Mark of the Red Triple changing Dragon mech

Posted in Identify Help

I do hope this is the correct section to post this. Forgive me if I post this here in error.

Anyway a long long long Time ago around I think 1994 or so (I know it was around then as Power Rangers had just went into it's second season with the Thunderzords and all) I'm in a resell store with my parents. The store was part of a chain called Buds and it was like Biglots meets Goodwill stores. They sold all kinds of things there from knock off toys of things like Lego and Transformers to junk old stereos and raidios. I think they even had video game carts for Resell there bout anything you could think of really.

Anyway one toy I got from the store in 94 was an interesting thing. On that day I found a Transforming Robot toy. It was almost I'd say as tall as a Optimum Optimus Primal figure in robot mode, was bright red with some silver paint and a black molded torso, and the thing about it that made me want it was it turned into a Dragon robot.

As I said above Power Rangers had just started season 2 and The Red Dragon thunderzord was the main zord at the time and it also transformed into a robot. I was poor in those days and my parents either couldn't afford the zords or they just missed em at Christmas time so when I saw this I had to have it and since it was a resell it was in the budget.

Now here is the big problem I've had since I got it way back when. Whatever toyline it came from, what company made it, and whether I had the whole robot I never knew. As I said it was a toy from a resale shop so it came with no box or anything. I found out only on thing when I got it home was it also transformed into a futuristic groundcraft that had small grey plastic wheels molded as if it was a off road vehicle.

I was quite young at the time I got the bot so I never knew to look at it for markings of manufacturer and such. As the years went by it was put into storage with many other of my beloved toys. Then about 7 years back a incident happened my house and all the old toys and well everything else burned down.

I'm trying now to find all the old toys I had as a kid and get them back so I can pass em on to the next generation as well as to have a hole in my heart mended. (sorry for the sappy tone but I'm sure some of you know the kind of thing I mean.) But try as I might with google and other toy/action figure sites I have not come across the dragon bot anywhere.

Now again I am not sure this counts for the Identify Help section since I have no photos only a detailed description I can give. So if it is in the wrong place please tell me what to do to correct the problem and I'll do it right then and there. Thank you for understanding.

Anyway lets get to describing the figure properly. Like I said it had a red and black color scheme With a few grey components here and there, The robot mode's legs had a pair of grey bumpers for knee caps thanks to it's vehicle mode's cockpit being what it's legs folded out from, It had two black triangle shaped bars for toes/feet and for added support while standing two grey wedges fliped down form it's heel area accting as a kickstand. The arms of the robot mode had strange articulation at the shoulder that I can best describe as being off set like a train's connecting rods and you could keep the arm level as you made it turn on the crank, It had two grey fists and the arm housed two ski like feet that became the dragon modes feet when transformed. The legs had articulation that allowed bending knees in robot mode but the hips could only fold horizontaly like a wing.

The Torso of the robot was molded black and was typical of the kind of mech figure except for one thing I always found odd it's chest was boxy and quite clearly had a purpose of holding another component inside. Kinda always made me think I could fit my Optimus Prime in there but I never tried. Besides that the torso was nothing especially different from other figures of the type.

Now the dragon parts were mostly Kibble when in robot mode. The head and neck slipped over the robot mode head with it covered in the lower part of the neck, The neck was oddly enough long enough to have a Articulation point allowing it to look straight ahead as if it could fly or tilt downward to look around as it walked on the two legs with ski like feet formed from the robot's arms. The dragon wasn't like latter Beast Wars toys which had the alt modes look organic no this one was like the old Dinobots from Gen 1 mechanical in every way, It's robot beak like mouth was painted in silver and if I remember correctly it had gold painted eyes.

The vehicle mode as I said above was like a futuristic command truck with a cabbin/cockpit that would fit in well with a space cruiser, The Dragon head was oddly unable to fold up while in this mode which like the chests boxy cavity suggests that I only had half the figure. The wheels were solid grey plastic with a shape much like a type of off road truck with slight gaps between so it rumbled as you rolled it, these were held on by a small pin and mine only had three of the four. Again part of buying it second hand.

Well thats about all I can think of about it. It was a favorite figure of mine as a kid as no one had anything like it and it was the closest thing to the Red Dragon Thunderzord I ever got. I know many of you might think it was a knockoff but if it was it was well built despite being made mostly out of plastic it was incredibly tough and I never even came close to damaging it and given I grew up with ADHD that is saying alot.

I did recently see omething that might help with figuring out it's nature and for a moment I had thought I'd found it when looking up obscure Transformer toys. The Autobot Overload from the Unicron Trilogy at a passing glance looks alot like it when in vehicle mode. I would link to the tfu.info page on him but I'm on a mobile device and I'm not losing what I typed. I'll post it tomorrow if I can edit this post from my PC.

Anyway thank you for listening to me ramble on about a old figure I can't find. Heres hopping we can figure it out together. Again sorry if I posted this in the wrong place.