I’ve been a “Voltron geek” since first watching the original VOLTRON: DEFENDER OF THE UNIVERSE animated series starting in 1984. This year I’m collecting the Voltron Classics lions and action figures by Matty Collector. Each of the five Voltron lions can accommodate a pilot action figure that’s about 3 3/4″ in height. The five lions form a huge Voltron robot that stands about 23″ tall.

The “other” original Voltron, known today as Vehicle Voltron, has never enjoyed the popularity of Lion Voltron. “VV” is a niche interest even among hardcore Voltron fans. For this reason it seems unlikely that Matty Collector will produce any toys for VV.

Not long ago Toynami produced limited edition, 60-centimeter-tall “Shogun Warriors” figures of Lion Voltron (technically GoLion) and Vehicle Voltron (technically Dairugger). For those of you who aren’t metrically minded, 60 centimeters is roughly equivalent to 24 inches, which is slightly taller than the height of Matty Collector’s Voltron Classics Lion Voltron.

Because I’m a geek, I thought I’d play with an image of the Shogun Warriors Dairugger swiped from ToyArk.com, and an image of Matty Collector’s Voltron Classics Lance figure from MattyCollector.com, to get a feel for whether it would be possible — ignoring the economic unfeasibility — to design a similarly sized Vehicle Voltron whose fifteen ships could each accommodate a 3 3/4″ tall action figure.

Assuming the Toynami Dairugger figure is 24″ in height from the “ground” to the point on the top of his head, and assuming the Lance figure is exactly 3 3/4″ in height with helmet, I placed roughly in-scale images of Matty Lance in the image of Toynami Dairugger. Click the thumbnail below in order to view the full-size image.

If VV’s proportions were altered somewhat, as was done for Matty’s Lion Voltron, this thing just might work.

• Marvin and Hutch figures could fit in an upright seated position in each of VV’s feet, facing forward with respect to both the feet vehicles and VV. Alternately they could lie face-down, heads oriented toward the toe of each foot.
• Shannon and Zandee could fit in an upright seated position in each of VV’s lower legs, facing forward with respect to the vehicles and upward with respect to VV.
• If VV’s upper and lower legs were to be reproportioned a bit, then Lisa and Tangor might possibly fit in an upright seated position in each of VV’s upper legs, facing forward with respect to the vehicles and upward with respect to VV. The toughest thing to accommodate would be articulated hips and avoiding the “nosecone butt” of the Matchbox Deluxe VV.
• Cliff’s ship — VV’s lower torso — would be the toughest of all 15 ships to design. Unless VV were to have “nosecone butt,” Cliff’s ship would need to be impaled by both upper leg ships’ nosecones, as well as the middle torso ship’s side thingamajig — not to mention allowing for hip and possibly waist articulation and whatever other connections are needed in order to form the Turbo Terrain Fighter.
• Krik’s ship, VV’s middle torso, would be a tight squeeze for the figure, but it would probably work with Krik in an upright seated position, facing forward with respect to the vehicle and toward the right with respect to VV.
• The upper torso ship accommodate either Rocky or Chip, depending on your loyalties, if the figure were to be in an upright seated position, facing forward with respect to the vehicle to toward the right with respect to VV. Alternately the figure could lie on its chest, head oriented toward the front of the vehicle. This alternate pilot orientation might make it easier for the ship to accept the connectors from the middle torso, head and upper arm ships.
• Wolo and Chip or Rocky could fit in the upper arms in upright seated positions, facing forward with respect to the vehicles and upward with respect to VV.
• If the lower arms were to be lengthened a bit, as they were for Matty’s Lion Voltron, then Cinda and Modoch could fit in the lower arms in upright seated positions, facing forward with respect to the vehicles and downward with respect to VV. I suspect that VV could still have wrist articulation and some hand articulation.
• Jeff could fit in the head ship if that white “thing” beneath the cone — the wheel base of the Matchbox toy — were to be enlarged a bit in order to accommodate Jeff’s legs. Jeff could then sit upright, facing forward with respect to the vehicle and upward with respect to VV. The top of Jeff’s head would be right behind VV’s mouth or chin. The tough part would be how to accommodate both the VV faceplates and the access hatch for the action figure.
• Ginger could fit in the chestplate ship if she were lying flat, head oriented toward the nose of the ship and downward with respect to VV.

So… this seems feasible from a design standpoint, although it would certainly be unfeasible from an economic standpoint for Matty Collector.