S is for Shelfies - TKMaxx and B&M Stores

Mostly dino'toys, in my two most recent visits to B&M in Basingrad, most of the shots being taken back at the end of July, with the rest taken about a month ago, as the Christmas stock was comming in, I'll be back there in the next week or so, with any luck?

 

A set of wild animals, grist to the mill, but the shots might help ID something, sometime in the future, which is always the primary reason for taking these shelfies, along with tying the contents/branding to other configurations on Amazon, evilBay or Alibaba.

Dynaforce, which aught to be some pun on Dino', but which includes the above zoo-animal set, so more of a phantom brand for B&M, it also (see below) seems to be competing directly with the Teamsterz stuff (possibly from Pioneer in China) which is a branding for Halsall / HTI, also carried in B&M's stores!

 

Going up several scale marks, we get this 3 1/2 or 4" action figure with articulated models in two sizes, along with a dino-skeleton kit, probably clip-together, but not the sort of thing I seek out for the stash, but when (not if) the smaller ones turn-up in the future they'll find a place in the collection, even if it's only long-enough to be photographed and Blogged!

 

Similar to the previous truck but with different contents and a sculptural cab which is even closer to the Teamsterz one! Pulling from a larger assortment of models, you only get one per lorry, with a daft egg and an even dafter mini-vehicle!

 

A week or so later - I have a feeling - based on a folder of B&M stuff, that the above are actually, all or mostly, TKMaxx shelfies, as I can't find their folder! Both stores tend to stock Teamsters and/or HTI, so it's easy to get confused, but makes the different truck below, definitely B&M, make more sense, the different designs were for different stores, but the dinosaur models are the same!

 

The older Teamsterz one, which I think we've seen before in both B&M and Smyths? You can see how the Dynaforce one is aping this one, down to the sculptured cab, smaller dinosaur models and daft mini-vehicles, but with HTI's you get more of both and no daft egg!

 

Animals are the same as the earlier Dynaforce conventional-cab truck, so whichever price point the buyer selects, we can assume Halsall get a cut!

 

The more recent visit revealed a new phantom or in-house brand 'Dino Hunter', of which there were, again, larger action figure sets as well as this one, which comes with four larger or medium-sized dinosaur models.

I may get this if they still have some on my next visit, it's only six-quid, and as you can see you get a total of 48 themed animals, in 12's; mini's of domestic, wild and dinosaurs; and a dozen dogs in a larger scale, closer to 54 or 60mm compatible.

D is for Dinorasers - 3 of 3

The third part of this quick round-up/catch-up, is basically a comparison of older and newer sets, but the newer sets have a couple of extra tricks up their sleeves!

We start with a set which is basically a China-marked green set of the old Diener-rasers (geddit!) or the Total premiums from the 1970's, with a cheaper sub-piracy in blue (with a key-ring/charm loop), in the middle, which have come in recently, and that's it for a minute!

 

I also bought this bulk lot on a clearance price, and they are imported by an old favourite, David Halsall (now HTI). Each pack has one flat/block silhouette dinosaur and one semi-realistic erasersaur, except the pack which has two multicoloured extrusion 'slices' - bottom right.

One of which must be near the end of the run and is totally unrecognisable as an anything, leave-alone a dinosaur! Obviously the streams of different-coloured polymer have shoved each-other out of true? The other though, is a quite clear Triceratops.

The fully round ones are also harking back to the early sets from my own childhood, but again have charm-loop/key-ring holes, which - in this material - wouldn't stand up to a day's wear & tear? There are also subtle differences between the older and newer (these will be no earlier than the mid-1980's) versions.

 

This was the sample just as it went to storage in March '22, and includes all past posted stuff and everything in these three and the Iwako post, but not the stuff in last Thursday's post, which is the most recent stuff to come in.

 

And you can judge for yourself how size differs between the sets, erasers have a small-hand rule and don't vary much (beyond that huge blue lump, in the centre, from Flying Tiger, I think?). But there were those sets of little micro-mini's which were everywhere a few years ago!

