1/6 Scale Motorcyles & 1/1 Motorcycles -- Size & Design -- Problems for 1/6 scale

Their hair was drying! Or rather the glue was. I've taken some seriously silly pictures all along since I got these figures. Even before that... With just the heads! I was cracking myself up!

It actually looks smaller in these pictures as I'm looking at them here than how it's been looking to me in person. Yowza!

LOL, those are adorable!

I tried to PM you to show you some photos of my peeps but your profile doesn't allow PMs. I put a few photos up on IG because my IG folks don't care if these are ready. LOL!

*Just realized IG cut off all the photos. I'll put the link back after I finish that.

chrisinbama wrote:I tried to PM you to show you some photos of my peeps but your profile doesn't allow PMs. I put a few photos up on IG because my IG folks don't care if these are ready. LOL!

*Just realized IG cut off all the photos. I'll put the link back after I finish that.

We don’t care if you’re figures are done or not, either.

Aw, yeah, if you want to share your pics, you can start a thread about your WIPs. Many people do that and document their progress on a figure or project. No pressure at all to only share finished works. So, go for it!

Oh I intend to post all the wip photos bc some of them are hilarious, and it also shows the struggle! But I went back to IG and took down the cut off ones. I posted again, different groupings.

Anyway, if you want to have a peek, IG handle is 9_kilo.

*So sorry... This has strayed off topic!

Hey Stryker2011, You ghost rider handle bars are ob the wrong side. That is why they are so low. Mine were the same way and I saw a picture of another's bike and notice his were in the right position and mine were not. Switch them ans flip them then they will be in the higher and correct positions.


DSC06082 by A.F.M. Productions, on Flickr

DSC06083 by A.F.M. Productions, on Flickr

DSC06084 by A.F.M. Productions, on Flickr

Hey! Good to know. Thanks. I wonder why they put them on the wrong side at the factory...

Stryker2011 wrote:Hey! Good to know. Thanks. I wonder why they put them on the wrong side at the factory...

You're welcome my friend. They had a 50 50 chance I guess. Thankfully it is an easy fix.

Here is a better look at the three motorcycles from the Maul triplets goofiness. I believe they are pretty close to being the right size (certainly more so than my converted Barbie Fat Boy; I have yet to customize the new Fat Boy), but I defer to Mark's expertise.

I'm not up on my Vespas (not my thing -- but looks a bit off, unless it's meant to be one of the really small ones); if it's meant to be the one used by Hepburn & Peck in Roman Holiday, it's definitely a bit small.

What I see from the other two is a problem that seems to persist at this "scale": the back half (from the seat back appears to plenty big, but the front half of each bike is squished a bit.

Stryker2011 wrote:I'm not up on my Vespas (not my thing -- but looks a bit off, unless it's meant to be one of the really small ones); if it's meant to be the one used by Hepburn & Peck in Roman Holiday, it's definitely a bit small. What I see from the other two is a problem that seems to persist at this "scale": the back half (from the seat back appears to plenty big, but the front half of each bike is squished a bit.

The Vespa is not really what I think of when I think of a motorcycle, but I got it for Henry Cavill-headed figures after he rode on one in The Man from U.N.C.L.E. It occurs to me that my figures are not sitting quite properly and are generally too upright. Perhaps this is throwing things off more. I tried to superimpose the Fat Boy from your sample photo and mine, and they seem pretty close, but I have to take better straight-on-sideways photos of the three bikes and gather some measurement statistics for a proper comparison of proportions and size. Here's a movie still with Henry on the Vespa. He is slouching a little bit, but there is as much above as there is below the Vespa's frame (not the steering wheel).

The RC Harley looks great. Look forward to seeing those handle bars painted silver. I night get around to doing mine. Not really....

I made some measurements (trying to be accurate) of the sixth-scale bikes and did some research on their full-scale counterparts. The comparisons are actually very encouraging. All three are very close to the correct scale and proportion. In the photos, I tried to keep the angle of the sixth-scale version with and without a rider about the same, and identical to the comparison photo of the real thing, but of course there is some distortion. So if one wants relatively accurately scaled motorcycles in sixth scale, these three appear to fit the bill. Whether one can pose a figure well enough on them, of course, is a slightly different question, subject to skill, articulation, clothing, etc.

The sixth-scale Vespa is apparently slightly larger than it should be (by about 1 cm).



The sixth-scale radio-control Harley Davidson Fatboy is about right -- I cannot guarantee the accuracy of fractions of cm measurements.



The sixth-scale Honda Valkyrie likewise.



AFM, as you noticed, I'm yet to modify the Harley for T-800.

Minutiae matters, I guess. If there was more crunch around the mid section — making the rider slouch more, it would help to minimize some of the “shortness” look, and the awkward lowness of the outstretched arms. Aside from “ape-hangers”, the majority of handle bars sit roughly close to shoulder height for most riders — individual height accepted, of course. The Fatboy in your new measurement pics looks slightly better at arm position for the rider.

Stryker2011 wrote:Minutiae matters, I guess. If there was more crunch around the mid section — making the rider slouch more, it would help to minimize some of the “shortness” look, and the awkward lowness of the outstretched arms. Aside from “ape-hangers”, the majority of handle bars sit roughly close to shoulder height for most riders — individual height accepted, of course. The Fatboy in your new measurement pics looks slightly better at arm position for the rider.

