For anyone who may not know why Transformers (and all toys that pass through US safety laws) aren't allowed to have small projectiles:Originally Posted by Adzma
+ 31-12-1978: a four year old American boy, Robert Jeffery Warren in Atlanta, swallowed a 3cm projectile (missile) from a Mattel Battlestar Galactica Colonial Viper toy. The projectile was lodged in the back of his throat and his parents were unable to grab it properly to pull it out. As a result the child choked to death. Mattel recalled the toy. The boy's parents sued Mattel for US$14,000,000.
+ 27-02-1979: Advocate group 'Action for Children's Television' petitions the U.S. government to regulate toys that fire projectiles, pointing out that there were over 1000 reports of children being injured by projectile firing toys and one resulting death in the previous year.
+ Under current U.S. law a toy with a projectile launcher must either:
1: have weakened spring action launchers (the force must be insufficient to lodge the projectile into the back of a child's throat), or...
2: if the launcher is not weakened, then the missile must be longer than a minimum length. The general rule is that the missile must be longer than the length of a standard camera film container (70mm??). A longer missile means that if the missile does become lodged into the throat, it's easy enough to grab the missile and pull it out quickly
This is why:
+ In G1 all Transformers' projectile launchers (for missiles, fists etc.) were intentionally weakened. Take any original G1 toy (e.g. Sunstreaker, Wheeljack, Mirage etc.) and push the fire button. The projectile doesn't fly very far (if at all)
+ Later Transformers that did have powerful launchers had long missiles, e.g.: G2.
+ Takara(TOMY)'s reissues have small missiles and powerful launchers, but their toys are explicitly labelled "For Ages 15 and Up."
+ Hasbro's reissues don't exclude children, thus they either have lengthened missiles (e.g. Optimus Prime, Seekers) or powerless launchers (e.g. Red Alert, Hoist).
+ Some of Takara(TOMY)'s "cutesy" toys with small parts (e.g. MyClones) have a special chemical in the paint that is intentionally designed to taste bitter to infants, inducing them to spit the part out if placed in their mouth.
...etc.
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