R is for Return . . . to Romans

We've seen these before here; on the Roman page (where I think they are waiting for blurb!) with their anachronistic card-art, and possibly in a rack-toy month, but having found another header-card set and got the loose figures out of storage, it's time to look at them again, and a few others of similar ilk - Hong Kong/Macau clone'ery!

Not the largest sample but it meets the purpose; there seem to have been three generations of these, the gold/silver ones which were mostly (all?) rack-toys in the 1960/70's, a set of muted colours (Christmas cracker/capsule-toy contents) through the 1970/80's and an issue in 'neon' or electric colours which were quite common as handfuls in the early days of evilBay and must date from the late 1980's/1990's, probably from similar cracker/capsule origins, or - from the bulk findings; those Maltese festival 'window-throws'.

The emerald green figure (in the little bag) was the first of these I found back in the early 1990's (it's the running pose), and I have glued him back together once or twice, but he has the consistency of candle-wax, so I hang on to the pieces for loyalties sake, or until a similar coloured sample turns-up with a bit more backbone! If I chucked him I'd be unable to show he came in that colour - it's how the collection works!

There are minor differences in the bases, with the early metallic figures having their mould-release pin-marks as punched-through holes, the mid-era figures have a slighter 'dink', while the late, bright-coloured ones have barely a sign of the pin, or no visible showing at all. It would seem that the release-pins were a separate process, possibly triggered by hand, or by hand in the early days of the tools life, with some operators forcing them through the still soft plastic, later batches showing more finesse in the phase application!

Compared with other HK clones, they (pink one) are the smallest, and were probably copied from the Elastolin 40mm figures as would the lollipop figures (orange brown one)* have been, after the original figures (far right and middle of bottom row) are the not Hong Kong, but 'Made in Macau' figures in gold and silver polyethylene.

These were probably copied from the 70mm figures, pantographed down to 50mm, but could have been grown from the 40mm Hausser originals. I'm not sure if the painted fighter is home- or factory- paint, but overall they have the makings of cake decorations, although I think they were carded rack-toys in France?

*This is one I think is probably not the Platicom/Soldabar series, but rather, another similar lolly-stick sweet-with-prize issuer as we saw here a while back with the contributions from Konrad Lesiak in Poland; it has the hole, but without the collar and with a smaller, more-oblong base. My sample is also a bit heat shrunk from early removal from the tool. - On the subject of which; there is a section on the Plasticom figures coming to the Khaki Infantry page with new poses courtesy of Chris Smith as soon as I get the blurb sorted!

These (upper figure) were also sold in France (by Jouets Super Plastics?) imported from/via Portugal (by Injectaplastic) as carded sets and are also believed to be from Macau in origin, this one was given to me by Peter Evans many years ago, and is missing what looks to be a polystyrene weapon - probably made soft at the hand-hold by the actions of the free-radicals in the dense PVC, the same thing you see with early tracks on Airfix AFV kits. Below is an Elastolin 40mm original for comparison.