R is for Red Blobs

Guards on Parade - 100 Piece Set...only there aren't 100, there aren't even 100 pieces! 98 pieces - once de-sprued - make 112 pieces assembling into 96 figures, assuming you happen to  have the correct number of side and bass drummers on the card to receive the separate instruments! Presumably if extant; the 49/50 piece sets had similarly complicated maths?

Purchased in Bristol in 1969 by Mr James Opie, this set is clearly an Airfix piracy, except that while the musicians are owing everything to Haldane Place, the marching figures are something else...

They have been suitably 'changed' (I think 'converted' is too strong a word for it!) from the Airfix marching figure, and although the legs are the same, the bodies have been re-sculpted to represent shouldered arms on the left and right, and port-arms likewise.

Looking at the figure on the left, you can see the port-arms sculpts both used the same scrap of metal or plastic for the change, so the butt is upside-down on that figure! The other port-arms chap (third from left) though, could paint-up well for Crimean - or later - war-gaming?

These will be looked at in greater detail on the Airfix blog pages for Robin Hood and Guards Band, so just a few shots to show how Maid Marion became Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, and that the musicians don't loose that much in translation.