Can you identify this item?

Update note: This item has been identified as Brakedown GTS from the Cybertron line. Thanks!
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I'm stumped on identifying a Transformers item...it is copyright 2004, and is a blue funny-car style vehicle, with two big wheels in the back and small wheels under the vehicle in front. Head is gray, kind of looks like Bluestreak's head, and arms are gary. It has an Autobot logo on it. I'll offer $2 store credit to the first person who can identify it for me! TFU.info is a good resource to identify items, but I didn't find it there. If you know of other thorough reference websites for the newer toys, please let me know!

While I don't intend to make it a sizeable portion of inventory, I do have on hand some random figures from the past 10 years that I am sorting through from Beast Wars, RID, Armada, Energon, etc.. The first of each item I have will get put on the Collection Completers page, and then any duplicates will get posted into regular inventory.

On an unrelated note, there was a good post asking about foreign figures. The person is correct that it hasn't been an area of focus thus far -- a few items can be found on the Collection Completers page, but that's pretty much it. I'll keep an extra eye out for items and see what I can do, but they simply don't come around as often as US figures (of course), and when found it typically is an international transaction which is both riskier and expensive, therefore making it difficult to obtain most items without charging an arm and a leg for them.

One final item I'll mention is regarding our website photos -- I'm slowly working on getting quality photos up that show complete figures for reference, and weed out some of the blurry and incomplete figure photos. I know the ideal would be to have actual pics of each item, but unfortunately that isn't within my time budget. When needed, I can do photos of specific figures on request, if you're willing to wait until a weekend for me to do it.

Poll Comments

Obviously it wasn't a scientific poll, and pretty low sample rate, but the vote is split between keeping things as is, and increasing G1 inventory. I am surprised that nobody voted for increasing the post-G2 inventory...perhaps anyone that collects those has already moved on to somewhere else?

Tough to say for sure how this will impact things to come (again, since it was a pretty low vote count), but at least for now I'll hold off on spending money on just big dollar items, and try to continue bringing in as much variety of G1 things as possible.

On a related tangent...I've tried taking want lists from people at times in the past, but with minimal success. Perhaps we could try to add a feature to allow everyone to post/update their want lists at the site, though I don't know if they would want to go through the trouble of maintaining it. That's one area where I'd like to find a way to improve the site, anyway. I'm willing to spend more to get in specific pieces -- as long as I know I have quick takers for them!

Quantity vs. Quality vs. Price

Let your thoughts be known! Post your comments or respond to the poll on the left....if you had trouble posting a comment before, I fixed that now so you don't have to login to anything.

As FortMax.com evolves, the question comes up of how to be as successful as possible and keep customers happy. The general operating philosophy to this point has been to offer as many G1 / G2 TF's figures as possible, at a price better than other sellers that carry any sizable ongoing inventory. The Gobots and Star Wars items are similar strategy, though they are not as much of a focus at this time.

Knowing we can't all have our cake and eat it, too (if so, I'd be making piles of money, but that's not the case!), I'd be curious to know your opinion on the following options:

1) You would prefer to keep FortMax.com basically as is, in terms of selection and price level
2) You would be willing to pay more per item, if the G1/G2/Gobots/StarWars selection was larger and you could find more of what you want at one time
3) You would like to see more high dollar or boxed/carded items, even if it meant that over-all selection was smaller
4) You would prefer to see increased inventory of post-G2 Transformers items (Beast Wars, Armada, etc.)
5) You have some other preference

Transformers Market in 2007

It has been an interesting year thus far in the realm of Transformers collectibles! Prices of items have increased notably in the market, with a sustained increase value of 25% or more on many G1/G2 items, especially for accessories of any figures that have not (yet?) been reissued. A surge of interest definitely has taken place over the last couple months, thanks to the Transformers movie (which made more money than what most people would have guessed a year ago). Typically summer time is slow business at FortMax.com, but not this year. What remains to be seen is if this influx of new interest and collectors will continue, or if it will die back down after the movie hype is gone.

While I like to see things worth more and not less, it definitely has presented challenges for getting new inventory in at an affordable price, too!

Its fun to see some of the G1 items represented back at stores, such as the little Robot Heroes figures that display nice... or good for my youngest to play with while watching my old-school Transformer tapes (he can watch the tapes, but the DVDs are off limits!).

The Titanium figures that run around $15 each are great concepts for non-cheapo toys at a reasonable price, that both transform and have a little personality. However, they do seem to fall apart at the joints a little too easily (I have Soundwave, Scourge, and Rodimus). The Titanium figures at the $6 range have some nice detail, but just a little too small for the price -- with the Robot Heroes I get two for that price and have more fun with them, anyway.
In addtion to getting the Robot Heroes, I've purchased a handful of the movie toys -- Bumblebee, Baricade, Brawl/Devastator, Blackout, a cell phone guy, and some MP3 player thing that looks like Laserbeak. The detail on these figures were nice, however it's just a little too hard to get the cars transformed back into vehicles and hold their form.

With all of the above said, there is a side of me that's a little bummed to see our niche hobby turned more mainstream. Perhaps that's just because re-issued items devalue the originals some, but I think its more than just a money thing...

Hey, I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts on any of the above. Also, if you don't mind sharing where else you buy TF's online (besides ebay), please post links for those!