The SP-W03 Mobile Pod was a civilian-use vehicle designed to assist in the construction of the space colonies.
It was later refitted by the Earth Federation to become the RB-79 Ball to serve as combat support in the One Year War.
History
When the One Year War erupted in January UC 0079, the Earth Federation is caught off-guard when the Principality of Zeon introduced mobile suits as a superior war machine. The Zeon forces held the upper hand in the war with their mobile suits, the MS-05B Zaku Iand the MS-06F Zaku II.
The Federation scrambled to develop a mobile weapon to counter the Zeon supremacy. They produced a prototype mobile suit, the RX-78-2 Gundam, but it was too costly to be mass produced. Their first mass-production mobile suit, the RGM-79 GM, was not produced fast enough to be deployed at all battle fronts. Thus, the Federation revived their cancelled Project V RX-76 Prototype Ball and refitted around 1,200 civilian-use SP-W03 Mobile Pods to be deployed in combat.
Design
The SP-W03 Mobile Pod had spherical bodies with a pair of manipulator claws for carrying objects or to perform simple tasks in construction work.
Derivatives
- RB-79 Ball
- RB-79C Ball Type C
- RB-79F Ball Type F
- RB-79K Ball Type K
- RB-79M Ball Type M
- RB-79N Fisheye
- RB-133 Type 133 Ball
Behind the scenes
Kunio Okawara is the original mechanical designer.