CONRAD S. "DUKE" HOUSER - MASTER SERGEANT

Duke is my fave joe. From sometime now I have been thinking about doing a kitbash with the version released by Hasbro back in 91-92. These were the first 12" joes released by them since 77. Duke was the first one released and the figure was a hit. That leaded Hasbro to release more 3 figures in 92, one of them being Duke with a re-sculpted head (better IMHO). I am working with the v2.0 here.





Cool figure but still very toy-ish. We have lotsa room for improvement here. So that is how I consider this project: an improvement, not really a kitbash.

First thing, we need a new body. I could have picked a super articulated from Hasbro but I prefer the classic collection body with gong-ho hands and small feets here. They are more muscular and Duke is pretty much the ultimate joe (to me at least).



As I said, I am working with the v2.0 head here. IMHO Hasbro did a great job with this sculpture. The eyebrows could be a little thinner but meh.



I just did a head swap. You can see the original body at left headless.



Now, the gear. This figure has a lot of great stuff we can salvage. I took the helmet, the BDU, pistol and knife, holster, stripes, boots and the amazing back pack.



I got this m4 from a seller but I have no idea wich company made it. Maybe from power team elite?



I also bashed:

- black gloves from 21st century.
- googles from gi joe classic collection infantry (I also did a bash with this whole set here).

And here is Duke, now fully articulated.

Nice upgrades!!!

Great work Falcon! he looks great!

Great kitbash! Duke is looking good and has a more natural pose in the finished pictures (not as stiff as the original!).
Your post has also taught me a couple of things too - I've got a few Classic Collection GI Joe figures and I was wondering if I could swap some MAM heads onto them. Your pictures showed the neck posts look identical so I'll have to get the kettle on and boil some heads!
I think I've got one of those guns too and I think it is from the Power Team range. They do have some nice equipment with those figures.

Nice one

Thanks a lot gibri, BA, SB and pete.

@pete, I am not well versed on MAM but I do know there are basically 2 types of head produced from 90s to 00s: one, the most basic, is pretty much like this Duke and other CC and modern joes so you will have no problem pluggin it on CC and super articulated bodies or even hybrids like this (I did not modded this body, this was all hasbro). The other head (like in the later boxer figure) swirls around the neck post and you wont be able to plug it right here unless you do some modding.

I wasn't that impressed with the big yellow eyebrows either. This was one of my first attempts at painting them on from scratch, its so much easier just filling them in  

You could try patches of pride decals if you want to redo those eyebrows. Check here:

http://www.patchesofpride.com/pages2/bodydecals.html

Falcon wrote:

You could try patches of pride decals if you want to redo those eyebrows. Check here:

http://www.patchesofpride.com/pages2/bodydecals.html

Fantastic link, I've not seen these before

Much better

Thanks, snow white!

Great post falcon! This is the figure that made the childhood of action man come flooding back and got me interested again! your body swap has made a great difference.

Thanks, Rossini. I was glad to found that I could actually use his original boots with that body, the feet are short enough to fit. It is a great figure, we can easly do many updates with it like I am still open to replace the pistal and knife for a web belt with a holster and a knife (and other pouches).

the eyebrows are the only thing that lets duke down

Does anyone have the target exclusive version 1figure of duke? Did it have a HOF body like this one did? In photos I've see the right hand looks different!

Rossini wrote:

Does anyone have the target exclusive version 1figure of duke? Did it have a HOF body like this one did? In photos I've see the right hand looks different!

I don't know much about the Duke figure so I did a Google search on him.  One of the pictures does show something different about his right hand. Doesn't look like the usual MAM/HOF hands.

Very nice, well reclaimed!...its been so long since I've seen a Duke with a complete Flock!

Well done!

Did someone mention eyebrows? My KGB agent sports some of the world's finest:

clivvers wrote:

Did someone mention eyebrows? My KGB agent sports some of the world's finest:

isnt he out of thunderbirds ?