I never did a tag for all these pull-back /
push-and-go / flywheel / reverse-spring / self-winding / friction / kinetic motor-equipped
toys and it's too late to start one really (there is a tag for wind-ups; 'clockwork'), but there are lots of toys out there with one of
several different mechanisms not requiring batteries or a power-lead, and this
is one of the newer smaller, yea-verily; even 'itty-bitty' units.
Another Charity shop purchase from the last
two weeks, as I have to walk through town every day for Internet at the moment,
I tend to do them all a couple of times a week and it's a bit like a car-boot
sale where everything is new or clean . . . or both!
This is by Kandy Toys - that West Country lot who have started to feature
quite often here at Small Scale World, being another importer of rack-toy
generics, novelty toys and 'beach-wear'.
Given that it was probably only a pound,
it's quite good really . . . a quick look and you think "A cut-above the
usual rack-toy crud", but actually you then realise there is no underside
to the wings and under the decoration is a pretty crude moulding.
The attached card insert suggests something
vaguely equating to a . . . Hurristang? Pukaracane? Heh-heh! Your guess is as
good as mine; and there's what look to be shots of something else on the
reverse of the backing-card, looking a
little more like a Hurricane, so there was probably a selection, like the old
balsawood, ramin or styro-foam gliders (which are timeless and still found
everywhere - one day we'll look at them too!)
However; once you put it together it
doesn't look to shabby, definitely carries the lines of a Spitfire well and
provided you look down on it from above, you can't see the daft undercarriage or
lack of reverse-wing detail. The nose is a bit Mustang and - while I'm no
expert - the five-blade propeller is a late war thing, by which time the
distinctive pointed, wing-tips had been clipped flat - I think?
I also wonder - if you filled the
hollow-underside with card and a little expanding foam, or some sanded-down
expanded polystyrene sheet, could you get it to glide . . . with a catapult; I
think you might?
The daft thing is someone, somewhere in the
Far East went to some effort to ensure the two wing roundel stickers lined-up
with the camouflage stencil, only for the person applying them to put them
back-to-front on the opposite wings! Speaking of the wing-roundels, they are
none-too-accurate either.
But, for, say; garden war-gamers, a box of
these would be a cheap way of getting a couple of squadrons airborne, and they
are robust enough to take the sort of punishment they might face on the vicar's
lawn! The screwdriver did its job admirably, driving the single screw home into
the soft ethylene, but I then tried using it to unscrew a die-cast SPG and
shredded the soft mild-steel tip, so it's in the recycling bin for Friday with the
two blister-trays!
G for Gay, my little spitplane!
Then a couple of few days latter this was
spotted in another charity shop for the princely sum of 50p, well; it would be
rude not to!
Still in the catalogue as CS90620 Hawker
Hurricane, carrying fuselage-code UP ● A and part of the S [for] Showcase line "For the younger collector" (they've got me pegged, clearly!),
it's what Corgi euphemistically refer to as FTB size, that is 'Fit The Box'! In
this case it equates to about 1:100.
However mine is to a higher standard than
the standard S range example and is actually from the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight Collection boxed set (CC99399), a
third version is available in the BoB
Fighter Collection (CS90691) with fuselage-code A ● LK with a Spitfire and Messerschmitt, and I'm
sure other variations have been issued!
I bet A) it's more than 50p in the high
street (although probably not much more!) and B) with no paint-chips; mine's a
minter!
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