Legendary Mobile Suit “The Gundam”

Model number: none
Code name: Legendary Mobile Suit “The Gundam”
Unit type: historical reproduction mobile suit
Manufacturer: civilians
Operator: Gundam Museum
First deployment: unknown
Accommodation: pilot only, in standard cockpit in torso
Dimensions: overall height 18.4 meters
Weight: empty 43.4 metric tons
Armor materials: unknown
Powerplant: unknown
Propulsion: unknown
Equipment and design features: sensors, range unknown
Fixed armaments: none
Optional hand armaments: Excalibur sword

The reconstruction of the legendary mobile suit, “The Gundam,” was one of the projects initiated to commemorate the end of the Vagan war in AG 201. It was also a part of the historical and cultural protection program promoted by the Earth Federation. The project received help from Earth-Mars peace science foundation and was led by the Gundam Museum’s lead researcher, Albert Ferguson. In recent years, the project saw significant development as the majority of the core researchers in the field of mobile suit archaeology gathered together to work on it. “The Gundam” was a suit depicted in the legends of numerous heritages as the savior that ended the interplanetary wars and brought peace before the establishment of the Silver Chalice Treaty. An amazing example was that in the region around Tordia, there was a legend about a white mobile suit defeating an evil dragon with its sword. It could be said that the legend had crossed the boundary of reality and into the area of myth, and the spread of such a ridiculous myth was the result of the information control and abandonment of war technology, including mobile suits, caused by the treaty.

In order to remove such myth-like information and to get a step closer to the real image of “The Gundam,” the reconstruction project used empirical methods often employed in mobile suit archaeology to conduct a detailed inspection of the vast historical data. There were also large quantities of quality information regarding the development of “The Gundam” in the house of the Asuno family, such as the remains of the portrait of “The Gundam” which was damaged during the early days of the Vagan war and the voice recordings of Flit Asuno, all of which were critical to the outcome of the project. Furthermore the Vagans, who had established ties with Earth, gave the researchers access rights to the EXA-DB under their care, allowing them to know more about the technologies used in producing standard mobile suits before the Silver Chalice Treaty. This then provided the researchers with confidence that they could reconstruct “The Gundam” using the technologies of that time with a good degree of accuracy.

Despite all this, it was still difficult to restore all the lost information and as a result certain areas required estimation and might not have been that reliable. In times like this, the researchers used the AGE-1 Gundam AGE-1 Normal as a reference as it was a product of the AGE System, which contained all the knowhow of the Asuno family, and existed before the Treaty. In addition, based on the researchers’ knowledge and understanding, The AGE-1 Normal’s development characteristics were the closest to those of “The Gundam” as it was the AGE System’s earliest design. Thus, the fully reconstructed “The Gundam” bore many similarities with the AGE-1 Normal in terms of its design, concept, structure, etc. As very little data existed beyond the machine itself, its only known weapon on record was a sword, which was referenced in things like the Tordia myth as well as in the remains of the damaged portrait. The reconstruction was thus carried out using this information. The sword was tentatively named Excalibur and is reconstructed to be as accurate as possible, based on information collected about such weapons that were used in the past. It was impossible to replicate the technologies used then faithfully, but the sword was created using the most advanced material engineering and metallurgy techniques currently available.

First appearance: Mobile Suit Gundam AGE: EXA-LOG
Original mechanical designer: Kanetake Ebikawa

Rear view