Dave's Mini-Con Rant: Wave 2 Race Team: Mirage, Downshift, Dirt Boss Destruction Team: Dualor, Drill Bit, Buzzsaw Picked these up over in Junction City's Super Wal-Mart. [Late Note: Hasbro added techspecs to their webpage on Sept 12. I have put them at the very end of the file.] CAPSULES Race Team: Mirage is an extensive remold of Swindle, with an extra joint at the waist. Downshift looks good in vehicle mode but has an iffy robot mode. Dirt Boss is likewise good as a vehicle, his robot mode is okay if hard to transform to if you don't have strong fingernails, and there's a few joints that feel like they're aching to break. Color scheme pretty unified, and the Skyboom shield looks good (less good as the jet they call it). Recommended. $6.84 at Wal-Mart. Destruction Team: Possibly the most techincally complicated Transformers of their size to date, each has a motion gimmick geared to a rubber wheel on their vehicle underside, plus gearing that lets these work when connected to the bottom of Cyclonus's cockpit. Dualor is a twin-cannon tank (not an antiaircraft one, since the guns don't point up), Buzzsaw is a wheel bucket excavator (a more or less real vehicle form, odd as it seems) and Drill Bit is a fanciful truck with a drill on the back. The unified color scheme is broken up a bit by Drill Bit's orange (actual orange plastic in addition to a lot of orange paint). They are all more poseable than they have to be, and for the most part have good transformations. Strongly recommended. $6.84 at Wal-Mart. RANTS Packaging: Pretty much the same as first wave, including the original comicbook/catalog. However, the cardboard bits with their names have been modified to fold up a couple panels, one panel having character art for one of the toys (Downshift and Buzzsaw). Each toy is held in by one or two twist-ties, there are no rubber bands. There are no techspecs for these teams up on the Hasbro website as of September 7, 2002. [Late Note: It's been pointed out to me that the top of the bubble is curved on the second wave Mini-Cons, while it's squared off for the first wave.] RACE TEAM MINI-CON: Mirage Altmode: Formula Racer (Indy-style, more or less) Mirage is yet ANOTHER to bear this name, the third in a year. Oddly, Downshift has a vehicle form more appropriate to the original Mirage. Anyway, Mirage is mostly neon yellow and dark gray, with silver accents and black wheels/head. And while the mold is essentially the same as Swindle's, it has been changed significantly. The Mini-Con symbol is on the left side, if almost impossible to see, and the connector is on the underside between the rear wheels, or on the robot's back. Vehicle mode is 2.75" (7cm) long. The rear spoiler is rectangular, the driver's compartment is more rounded than Swindle's and has a silver chair (no, not a EuroTeen group), and the front airdam is narrower and more pointed than on Swindle. In fact, while close inspection shows the wheels and some of the underside are the same between the two, they are otherwise totally different in details. Transformation is almost the same as Swindle's, except for two details. One, the spoiler really doesn't cover the face at any point (although it still moves). Two, the waist has a joint so that the legs are spun around 180 degrees in transformation. The robot mode is 2.25" (6cm) tall and doesn't stand very well because the legs don't have a stable position between almost closed and Van Damme Splits. The head is black with a red face, and is much bigger than Swindle's. Skyboom mode is identical to vehicle mode. There's just a hole in the top of its head to clip it onto Dirt Boss. MINI-CON: Downshift Altmode: Formula racecar Downshift is mostly dark gray, with some light gray and an incongruous bit of neon yellow, plus some silver and light blue paint. The number 3 is painted on the hood and sides. The Mini-Con symbol is on the left side behind the 3, and the connector is on the underside of the vehicle between the front wheels (inaccessible inside the chest in robot mode). Vehicle mode is 2.5" (6.5cm) long. It's generally smooth, but the shoulder joints of robot mode are visible on the sides, especially since they're neon yellow. Transformation, while simple, is a new one on me. However, you have to be careful when separating the legs, because they can easily pop right off. The robot mode is a 2.375" (6cm) tall and a bit oddly proportioned. The arms, with ball joint shoulders, are rather long and bulky, although they do have fists molded onto them and the fists