P is for Plastolin Plasticine!

These may be the only examples in existence, or rare survivors of a small production run, we just don't know, but they are listed on the new Composition Page, so I need to get them up here, in order that a wider audience is made aware of their existence!

 

The label reads;

 

PLASTOLINE

Model Manuf: Co:

Set X1. Gestapo H.Q.

With Officer at Desk

NO.03.

Plastoline - Hand Made, enamelled,

Hard and glossy, copyright, patent.

 

And one has to assume the '03' is the number in a series of similar vignettes? There is nothing on the 'web to suggest any of it was ever patented, and copyright's a long shot, given some, most (?) modellers could copy it to a much higher standard!

 

This is the item described above, he has broken-off at ankles and stool, the shaft if which has been lost. The whole made from Plasticine, probably hardened with Banana Oil, otherwise known as 'Dope', or isoamyl acetate (also known as isopentyl acetate), painted and vanished in a deep gloss to give a lacquered appearance in the 'Old Toy Soldier' style.

 

Also in the box is this WWI'ish (?) machine-gunner, listed as (3) in the list below, as WWII, and which differs from the previous example in also using embedded wire for the machine-gun, not that it's prevented the gun from curling slightly over time.

 

Which, by a process of elimination, and considering the fact that no other suitable figure was in the unknown 'Question Time' post, also dealing with this make's figures, here, must be the number two item - Mexican irregular from the wars of the turn of the last century?

On the underside of the inner box, we have further clues as to the originators of these figures (the Mexican is really quite good, albeit a tad 'footless'), with this label, origianlly in Biro, but added to at a latter date in pencil;

 

(1)GERMANY-GESTAPO   -   C 1940

(2)MEXICO - IRREGULAR   -   C 1900

(3) GERMANY - M. G -    C 1940

(1) By  .  D. BROWN .

(2) By     M, LEECH .

(3) By  .  D  BROWN .

IN PLASTOLINE  .

 

So the clues, would suggest that a D Brown, and M Leech, attempted to manufacture, in Plasticine, a small range of figures with a commercial bent, when and for how long were they in production is anyone's guess, except those who might actually know?

 

And the three figures from Chang-Kai-Chek's Imperial Chinese forces, and the odd chap in a respirator, seen previously, were also stuffed in the same box. Anybody know anything else about them?  I believe, although I haven't found them yet, that there were adverts in the back of the periodicals of the time - Military Modelling, Battle, and/or . . . the other one . . . Campaign?

W is for Weird Science!

Sadly not Kelly LeBrock at her finest, or even in her finest underwear, but rather; maggots and a worm-mould! Another Halloween post, even though this wasn't being specifically sold with the season in mind, it's the sort of stuff we see at this time of year, as well as being a useful addition to any insect/invertebrate collection, and would make nice 'going-home' presents at Halloween parties, or alternative trick-or-treat prizes.

 

Totally nasty weird science! I think I got this in one of those independent or small chain Poundland lookie-likies, but I can't honestly remember, so I'm not naming anyone, but they are out there somewhere, I did study the other bags in the dispenser and conclude that this was it, whether another carton would have bags with different contents remains to be seen, but I suspect not, this seems to be a one-off novelty item.

You get a bag of maggots to start playing with straight away, and to keep playing with if the moulding exercise proves less than successful, a small, simple mould of two worms (or a worm and a caterpillar?) a spider and a pile of eggs (or a pupa?), and a bag of powdered gel ('goo') mix, not edible jelly thought, rather, I suspect that dentists moulding compound, some small-batch toys soldiers may be being made out of at the moment, not a long-laster?

Those maggots in full! Similar to other maggots seen here at Small Scale World! Out there now, somewhere! Issued by RMS International (previously seen here with a horse-transporter), Google revealed a larger boxed version of this set, and other products under the Weird Science brand-marking.

G is for Get Arff Moi Laaaand!

I saw this on the side of a house in the hamlet of Mapledurwell near Basingrad, earlier this evening, and there was still enough light for a decent picture, so I leapt out of the cab and took one!

He literally leaps out at you as you come round the corner of a tight little lane, but the way the building is angled, by the time you've registered him, he's gone, and you're driving up the road thinking "Did I just see that?"! Hackle and buttons say Grenadiers, and he's pretty-much life-size! And it must be the Devil's own task to keep the Virginia Creeper clear of him!

