Gran Arm

Gran Arm is an Autobot Micromaster from the Generation 1 continuity family.

"Gran Arm is fleshling wife to Gran Leg."

Gran Arm (グランアーム Guran Āmu) is the comedian of the Build Team, even going so far as to appear on human television shows with Digger for publicity stunts. He's not as physically strong as his teammates, but his incredible armor and tight-turning vehicle mode compensate for this shortcoming.

He also has an evil counterpart running around.

Fiction

Japanese Generation 1 cartoon continuity

Legends comic

Gran Arm was among the Cyberdroids who left Cybertron and came to Earth in search for Optimus Prime and the Matrix. A dimensional shockwave mutated them, altering their forms and enabling them to transform. Tailgate/G1 Mini-Con Chapter

Micromaster

An entire battle lost just because it turned out Gran Arm couldn't read.

Gran Arm was one of several Cyberdroids in stasis at the Autobot Micromasters' Earth base. During a particularly pitched battle with the Decepticon Sixwing in Berserker Mode, the capsules containing the Build Team took a shock, activating them. A little while later, Micromasters resembling the Build Team were spotted wrecking human construction sites. The Build Team soon confronted them in Sixbuilder mode... only for the impostors to do the same! The green Decepticon Sixbuilder announced that the two teams were actually halves of the original whole, and that he would rejoin with Sixbuilder only after all the other Autobots had been destroyed. Sixbuilder the Ill-Fated Warrior!?

Later, after Sixtrain beat back the Decepticons at an excavation site by a dormant volcano, the Build Team began their own investigation, wondering what the Decepticons were digging up. Gran Arm's grumbling was interrupted when Raise discovered two pieces of Cybertronian metal, one of which bore a strange purple insignia. Realizing something incredibly important was buried there, but not sure what, the Autobots built their new Metrobase headquarters there to protect it from the Decepticons. Sixtrain! Activate Red Mode!!

Operation Combination story pages

Decades later, Gran Arm and the rest of the Six-team Micromasters joined Guard City and the Road Corps in defending Earth from the forces of the Decepticon High Regent Scrash. Operation Combination

None of the combiner team individuals ever actually show up as individuals, only as components of the combined robot modes.

Beast Wars: Uprising

Gran Arm and Crush Bull were lost after the deaths of their Micromaster squad. They found sanctuary with Sunstorm, a minister at the First Church of Primus in Dodecahex. For years, they served as his attendants and became as close as family. When the Vehicon Apocalypse came to Dodecahex, the Micromasters got the congregation to safety while Sunstorm sacrificed himself to cover their escape. Derailment

Toys

Fight! Super Robot Lifeform Transformers

Better buy the reissue, because this one will cost you a Gran Arm

• Sixbuilder (Micromaster Six-Team, 1992)

• ID number: TF-01

Released in the eighth and final year of the original Takara Fight! Super Robot Lifeform Transformers line under the Operation Combination banner, Gran Arm transforms into a LeTourneau L-2350 - ironically for a Micromaster, the largest payloader ever constructed.. He can also form the chest or back of any of the Six-Teams, though his nominal placement is as Sixbuilder's chest.

He was only available as part of a complete Sixbuilder gift set, packed with his teammates Crush-Bull, Digger, Iron Lift, Mixing, and Treader.

The original Six-Teams are considered among the more difficult Japanese Generation 1 pieces to find, due to their final-year release well after Transformers had faded from relevance in Japan, and thus command some hefty prices even with the molds' later re-releases.

This mold was used to make the Universe Micromaster Buckethead and the evil half of Gran Arm.

• More information on Gran Arm at TFU.info
• Gran Arm toy gallery at Transformertoys.co.uk

Micromaster

New look, same great nectarine & tangelo taste!

• Gran Arm (Micromaster, 2003)

• Sixbuilder ID number: 4
• Accessories: Sixbuilder torso & head

In 2003, the entire Sixbuilder team was re-released as the fourth wave of The Transformers: Micromaster, in individual boxes with a number visible to show which mold was inside each box. For this release, the team was extensively redecoed; Gran Arm went from red to orange-yellow. Instead of stickers, he was instead covered with a whole new set of paint applications.

On top of this, two out of every twelve toys in the shipping/display case were in mostly-bright-green decos, as part of the Destron Sixbuilder chase figure. The evil half of Gran Arm came in the same box and with the same packaging as the normal version.

• More information on Gran Arm at TFU.info
• Gran Arm toy gallery at Transformertoys.co.uk
• Translation of Gran Arm's Micromaster bio by Doug Dlin

Notes

• Gran Arm, like all of the six-team Micromasters, had no individual bio information whatsoever until his Micromaster release a decade after his original Operation Combination release.