are painted. The legs are skinny and close together...they can be pulled apart a bit, but otherwise have no poseability. And unlike Wreckage, the feet are flat on the table when the legs are together, not when they're apart (okay, there's a little angling, so they're flat when the legs are a tiny bit apart). The head is all light blue and reminiscent of a TIE Fighter pilot helmet. The front third of the car is a shelf-like chest, giving the robot mode a look much like that of Overdrive, one of the Omnibots (the original Downshift was another Omnibot). Transformation to Skyboom component mode involves rotating the sides of the car around to peg onto the front. I've found Skyboom looks a little better if you instead have the arms straight out to the sides, as it make shte shield/jet more triangular. In either configuration, one can easily see how Downshift might look like a skimmer craft or even a high flying spyplane. MINI-CON: Dirt Boss Altmode: Rally SUV Mostly light gray and neon yellow with yellow, brown, black and white paint apps and the number 7 on each door. The Mini-Con symbol is on the left side of the vehicle behind the driver's door window, and the connector is on the underside, forward of the center. The vehicle mode is a little over 2" (5cm) long, and is clearly a rally-style SUV in the X-Brawn fashion. Transformation to robot mode is more complicated than one might think if you don't use the instructions, since there's so many more joints that are involved only in Skyboom mode. A head on a spar flips up and around, the legs pull down and thin feet fold out, and the arms come out of the sides. Getting the arms out can be difficult if you don't have strong fingernails or a prying tool. Robot mode is 2.75" (7cm) tall, with more neon yellow visible than in vehicle mode. The head is solid paintless neon yellow, so all the mold details are practically invisible. I've already painted the eyes neon blue to help keep the head from just looking like a peg. The legs have restricted ball joint hips and hinged knees, plus hinged ankles...although the bulk of the shins and shortness of the thighs reduces the real poseability of the legs. The arms' natural position makes it look like Dirt Boss is doing dumbbell curls, although the elbow hinges let the arms straighten all the way. Transformation to Skyboom configuration is best started from vehicle mode, and mostly involves opening it up like a book. The head of the robot becomes the handle of the shield, and a couple of winglets fold out to give the component more of a trapezoidal shape. SUPER MINI-CON: Skyboom Mode 1: Shield Mode 2: Jet Combining all three of the Race Team gets you a roughly jet-shaped thing 6" (15cm) long which has an obvious car at the front. I suggest pulling the head/peg from Dirt Boss down a little so that it acts as a bit of landing gear. This way, Mirage's wheels let it roll/slide along a smooth surface pretty well. In any case, it only looks vaguely like a jet, in a way similar to Raindance the cassette G1 toy. If you fold Downshift's arms down and around so they're straight out to the sides with the "hoverfan" circles pointed up, you get a more triangular shape that's even less like a jet, but looks better as a shield than the official mode does. In this form, it's only 5.5" (14cm) long, but 4" (10cm) wide at the top. While the peg is Star Saber sized, not every toy that can hold the Star Saber is able to hold the Skyboom Shield. Hot Shot, for instance, has too much stuff around his fists, so the handle isn't long enough to clear it. And Megatron's fist is raised a bit around the hole, so the peg only fits snugly in a few positions. Overall: The combiner gimmick is only okay, nothing special, and I'm not partial to neon yellow. While these are good toys, I think they could have been a bit better (especially the fragility feel with Dirt Boss). DESTRUCTION TEAM MINI-CON: Dualor Altmode: Dual Cannon Tank Dark gray and neon yellow with blue paint details. Yep, the color scheme continues, apparently Hasbro decided to save on bulk colors by making most of the parts of both teams from the same three colors. The Mini-Con symbol is at the front/top of the turret, and the connector is on the underside of the vehicle, the pelvis of the robot mode (or the butt, if you go with an alternate transformation...either way it's an unfortunate positioning). The tank mode is 2" (5cm) long, and seems to be a little backwards. Usually, the rear of the tread section is higher than the front, but that's