A is for Armstrong Whitworth, not Northrop, apparently!

This post will - unbeknown to you (if only I could keep my gob shut) - be accompanied by frantic Googling to check facts, and will probably have been last-minute-edited at the time of posting!

Returning to what used to be so 'rare' it's existence wasn't known, and is now becoming a bit of a perennial - this being the second or third we've seen now?!

However, previous investigation suggested it might be a Northrop experimental; one of two if memory serves, both of which were well within the early war (World War Two to the youngsters) date I have pinned on the original first run of the Palitoy aircraft range from which this model comes.

In fact (the bit which will have been frantically Googled in the last few minutes!), I was told by a chap at Sandown Park this weekend that it was an ArmstrongWhitworth design the AW 52, something which hadn't even featured in previous research, and as the [just found] link [hopefully] shows - that is the case, with the strange pipes coming of the trailing edges which never quite matched the vanes of the Northrop designs.

Like the other examples we have seen (and unlike the rest of the Palitoy range) the aircraft type is not listed among the markings, which are otherwise just as 'vocal' as the other models we've looked at with - from the left, looking from below;

Palitoy Regd.

Non Flam.

CAS

____

CAS

Made In England

The CAS being almost certainly British Cascelloid Limited, the parent company's name; the retail trademark Palitoy being a play on the founder's name, a Mr. A. E. Pallett. Celastoid being the 1920's trademark of rival British Celanese Limited's cellulose-acetate, aircraft modeling parts.

Because stuff sometimes hangs around in Picasa for a while, until I work out what to do with it, or wait for a suitable post to slip it into; this has been hanging around since the last Sandown show in September (Mercator Trading to thank for both) and now's clearly the post to slip it into.

Around 1:50th scale, this bears all the hallmarks of the aircraft range (without the 'CAS') but is part of a small range dated by vehicle collectors to 1948, this could mean the aircraft models too; date from later than suits my previous pontification, although I think this model (with a replacement wheel) has more in common with what I consider later (flat colour) issues of the 'planes (such as this flying wing) rather than the flecked/recycled/waste-plastic ones, but clearly more digging needs to be done!

Previouslyon Small Scale World (this post will reappear at the top of the results page - scroll down!)