got some insecticons that are mint as well. I thought they may be KOs but my rationale was when I bought them I bought them from some pawn-shop type of place (shrapnel and bombshell for $6 total), and I figured who would go through the trouble of buying new KOs only to sell them to the pawn shop for $1 each?

I guess until there's a reasonable way to differentiate KOs, the way to be relatively certain is the source you're buying them from.

Just an FYI Hound, or whoever may find this useful, you may want to be aware that some of the newer (released in the past year) KOs are of Cyclonus, Gnaw, Wheeljack, and the newest one, Shockwave (purlple KO shockwave)

inc ase you're looking to grab those.