T is for Two - Ceremonial Castings

I'm trying to clear some of the nascent posts in 2022, '23 & '24, which are now making-up a bulging 2025, that's how I roll! And Brian B from New York sent these to the Blog back in the autumn of '22, so well overdue for an airing.

It's one of life's quandaries that after a successful armed insurgency against their legitimate government, the newly independent Americans would spend the next 250 years utterly obsessed with their former parent, its royalty, its Parliament, its Capital, its 'pomp-and-circumstance', and its ceremonial troops, consequently, a lot of 'Royal Guards' figures have appeared on that side of the pond!

 

London Bridge is one of those makers, and with the old London Bridge having been situated in, errr . . . London, England, and it's now residing in Lake Havasu City, Arizona, the company seems to have named themselves in homage to the Mother Country, rather than for any geographical connection to either site of the eponymous water-crossing infrastructure!

Compared with the Britains Deetail figure, we can see the castings are closer to the old Britains 'Standard' 54mm (1:32nd scale), which is as it should be, the Deetail were heading toward the 'new' size of 58/60mm.

 

I'm not sure if bearskins have changed size over the years, but they are now 18 inches tall and over a pound in weight, built on a bamboo frame, I've handled one, at an auction-house, and they are very floofy! But older model soldiers and paintings seem to indicate one of around 12/14 inches prior to the mid-20th Century?

From the archive, and to make-up the image numbers, comes this flyer from Reb Toys' 'Castings' division (I believe they recently [last ten years?] changed their name to Miniature Moulds, and are now defunct?), and we see the same 'traditional' toy soldier lines in the sculpting, but you have to cast them yourself.

 

While they also supplied the ex-Schneider semi-flat / demi-ronde Prussian marching band, which you often see on feeBay, sometimes as ratted old damaged rubbish for re-melting, sometimes as nicely painted sets, often for a daft amount of money, for essentially homemade figures in an odd scale; about 40mm.

 

Many thanks to Brian Berke for his 'work in progress'.

M is for Merry Mass of Malleable Model Mayhem! 5 - Civilians

On to the civilians from Chris Smith's donantion today, always a few surprises here, although some of the more interesting ones, those who are nationally/ethnically-dressed, have been sent to the Ancient/Medieval post to pad that out!

And what a way to start, you know we like divers here at Small Scale World - sticking out of everything else when I opened the box, this, admittedly large, lump of polystyrene is a candidate for best in box! Obviously a fish-tank ornamental aerator, it has a pipe connection at the back of the helmet and a finely pierced ceramic plug in the top, to generate the fine lines of oxygenating bubbles. But it's just so unusual, and a rare survivor from - probably - the 1950?

 

Sports was mostly footballers, with Waddington's Table Soccer figures to the left, and what I think are Ariel's Soccerboss figures, de-pegged to the right, the tennis-player pencil sharpener is a real treat, while the incomplete kicking player could be Parker, Palitoy, even Subbuteo, there are lots, and one day I'll sort them all out. Two athletes and a broken Subbuteo make up the shot.

This is fun, and following-on from the footballers in the previous shot, he's an Airfix footballer under his new skin of Mariachi guitar player! The instrument is from an enamelled metal pin-badge, which I distinctly remember having as a kid/teenager, which has been thickened with a balsa-wood off-cut, totally homemade conversion . . . Wild West or a 1-guage restaurant/dining-car? We'll never know!

 

Odds and sods, what can you spot? The drunk is a magnetic novelty who needs his lamppost to work fully, the green chap next to him is from that Wookie/King Kong game we've seen here in passing before, there are some railway bits, cake decorations and die-cast accessory figures.

 

Police; one marked Funrise (dark blue) and in a soft PVC substitute, the two to the left unmarked in a very soft silicon and 'maybe' Pioneer, the other a common'ish, current ethylene rack toy we may have seen before here?