HTI is for Halsall is for Welly is for China

Welly are more commonly a now China-based, previously German toy importer and now die caster, rivalling Carama for shelf-space in the cavernous Smyth's and reborn Toys-R-Us's of this world, at some point Halsall toys - now HTI - got hold of this circus set and shipped it into the UK.

 

 

Quite a boxful, for what wouldn't have been a great amount, being no more than a glorified rack-toy, as far as the toymen are concerned, although the Welly moniker would take it up a pricing-rung! 

From the bases one is forgiven for wondering if the figures came from Pioneer, another die-caster, but, as we've seen here before, often including figures, which usually have largish oval bases?

This time we get a seperate ringmaster and another white-dove producing magician (see today's earlier post), a clown and a performer who seems to have been designed for a piece of apparatus which didn't survive the planning/design stage of the set, having two arms which might have slid-down or clipped into something, now absent?

In addition to the loose animals above (tigers, elephants and a lion), we get two lions in a cage-wagon clearly influenced by earlier vehicles from Matchbox, Corgi Juniors or Majorette (see now, below), and it's demountable, more for ease of construction on the factory I'm sure, but it does mean you can drop them and their cage near the 'Big Top'!

 

The Big Top, is actually a big cage! But quite well modelled for such a set at such a size, with entry and exit points and some big-cat guide rails, which as we shall see in a minute, all go on a lorry!

 

Obviously the set is aimed at toy-car fans rather than circus aficionados per se, and as such contains a nice variety of vehicles, some carrying the logo of a fictional 'Circus World'. If the tigers go in the blue trailer, and the lion in the horse-box, that leaves the artic' below for the elephants!

 

"The artic' below' is now above! Two US style long-nosed articulated trucks, which technically should be called semi's (or sem'eyes, but there's me, being 'racist' again!). There aught to be a rubber-band, holding everything on the lower wagon.

 

A Majorette set as seen on evilbay a while ago, a smaller set, but from the image on the back of the box, part of a larger line of Pinder-branded stuff. Pinder are still going, France's main circus I believe, although originally Anglo-Scottish in origin. Also note that the two articulated lorries nearest the viewer in that image seem to be a larger 1:64th scale or thereabouts.

 

It's interesting that the three sets looked at today, Lidl/Padget, and the above pair, all appeared around the turn of the century, as animal circuses were going rapidly out of fashion, yet all three reley on animals to give them a circus feel?

M is for Matters Arising!

Well, I've pulled the last big post, which happens to be one of the posts pulled last year! The other was the Premium Pirates, so very convenient that Kent moved first! I'm not pulling it because I've run out of time or got flue, but because I couldn't be arsed to finish it off this afternoon, went and did other things and am now looking forward to a late chicken stew which will take 'till midnight (needs deboning), if I get this out quick!

And what this is, are a few shots I took as a sort of follow-up a couple of hours ago while I was round at the flat getting the tins of chicken soup and mushrooms for the base of the stew!

 

The yellow one here is the Webb's Supertoy pirate one, but I've had several of the pink ones from Peter Evans, and while I suspect something more 'princessy', the figure makes a good period C18th lady-pirate, or pirate's moll, and an ID would be nice, the embarrassment may be that she's on the blog in one of those pinky-mauve sets from 99p Stores or Poundland around ten-years ago! Anyone recognise these pink ladies?

Having waited years, over a decade to get a full set of these (finally managed a year or so ago), five came along at once - the Supreme / SP undead pirates!

 

I mentioned the likely compatibility, and you can see here the eight Crazy Pirates from New Zealand and Aussie-landia (there was a Peruvian issue too), do fit in well with the other set of twenty, so even more fun, pity nobody knew that in 1970! Many thanks to Glen again for those.

 

Comparison between the PVC-alike production of Papo (50mm), Plastoy (45mm) and the Pirateology game-piece figure (40mm), all a bit 'ish, but all out there now, and relatively affordable!

 

This (Supreme for Halsall - now HTI) should have been covered in the ITLAPD into' post last year or the year before, but a loose boat came in, and I had the spare figure here, so posed them both together!

