Another reason I wanted to see the back is to find where is the purple? The front does not show a lot of purple, and the train mode is all purple. Maybe he turns himself inside out?

 

Can see a large chunk on the back, so I imagine a lot of the train is on the back of him.

 

One interesting point of the gap is that it shows that the front face of the lower leg is entirely grey, so it's not part of the purple train showing (although it might be on the bottom). All in all, I think Thomas might be very interesting due to the needs of the modes colors and transformation (and it will probably be a complicated one, but tht's one the reasons I like FT).

I just preordered two more today in China, let's see if all my 4 preorders work.

 

Yeah, the chunks and the way they seem to be folded up reminds me of Roadking, so, as the main body does not see to have double colors, the backpack probably envelopes the whole body in purple (and the purple in the legs envelop the rest).

 

Really? I just see what looks like a couple purple panels that form some of the train shell and wheels nicely flattened against the back of his wings and what is either the upper curve or bottom curve of the shuttle forming his back. Not seeing much of a backpack at all in those two photos, unless you count the wings themselves as a backpack.

 

Not saying there is a giant backpack, but rather a large chunk of purple sitting on the back. Its probably far more flush than their arialbots.

 

4!? why 4? He only has 3 modes  

 

Simplified due to my lack of skill but as near as I can tell this is where most of it ends up.

 

I display them in Robot and alternate modes (2 for Thomas) and also in "transforming" mode  .

Actually, I'm new into collecting and buying in China, so I'm not 100 % sure how preorders are working there, so I've got some as a backup. I'm also buying some for some friends in Brazil, so the money will not be thrown out.

Agreed, this seems like a very good estimate.

 

Oh I see! glad to know that people from South America are collecting transformers too! I suppose you are from Brazil right?  

 

Yes, I'm from Brazil, there's a lot of TF collectors over here, but it's not that much of a group thing (most collect separately or in small groups).

 

I hope you enjoy the hobby as much as we do here!

 

Oh yeah, manage to po one at the last minute

 

But for Thomas, you can have robot transforming into train, robot into space shuttle, and train into space shuttle.
So, uh... I guess you have to buy 6!  

 

Uh-oh, I will need to find more preorders available  

 

Finally found some partial pictures of the back from a discussion board in China.

 

That's a lot less flush than what I expected.....

 

It's interesting how FT decided to replicate the animation model's fin on the back. Interesting, but I'm not sure I actually like it.

 

Hunk is overjoyed to know his own backpack is going unnoticed