Phil's Generation Two Road Rocket,
Unproduced Generation Two Jazz,
Microman Mach Speeder,
Microman Exclusive Hyper Speeder,
Robots In Disguise Sideways
and
Robotmasters Road Rocket Review


Generation 2 Road Rocket

The laser Cycles are the sequel to the laser rods released the year after (1995) when ball joint technology had really taken hold.

You don't get too many TF motorbikes - Protectorbot Groove, Triggerbot Override, Pretenders Iguanus & Vroom and Micromaster Glide are the only robots that turn into motorbikes that I can think of (though Action Master Prowl & Axer do ride them)

Road Rocket is a sleek looking red motorbike complete with moving wheels, wind shield and stand. A button on the petrol tank causes one side of the rear fork to light up - sadly the headlights don't light up off this same gimmick. The handlebars and front fork don't turn but the handle bars do have brake grips molded into them..

TF: Pull the light up side of the fork and the bit of bodywork it's attached to away. Fold down the plastic the stand is attached to - that's one arm. Pull the other down with the front wheel from under the wind shield. Rotate the entire wheel section round so the black panel on the piece of body connecting them faces back. Fold the body work back so it locks with the front of the bike - there's a hole for the peg on the back that previously attached to the panel you removed. Pull the back of the bike back to reveal the upper legs, separate the legs, turn at the waist and fold the rear of the saddle up to form feet. Fold the black panel on the body down. Fold his left arm up and rotate down into position. Turn the mudguard on the other arm to the rear and mount the removed bike panel and fork half on his arm as a blade weapon.

Said blade weapon is shaped like a circular saw at the end. When you press the fuel tank button - now on the robot's back - the weapon lights up. A lot of the revealed robot parts are molded in black. His elbows are ball jointed, the shoulders bend to the sides as well as move forwards & backwards. The head turns - the images I can see show painted eyes but I believe the part should be light piped. The waist turns and he has ball jointed hips & knees. The poseability is a little limited - in the legs by the short upper legs and in the arms by the cable for the light up gimmick - which is proportionately longer than Combat hero Op's but still mounted on the wrong side of his body.

Very decent bike, ok gimmick, ok robot. Well worth a look

You'll have to go a long way to find a toy with a more interesting repaint history than the G2 Laser Cycles. We've got unproduced repaints, repaint in other lines and exclusive repaints to look at here !


Unreleased G2 Jazz

Jazz would have been a lime green and white repaint of Road Rocket. Not the best colours, surely a jazz bike would have been all white.

Speaking of Jazz and Bikes - I remind everyone of my theory that the Protectorbots are new versions of G1 Autobots and point out the similarity in theme between the names Jazz & Groove.


Microman Mach Speeder

The Laser Cycles then make an appearance in Takara's Microman line, in the year they did their LED Power figures. Microman & TFs have strong links - many early TF toys were Microchange (the successor to Microman) toys and could be used with Microman figures - especially Perceptor & Megatron. All the figures this year had light up gimmicks so it made sense for them to include these toys. Unfortunately they took the light up gimmicks away ! They also committed an additional remold and removed the brake grips so Micromen could hold onto the handlebars. Said remold would continue through all subsequent versions.

Mach Speeder is a very similar colour to Road Rocket - the red is slightly more metallic though. An attractive but minimalistic repaint. He comes with a Microman called Arthur in similar colours.


Microman Hyper Speeder

Hyper Speeder is a Japanese TRU limited edition of Microman Mach Speeder. The red becomes clear yellow and some of the black becomes orange.

I love a clear repaint but this looks a little odd coloured. He comes with an alternate colour version of Microman Arthur


Robots In Disguise Sideways vs Axer

In 2002 I wrote "Not a lot I can say about these as most of us have seen their G2 counterparts. Essentially they're 2 basic sized toys with an added electronic light up gimmick.

Sideways is a repaint of Road Rocket, who was a red, blue and black Kawasaki. I have to admit that I always thought this toy looked very plasticy and artificial, but the new yellow & black paint job makes it look fabulous in Bike mode and improves the robot no end.

Axer is a repaint of Roadpig (mainly black with some red and gold) still mainly in black but with more authentic silver accents (mainly on the forks and engine blocks) and some gold highlighting, all of which is carried into the robot mode.

Both feature a lot of transparent plastic (lights, windshields and light pipe eyes) which you can easily light up by detaching the lamp from the weapon piece (though Sideways could do with a slightly longer wire !) Not bad repaints, but perhaps not an essential buy if you have the originals. "

What is said there, except it's more black than yellow. Very nice repaint. The name would later show up on the Armada motorcycle.


Robotmasters Road Rocket

In 2004 I wrote "he Autobot bike gains a nice yellow paint scheme which looks nice and sporting on this design. I imagine the reason it's not red this time is that the just released Galaxy Force Gasket is! Good choice for the better of the 2 molds in my opinion."

This bike is mainly yellow with some red painted on detail. Another decent repaint.


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