 

And that's it for this year, much gratitude to everyone who's helped and/or contributed; Brian Berke, Peter Evans, Glen Sibbald, Chris Smith, John Begg, Jon Attwood, and you, if I've failed to mention you . . . no, not YOU, you ate all the biscuits and wandered off, I'm not even inviting you next year.

Ah'haaarrrrr mee arrty felloows! Until next yearrr, may the wind get behind yerrr sails and yerrr mast stay up! Ooo-urrh missus!

ITLAPD is for It's That Long Assorted-Post Dissertation

Oi' been led to ber'live some scurrvy scurr callin' hisel' Mad Cap'n Tom were for a number o' years callin' hisel' the 'ead of ther Brit'ish ITLAPD . . . and feel Oi' should point owt, Oi's been postin' err' regulur-loik ferr longurr thun thaat!

http://www.yarr.org.uk/

So 'ere's be ther furrst o'a' few posts on Poirates and Poiraty things 'er at Small Scale Worrld, not as many as some yurrs, but plen'eny to's keep me 'and in! Aharrrrr maties!

First off, a question-mark; they keep turning-up, usually in small numbers and have as many clues to early Hing Fat or late Ri-Toys (plastic type, plastic colour) as they do to DFC or HG (figure size, figure subject), and could be two of the above (or others altogether) as there are definitely two versions of the sailors/pirates (left and middle), but so far only one type of AWI/Revenue-men?

You feel they should be commonly known, but they might have been some kind of cheap'o rack toy? Or I'm just being dumb! Anyone able to add any more to these; were they branded, big-box or bottle-bag, 1980's or '90's? I've been picking them up since the early 1990's and they're around the 50mm mark.

The weird thing is the unmarked revenue men seem to go with the middle pirates, not the similarly coloured lot who ARE marked CHINA, so late 1990's-onwards for definite, on them

Another question-mark; A rather stubby gun and pile of muddy cannon-balls. From the colour this looks as if is't cut out of a Bellona vac-formed scenic sheet, but which one? There was a 19th century battlefield one I think and a couple recommended for ACW, but the barrel here is more piratey than Napoleon or Parrot?

We've seen these before, and I keep a look-out for them on that there interwebamathingy, but the big lot were sniped at the last second and the others were too-expensive or reposted on value-aggregators like Worthpoint, but the two question marks remain; what's the significance of the wild-animal base marks? And what set/line/range were they in? I've seen them listed as 'The Disney Collection' but not found many more with that as a search term.

From the number which have turned-up and the number of duplicate characters/different poses now found, it looks to be at least two boxed sets of around ten poses? First two movies? Two waves of the second movie? Four boxes of six figures? I said we'd return to these and we have . . . and we will again!

We looked at these big-box generics last year, but I've collected a couple more images which are worth a peek, if only because one is wearing a rather piratical A-to-Z logo (which is the importer Padgett Bros) and new box graphics.

Just a bit of fun, these are out there on-line; expanding foam pirates, this one credited to a Forum Novelties Inc., but there will be others I'm sure! Put him in water and he grows, put him on a radiator and he shrinks, cat gets him and he shreads!

With the demise of the Early Learning shops, and having received a few of their other large 'solid' figures in Charity Shop lots, I was pleased to find this old sales picture still finable on-line, The Early Learning Centre pirates.

Saw this, or was I sent it? It might have been part of the wider conversation into Brian Berke's Charles W Morgan kit, which we looked at a couple of ITLAPD's ago? Or I looked it up after? No matter, it's piraty, and Captain Morgan may have produced pirate premiums at some point, maybe a little metal one like the old Britains semi-flat Johnny Walker? I just feel I should be saying more about it?

I got a Supreme carded pirate, I'm sure I've seen a generic version in a catalogue somewhere, but can't remember where . . . Henbrandt or Marshalls maybe? Anyway, it comes with a faux-velvet purse (treasure bag!) and one figure, who gets a rather crude boat to play in which is barely large enough for him and his huge treasure chest, which has a naff card-insert treasure, rather like Blue Box's hay-wagon load! Here branded to Halsall's (HTI) Time4Toys.