 

Firefighters; Three from 'big-box' vehicle toys, the third from the left being a really nice composition figure, presumably from the basket of a tin-plate ladder-truck by someone like Tipp & Co., Karl Bub or similar, as is the white chap from a plastic garden-toy

The smaller figure keeps turning-up, and is hard to place, but someone did a Berlin firefighting vessel (River Harvel) kit (Revell?) and he may be from that, or something like that? In the past I've suggested a fisherman or sailor from one of several Tug or Trawler models, but each time he turns up he's in blue or painted blue, so I think firefighter from somewhere/something?

The guy on the left is interesting for being an apparent copy of the Corgi 'cherry-picker' platform truck (forward-control Jeep), which was copied by one of the Hong Kong pirates (TAT/Telsalda?) in a large-scale plastic as a Dinky/Ford hybrid, I think, so he'll probably be from that!

 

The racing car driver is obviously from a racing car, but is looking early-British, plastic-wise, and from quite a big model (1:20/1:24?), he's both new to me and pretty stunning, he must have George Musgrave, George Eric, Stadden or Nibblet behind him? Someone like that, a bit of a 'Find', I think, and another contender for best in box - Chris, thank you!

Shopping lady could be Plasty or Kinder, I think she's the former, but I'm not 100%, and is she West West or some civilian 'doll' village thing? While the policeman is a new'ish die-cast accessory.

 

Seated figures tend to close the civilian page, as paratroopers open the posts! We may have seen some of these before, but with colour variations, there'll be many more to come, and there are shed-loads in storage to sort out and ascribe one day! Highlights here include a beach-buggy driver from a plastic kit, the pull-and-go racing motorcycle and sidecar crew and a Mattel CUTIE seated in pink!

H is for How They Come in - Charity Shops Again!

I picked up a couple of bags, just after the last post on the subject, then managed to find a couple more shots I'd missed (which aren't in the big folder of stuff waiting), so here's a few bits, some of which we may have seen before?

 

Two-quid for a very mixed bag, several of which pieces will go back to a different charity shop in the next donation from me, but from which a few useful pieces were sorted into the collection, and well look at the better pieces below.

 

The dinosaurs will feature in a forthcoming post on erasersaurs, for that is what I think they are! The two lady bears are 'In My Pocket' toys from Morrison, while the red stuff is a right old mix, Nabisco Dougal, the unknown premium elephant we looked at years ago next to the Kellogg's-Raja-Dunkin ones and a bear previously shelfied in pastel shades as Baby Shower rack toys, AND found in the street in yellow plastic.

 

The ball, soft-foam, which is increasingly turning-up in these mixed lots, is from some rival to Nerf Guns, which I did see the name of the other day, but forgot to note!

I picked this up because it was cheap, and the basket was undamaged (along with all those ears!), so it was a rather fine example of a new name - Avon 'Forest friends' - for both the Tag list and the A-Z blogs - eventually! Probably meant to post it at Easter, may have, but found these images anyway!

 

The other recent bag - I seem to have veritable herds of these in dozens of sizes, sets, plastic types, because obviously it was a very successful movie, and got heavily covered, even until now, and I will have to sit down at some point in the future, and sort them all out, for a proper ID session/disambiguation post! Disney's Frozen!

 

While this was a 50p purchase a year or two ago which we may have had here, real borderline as far as taking the term 'figural' goes, but fun, and the sort of home-made stuff gift-shops still carried when I was a kid and Hong Kong's tsunami of polymer had barely started to flow!

C is for Camberley's Carnival Carousel

I don't know about your local 'hood, but here in Fleet, one of the many empty retail units has been filled with a sort of community-hub, information centre and whole-food promoter, which may or may not be run by the local authority or the local business body?

 

Back in 2021 I spotted a similar enterprise in Camberley over the ranges, which seemed to be more a combination café and outlet for the local library, or given that the Tories have closed more than 500 libraries in the last 13 years, it may have been a replacement for the library? 

 

Anyway, it was closed, but in the window was this rather fine scratch-built fairground scene which I shot against some harsh reflections, these are the best shots that I managed to render viewable with a bit of cropping and some contrast work!

 

If you missed it, the history of the piece in on the sticker attached to the glass or acrylate cover in the first image. A couple of the figures look vaguely familiar, but I can place them, so they have probably been heavily works to turn them into young civilians! And that's it blurb-wise, just some pictures of a beautiful thing!

W is for We Do This Shit . . .