reversed here. You could turn the turret around to correct this and redefine the front, but it looks kinda weird (and cute) that way. Of course, the thickness at the front is because of the robot feet. Assuming the front is where the pictures say it is, there's two wide rollers at the front and one rubber wheel in the middle of the back to roll along on. Pushing it on a smooth surface causes gears inside the toy to make the cannons reciprocate (one goes back while the other goes forward) like Strika's. And because the turret is part of the gearing system (turning the turret will make the bottom wheel turn a little) it works with the turret pointed in any direction. The tank plugs directly onto the clips under Cyclonus's cockpit, and the guns reciprocate when you pull Cyc's trigger. We now know why Cyc's feet have those notches cut out of the bottoms...it's to make room for the cannons to reciprocate. While the colors don't really match, Dualor nicely fills the gap in Cyc's vehicle mode. However, the gears turn so fast that you can't really see the guns move when the trigger pulls. Transformation is pretty simple. Pull out the front of the tank, flip out the toes/heels, and maybe turn the waist around 180 degrees. Rotate turret up if you want. The contact points with the ground are the same regardless of whether you rotate the waist (it's symmetric under rotation), so neither way is more stable. Just a matter of where you want the embarrassing PowerLinx connector...front or back. Robot mode is just a little over 2" (5cm) tall at the head, more if you measure up to the cannon tips. It's jointed at the shouldes, hips, waist and neck. Yeah, it's cool that the head turns even though it doesn't have to for transformation, and the waist joint lets you pick the look of the legs. The instruction do not show the hips turn, and they do show the head turning, although the vehicle mode looks better with the head staying where it is in robot mode. In any case, the turret is a little heavier than the designers intended, I think, since you have to lean the robot forward a little to keep it from falling over backwards. One last note. The gears on my Dualor sometimes get a little jammed so that it'll roll forward okay but lock up on rolling backwards. I found that pressing down very hard and pulling back would get the gears to reseat themselves and I got good motion in both directions. MINI-CON: Drill Bit Altmode: Drill truck Drill Bit breaks from the other five toys in this wave by having orange plastic (the legs/wheel housings) in addition to the dark gray and neon yellow plastic. There's also a lot of orange paint and a gradation of silver paint on the drill. The Mini-Con symbol is on the drill engine housing (right shoulder), and the PowerLinx connector is on the underside of the vehicle (back of the right arm). Vehicle mode is a little under 3" (7.5cm) long, and looks like a sort of futuristic halftrack yard tractor with a big drill mounted on the back instead of a hitch for pulling trailers. There are three wheels on each side, the rearmost pair actually rolling, and treads at the front with the rubber gear-wheel between them. Oddly, while the side windows are painted dark metallic blue, the front window is left the unpainted dark gray of the plastic underneath. The robot head is turned around in this mode to partly hide the face, but the face is still pretty visible. I suppose when the truck moves backwards the robot guides it by looking back. When the vehicle is linked under Cyclonus's cockpit, the drill bit does not stick out past Crumplezone's gun, so it might be better to just have one or the other Mini-Con on, not both. Maybe the spinning drill will shoot rays when attached to Cyc in the cartoon. The drill spins nicely when you pull Cyc's trigger. Transformation to robot mode has the wheel/tread units swing down and fold feet out, while the drill comes around the side to be the right arm and a teeny little bit rotates out to be the left arm. And the head turns around, of course. As a side note, the left arm can be rotated up in vehicle mode as a weapon. Robot mode is a little taller than 2" (5.5cm), with moving hips, shoulders and neck. The head is dark gray with a neon yellow face (I may paint the eyes red...in fact, just a sec, I'm gonna do that now. Much better). While the design doesn't allow for waist articulation, Drill Bit is notable for having a connector point that's not on his torso, but instead is on his shoulder. MINI-CON: Buzzsaw Altmode: Bucket