When I looked at the Klutz bits a while back, this chap had just come in, in a mixed lot, so I used him as a sizer, and shot a couple more to go here, so here they are! Fontanini, hard PVC 60/70mm, they also appeared in a smaller size, like these and as unpainted/antique-washed polyethylene versions - the cat'O'two-tails!

Peter Evans bought this for me in the Toy Project Charity shop a while back (Christmas-time I think) and we will be back with them in a minute, but this post is written-up in an 'as they were added to the folder' order, and he came earlier.

He seems to be designed to hold something on his head and I suspect it's treasure or tokens as you move round a board game? He may - equally - not be a pirate, but more of a general 'historical' figure, he looks a bit fairy-tale-artwork-of-my-childhood like? I think he IS a pirate, just covering possibilities - anyone recognise him?

Why is this in the folder? First Captain Morgan, now these? Goes away, has a coffee and a think, comes back non-the-wiser and writes a couple more picture captions . . . OH! Yes, someone (Chance Priest?) on Brian Heiler's Facebook group (where lots of them are Mego fans) found it and I was sufficiently amused by the subject-matter to chuck it in the ITLAPD folder!

Italian kids of the 1970's obviously thought nothing of buying their pirates large and in sixes! There's gotta'be a story here - festival of some kind, very larger garden-toy/sand-pit ship by the same company? Giocattoli Querzola.

Unknown cartoon octopus with a pirate's air about him, unmarked, but in a Kinder style, so maybe another capsule-toy issuer? Is he a character from Sponge Bob or a more generic thing?

This IS a capsule toy AND Kinder! Lady-pirate from a crew which is both unisex in mix/numbers and overall quite androgyn! Not sure if the 'Pablo' character comes separately - and apart from the rest of the set - in a larger 'maxi-egg', or is reduced from the apparent size in the artwork on the insert sheet (where this figure - Alisea - is not seen in the issued figure's pose/sculpt) to fit in the normal-sized eggs?

Not my thing particularly, but it does ID some blobby, black knights we may or may not have seen here, I know I had some come in but can't remember if I posted them? Redbox infant toy set, with equally blobby pirates and a ship which is of limited use in any scale that might be looking for something more realistic, but they would be cheap.

I can't remember if we've seen these here before or not, they were available last year as I shot them for the 'seen elsewhere shot (next shot below), but I think I then realised they weren't on the Blog, so shot them for this year, or something, anyway, here they are and I don't think I know anything else about them - more corner-shop, counter-box pick'n'mix vinyl's?

That 'seen elsewhere' shot, which was all the softer PVC or PVC-a-like figures, with the K&M / Wild Republic; centre left, Klutz in his own row; top right, the chap from Brain B above him. The two ships crew; bottom right, the four we just saw; top left, and a few odds and sods.

These are on Alibaba, and are probably available about the place as generic cake decorations, I have a similar Disney Alice' set in the queue which I have managed not to post several times despite meaning to! Nice sculpts, well finished, but cartoony, and nothing like the characters in the licence they are knocking-off, but both the skeleton and the lady have mileage enhancing others sets?

Current listing on Toy Major's site, set W5545 Action World Pirate Collection window box, previously carried by Toysmith (and others), and here with some useful accessories.

Another one I was outbid on! And it went for silly money for a relatively current set, but there you go! Pech Brothers copies with a runner of crude accessories from BumSlot! They may previously have been seen from Montaplex or Hobby-Plast.

I was up in London last Wednesday and added these two to the post at almost the last minute, a Papo-Mini (40mm) and a piratical penguin of unknown origin who has something of Phidal about him?

Both bought from the Toy Project which I visited with Peter Evans, they have a new layout and more stuff (post in the queue) and have opened another shop, so seem to be doing well which is nice!

But the eleventh-hour slot on additions to this post went to an eBay BIN-purchase of cheap fondant-icing cutters which arrived a day or two ago! They were so cheap, and I plan on making a pirate-cake for a future ITLAPD, so we may see them again - plans and reality being separate tenants on life's journey!