. . . so you don't have to!

You may remember when Peter Evans sent the home-making moulds by Irwin RX to the blog? Four years ago, where does it go! Anyway, having not bought a couple of the 'ovens' in charity shops because they were too expensive (I'm not paying 20-quid for a second hand novelty-toy in a broken box!), I did find a cheap one, so we can now look at them properly!

 

 

A reminder of the set Peter sent to the blog, although the 'oven' is prominent all over the box, you actually get a few plastic moulds with reminders to buy a "3D Magic Maker available separately"! Which I had previously shelfie-shot, in TKMaxx I think?

The 3D Magic Maker, it looks like an oven and while there is nothing in the instructions (or online, then (2018/19) or now), I am 100% sure it is nothing more than a couple of small ultraviolet (UV) 'tanning' lamps!

 

The gel is quite soft, think mayonnaise, and here you can see an empty cavity on the left, new 'squeeze' in the middle and smoothing the gel into the cavity on the right, I used a cocktail stick, but something like a credit-card would be better, a Plasticard offcut, something like that?

 

Once you are satisfied that the moulds are prepped as good as you can get a semitransparent gloop, into the 'oven' it goes, and after a few minutes, out come the slightly warm, soft rubber figures, as halves!

After trimming ('fettling' the 'flash') you glue the two halves together with a slip of the gel, and give them a couple more minutes under the lamps, a single base needs to be manufactured twice more, and if you're still persevering with the project, similarly glued. I think we can assume I won't be making any more.

I can see this being fun for kids between about seven and maybe eleven years of age, but the fun will be in the doing and the mess, not the finished product! The gel however, in combination with the 'oven', may have further uses for hobbyists, for scratch-building, by producing specific parts, bits or scenic items?

 

There are other ranges of UV-setting resins out there, so A) there must be other similar products and B) you could extend your available pallet and even mix shades before 'cooking'? So I may well have a go at something more 'free hand', at some later date!

 

Most of the data online pertains to 2016, so they were probably already in clearance by the time I found the one in TKMaxx, and while there are a few other moulds out there (sea life etc...), Irwin RX seem to have had a better launch/presence in the US than Europe (distributed by Boti), although Russia seems to have got them as well.

As always; many thanks to Peter for the donation of the moulds.

A is for Apropos The Previous Post

Just a couple of quickies; 

 

First, don't forget it's the Autumn Sandown Park Toy Fair tomorrow, it's going to be a lovely day for it, and while the air-con' might struggle to keep the place fully cool once it's full of exhaling, warm bodies, it's never too hot, although it will give the all-day attendees a dry throat! Anyway, get on over and fill your boots with old kid's playthings!

Secondly, I found a few more of Claire's Creations images from this Spring (couldn't find the Lifeguard?), so here they are if you're thinking of dropping her a line with an idea for a figure.

The Guardsman

The king

An old-school Gypsy wagon

A canoe! With a mouse!

This was the online image from which Claire modelled the Horse guard she made for me. I might have a go at sewing-in the red cord which runs round the centre of the cartridge-belt?

F is for a Bit Floofy!

Well, soft anyways! Some of you may have noticed that some event for non-self-determinist fan-boys occurred up in Laarden Tarn' earlier this year, in celebration of which an old friend of mine, Claire, produced some hand-knitted (or crotch-et-ted) members of the Royal Family,  Life Guards and Royal Guards, to which, when I saw them on Faceplant, I added my usual pithy call for Horse Guards, and damn-me if she didn't make me my very own Horse Guard

 

We had similar soft-toy animals when we were kids, my brother had 'Bill' the guardsman, who ended-up with some of Grandad Hall's miniatures, a sam-brown from a fancy pet collar and a paper-knife sword - he should appear on the Blog one day, he's somewhere in all the stuff I've been moving around.

While there was also a blue and white lamb and a Santa Claus, I think they all came from patterns you could buy in newsagents, or that came with housekeeping type magazines . . . there always seemed to be a table of them at church fêtes!

Beautifully made, he's about eight inches in his boots and the metallic wool is very clever. I'm sure Claire's Creations would accept commissions if you have a good reference for her to work from, and you can contact her on the above details.

 

Guarding one end of the bookcase!