I had to think long and hard about posting about this figure because, while Perfect Effect's Leonidas is undoubtedly the most disastrous purchase I've made in all my years of collecting, Binaltech Black Convoy comes a very close second. Made available at the winter 2007 Wonder Festival in Tokyo for the very reasonable price of ¥6,500 (a mere £42 in today's money), I acquired this on eBay at some point after the event. Once out of its packaging (a bubble pack, much like contemporary Alternators toys, rather than the traditional Binaltech box), it quickly became apparent that I'd bought a bit of a lemon: one of the joints connecting the bonnet to the car had been subject to a glue spillage and was immobile at an awkward midpoint, useful neither for robot mode nor vehicle mode.
At the time, it felt kind of like the universe's response to my avarice, considering I'd already acquired the Alternators versions of both Optimus and Nemesis Prime, and this figure basically went straight back into its packaging. There it remained until a few months ago, when it fell off the shelf it was on. Naturally, since the packaging was open, the figure slipped out on the way down, leading to one of the wing mirrors breaking off.
Since the box is clearly no longer a safe storage place, and I've been debating what to do about the wing mirror (temporarily on hold, having discovered that every tube of superglue I own has dried up), he's been sat on one of my main display shelves just to keep him reasonably safe and out of the way... Earlier in the week, I had to do a bit of hoovering, and so cleared the space in front of that cabinet, I figured I might as well pull him out and snap a few photos...