Thank you for the feeback. I find it interesting how limiting even TBLeague figures can be when it comes to minor details of poseability. Despite their somewhat pliable surface, even they don't sit quite naturally on other surfaces (they sit up more), and, as you pointed out, even here a bit more crunch would have helped. In fact, I noticed it was somewhat difficult to extend the arms properly to grasp the handles while the feet were planted firmly in their proper place. And I was even using less constraining clothing this time.

Some bikes made for fashion dolls.

Stryker, you know this is like opening Pandora's box with me right?    Not to go on a rant but the BMW Boxer engine design is probably the most hardy and reliable motorcycle design in history, I love V-Twins (just look at my name here) and have always found BMW's boring! Why? Because they just work and keep working until they are demolished or scrapped. The first big bike I learnt to ride at the age of 10 was my dad's BMW R51, a 1950's Boxer engine with the 'out and down' weird Kickstarter. These were legacy bikes of the WW2 BMW R75's that have rear hubs that can connect to an axle to drive the sidecar wheel too (two wheel drive), they have a set of high gears and a set of low gears for seriously rough terrain! They also have reverse and were the German equivalent of the Willis Jeep, they towed stuff too and were often armed with an MG34/42. I have ridden one and in one (the sidecar) over in Greece and they are insane! They literally ride up the side of Greek mountains!! In and out of deep ditches etc.. if you get stuck, there's reverse lol. On a more modern note, I have lost count how many times the BMW R80 Boxer engined Enduro has won the Paris/Dakar cross Saharan race. Also "The Long Way Round" with Charlie Borman (nice guy, met him) and Ewan MacGregor documentary series use BMW R1150's and R1200G's in "The Long Way Down". No you can't put forward controls on them (as I have on my Harley) but they're not designed for that 99% of the time, the BMW R1200C Cruiser (the one you have a model of, so do I lol) is using the same engine as the  R1200G Adventure that literally has been ridden around the world twice for television and is used in the Paris/Dakar race (the most gruelling in the world, a friend of my dad used to do it in a Porche powered van and would carry an Uzi with him because of bandits). So no, it is not a stupid design, the Cruiser model on the other hand was was just BMW experimenting with that market (and was not really their market, however check out their new R18 2020 model, inspired by the R51 that I learnt on and cruisers it seems, very nice just saw it now) while everything Harley-Davidson became so popular in Europe during the late 1990's and early 2000's, so much so it actually disgusted me that every doctor and dentist now thought they were Bikers that I moved to Daytona Beach Florida!

FYI here's a site that has a pretty good collection of bikes that you can get a rough idea on how various bikes fit riders of certain height:

https://cycle-ergo.com/

angryboot wrote:FYI here's a site that has a pretty good collection of bikes that you can get a rough idea on how various bikes fit riders of certain height:

https://cycle-ergo.com/

Thank you for pointing us to this fun and relevant resource!

GubernatorFan wrote:Interesting, I had always suspected that these are often undersized. This made me look up the specs for the Terminator Fat Boy. Why is it so bloody hard to find out the overall length of a motorcycle!? At any rate, according to my findings, the length should be 93.8 in (238.25 cm) and the minimum height of the seat should be 26.5 in (67.3 cm). Translating this to 1:6 scale gives us 15.6 in (39.7 cm) by 4.4 in (11.22 cm). I compared this to my customized Barbie Fat Boy (below), which measures about 14 in (35.5 cm) by 4.15 in (10.5 cm). The height is pretty close, the length less so, and the motorcycle is therefore both undersized and disporoportional. But it doesn't look particularly short from the side... (the photo is a little misleading as the front is turning a bit away to its right). Am I missing something?

I recently scored the orange flame version of the Barbie Fat Boy and had a lot of problems with copying poses of motorcycle babes I found on Pinterest due to the stunted size....(plus the fact it's a Jiaoudoll body, which we all know is lacking in the ability of posing.  This body is going in the trash now, it's pretty trashed and starting to disintegrate, unlike my Phicen bodies).

That’s unfortunate. Looks closer to 1/8 scale.

Ouch! I've found Jiaou's less fortunate than TBLeague in many ways, but none have disintegrated on me. I think the angle of the bike and the angle of the camera have contributed to the size issue in these photos, although the fact that the bike is undersized and the female body possibly overly tall have surely played their part. You could try this again with one of the more petite TBLeague bodies (S25B, S27B, possibly S49B) with hopefully better effect?

Good idea, though it is a particularly small Jiaou doll.  My motorcycle didn't come with the stand and base, so I had to use the stand on the bike.  I tried to aim the camera looking upwards a bit to try and show more of the bike, but it just didn't work. Newbie problems.  But try, try again I guess...

I see now, yes, that would do it. Also, when we shoot figures in this scale, we inevitably do so from fairly close up, and the camera's perspective tends to distort more than otherwise. There are smaller Jiaous? I wasn't aware -- but after some disappointments, I confess I have stopped investing in them and don't really now what is out there.

Damn it, I ordered an 1/6 scale dirt bike, and it even looks fairly good at first glance scale wise, but it arrived broken

Now comes the part where I try to convince the seller to replace it.