Wheel Excavator (yes, it's a real thing) Dark gray and neon yellow with dark green paint accents. Mini-Con symbol is on top of the vehicle (robot shoulder), and the connector is on the bottom of the vehicle (robot butt...disturbing trend with this set). The vehicle is 3" (8cm) long, and believe it or not it's more or less a real construction vehicle. The rotating bucket wheel scoops up stuff and deposits it on a conveyor belt that runs along the top, eventually dumping it in a waiting truck. It represents a huge vehicle, in fact...if you look carefully, you'll see the control cabin is scaled for a human about 2-3mm tall. The other vehicles in the team are scaled for humans closer to 5mm tall. The only wheel on the vehicle is the rubber gear-wheel, the treads are totally unmovable and lack little wheels in them. When you roll the vehicle forward, unfortunately, the bucket wheel moves the wrong way. I think the guy who did the gearing misintepreted it as a sawblade, and has it spin as if it were one. The bucket wheel is, by the way, an inch (2.5cm) in diameter. When plugged into Cyclonus, it's the only one so big that Cyc can't land on its skids. It also spins the wrong direction, as if it were a buzzsaw. It doesn't stick out beyond the front of the cockpit, but it does stick out the bottom enough to be an effective melee weapon. While the transformation of the legs is pretty straightforward, the arms are delightfully complicated, including a multiple-piece rotating bit to get the right arm (conveyor belt) onto the shoulder. An extra panel flips up to cover the gears on the chest. The robot stands 2.25" (6cm) tall, and is sadly very top-heavy. The feet simply aren't long enough to let the toy stand up to even a little bumping (the amoung by which my typing shakes the table causes it to fall over). The shoulders and hips have swivels, and the head and waist both turn, even though they don't have to for transformation. Unlike Dualor, the support points are not symmetric under rotation, so you can't turn the legs around...what little stability it would have it loses in this case. If you turn the waist a little and have Buzzsaw bend over slightly, though, it becomes a lot more stable...it's stayed standing while I type this, in fact. The paint apps for the face are either very subtle or kinda sloppy, but I'll go for subtle right now...the dark green paint on the face doesn't quite cover the pinpoint eyes in the visor, so they poke out as tiny bits of neon yellow. The right hand is painted green and has a fist molded onto it. So Buzzsaw can either scoop chunks out of you with his left arm or smash you with his right arm. Finally, unlike the other two, Buzzsaw has enough accessible gearing in robot mode to easily spin his bucket wheel by manipulating the gears (okay, you can roll the wheel on Dualor's chest, but it doesn't look as good). Overall: Not only are all the toys in this set very cool on their own, but they also serve to make a previously-released toy even better. You definitely want to get the Destruction Team. Dave Van Domelen, check out my Mini-Con Follies fumetti at http://www.protoformproject.com/dvd/images/raceteam.GIF and http://www.protoformproject.com/dvd/images/destruction.GIF (the Destruction team one is a bit on the racy side, and if you don't get what it means, I ain't gonna be the one to tell you) [AND NOW, the missing TechSpecs!] RACE MINI-CON TEAM DOWNSHIFT DIRT BOSS MIRAGE Quote: "Combine and defend!" As single units these robots are fast and sharp, but their individual power is no match for their combined force. In the heat of battle, they can join together to form the awesome shield known as SKYBOOM - the only defense against the super-powerful STAR SABER. This ability pits the AUTOBOTS and DECEPTICONS against each other in a struggle for possession of the Race Team. STR 6 INT 6 SPD 10 END 7 RNK 5 COUR 6 FRB 4 SKL 7 Avg 6.375 DESTRUCTION MINI-CON TEAM BUZZSAW DRILL BIT DUALOR Quote: "Destroy and conquer!" The ultimate in destruction MINI-CONS, this team creates chaos wherever it goes. Cutting, drilling, and rolling into action, they are able to take on any TRANSFORMER. They have incredible individual strength and the awesome ability to attach to the helicopter, CYCLONUS, to maximize their fighting power. CYCLONUS has figured out how to use these demolition-driven Mini-cons to create the most damage possible. STR 6 INT 5 SPD 6 END 7 RNK 5 COUR 6 FRB 6 SKL 7 Avg 6 [Wow, that's the tightest grouping of scores below 9 I've seen in a techspec.]