F is for Follow-up - Brent, and Zang for Timpo

I've had a few more British composition come-in over the last couple of years, and with my 'master' samples in storage, these are here, waiting to be compared and sorted into them. The Military were 'seen elsewhere' a while back, the mechanics are a newer image.

Nearly two of each, so a shot which leaves little to the imagination, and these are the smaller size of Brent's two sizes, early war 'Expeditionary Force' uniform with the respirator case high on the chest, I think the marching guy might be new to collection?

 

 

And this is definitely new to the collection, but I think the stretcher is taken from another maker's hollow-cast figures, Brent's stretcher teams when I've seen them before, always have a paper stretcher, with two stiff wires, this is a lead moulding, but the casualty is correct I think.

 

A nice set of matching mechanics, who actually came in two lots, and a pretty clean chauffeur, in blue, I can't remember which colours I've got of them, I think there are four to find - Grey, Brown, Green and Blue - and I hope this is one I needed, if not he'll end up on the new swaps page, especially as by the time you read this the only swaps on that page will have been handed to a new owner at the London Toy Soldier show!

B is for Bergan and Beton!

This is both a quick box-ticker and a bit of fun! In the parcel from Jon Attwood, there was a Bergan Toys (Beton) figure, which didn't seem to have been photographed either in the lots we've seen, or another still in the queue, and when Jon mentioned it the other day I got worried in case I'd not shot a bunch of figures, but I found him in the first post, I just didn't mention him in the blurb, anyway by then I'd shot everything I'd found, so we can have a quick-look

 

This is what has come in over the last 18/24-months; less any which went to storage last autumn, and they are an ecclectic snapshot of some of the variations you can find of these figures.

 

With - from the top left - A Plastic Toys copy in hard 'styrene, another hard plastic early figure with paint, one (from Jon) with the leachate you sometimes find on these figures, in soft 'ethylene, a similar soft one in blue (for Navy or Army Air Force?), and a later stable-green one with no leachate below.

Bases, the one from Jon lacks the formal information in the middle depression, but you can see the clear 'B' intertwined with a 'T' of the logotype on all three of the Bergan/Beton bases, the Plastic Toys copy is unmarked!

 

This rather dented chap has been hanging around in Picasa since I shot him in 2013, and is another copy, from Reliable of Canada, in soft polyethylene again, he's suffering a bit of sun-fading in addition to his surface dinks!

While two of them came-in just under year ago, along-with an early seperate-based cowboy, and they were also in Picasa! It's a measure of my lack of imagination that I'm still using the same sheet of black cartridge-paper!

We looked at my existing small samples here, while the last (and best) words on the subject are on Ponylope - this link is to the 'WWII' page, but then click on 'WWI' and '*Beton Variations' in the left-hand menu to get far more than I will ever be able to show you!

T is for Two, no Three - Tinplate Toys!

One of the things which leads stuff to languish in the long queue for years is an annoying habit I have of getting the photos done, maybe even doing any collages or touch-ups, perhaps even starting the text, then thinking "Hold on, I really need x to make the post", going off to feebleBay, finding it's only available as a ten day auction and waiting for it to finish, by which time I've lost interest in the post, or finding it's not there at all and putting the whole thing on the back burner with a vague mental note to get one/some at some point!

Another reason, is that I imagine if I post it before I've located the 'missing element', y'all will rush off and find it first, so better to not raise it with you until I've got whatever it is first!

I say that only because when I posted the tinplate the other day, that's exactly what I nearly did, but in the end I published despite leaving bids on two items which would have made that a better post, and which you might have gone to look for after I published, which fortunately you didn't, despite Andy B mentioning one of them specifically in the comments to that post! Phew!

So, I managed to get both without counter-bids, leaving a T is for Two as the obvious direction to go in. And the first was this lovely inter-war (?) piece of generic WWI limber.

I say generic, it's more a French helmet than a US or British one, however the dark-on-light grey of the cart's camouflage is more a Wehrmacht thing, but then it's been buggered-about-with, the horses are pulled tight to the limber and a bit squashed at the rear-ends by replacement wire traces, so I don't know how original it is, and it's missing a crewman, but if it was pucker it would be 100-&-something quid or Euro's or dollars, or whatever and well outside my budget! But it will look the part on a little shelf somewhere!

The other item I literally went and bid-on half-way through editing the post two weeks ago was the missing Roggaz/^Z_Z-marked military piece from Schilling/Tobar; the ceremonial sentry box with a slightly Prussian or Austro-Hungarian bent, as mentioned by Andy! Luckily no one else from the loyal readership went to look for one, or if they did they didn't bid and I got it for the opener! isn't it lovely? It's lost it's tree-hanger, but is otherwise pretty minty.

Then, a week ago I managed to find this at an otherwise very quiet Sandown Park show, which rather threw the T is for Two trope under a bus! It's a relatively common French 'penny toy' in the metallic 'spirit paint' finish such toys often came in, and again is probably a between-the-wars thing.

The boots and jacket should be gold'ish and blue respectively, but have suffered from degradation leaving little 'liver spots' under the varnish and fading the colours, but the red has held up well, and I'd photographed a better one on Mercator Trading's stall a few years ago (for the Tin Plate Page, if I ever get it finished!), so we will see a better one here at some point!

The two horses with the limber are marked 'MADE IN GERMANY' from where a lot of the early tin-plate came from (Schuco, Bub, Tipp, Carrette, Distler, Märklin et al.), which is why the Roggaz goes with its misleading ^Z_Z GERMANY ©, which can mean Roggaz from Germany's ^Z_Z brand, copyrighted to Schilling or some Chinese firm, or not at all!

Something Schilling would have been happy with, expressly for that 'Germany' provenance, whether they were instrumental in the operation at the start or bought-in after Ingo Roggaz had instigated the line!

So, three new pieces of tin-plate! You'll observe from the previous collage, I cleaned the limber after I'd taken all the other pictures! I wasn't just watching it Andy! And I will get the motorcycle and sidecar when I see a cheap one . . . for another day!

I've also found scans I'd taken, of the other catalogue, which I'll post shortly, or between now'ish and midnight, I must go and cook something!

M is for More on WHW's

A few points on Wintershilfswerk figures, either confirming previous observations or not previously covered.

I picked these falschrimjager up at Sandown last Saturday, from Adrian's rummage tray of WHW's and because I couldn't remember which one I had at home, hollow or flat base (upper pair), I selected both, only to find on Sunday that mine was completely different (right hand figure in lower two images) with a 'penny' base!

This confirms what we saw with the grenade thrower - three distinct issues. And the differences are greater here than they were with the grenadier; with my solid being joined (as a moulding) down the shins, while the two half-and-half glued-figures have a gap between the legs.

The one with a hollowed-out base is slightly miss-aligned, so the photo's had to be shot at weird angles to get him to stand up and make them all the correct height which - as you can see - differs too.

Meanwhile, Adrian had found these and put them to one side for me, they are unused factory 'blanks' from a set of bisque service personnel; a set I'm currently unfamiliar with. You can see how they are each numbered under the place where the pin-badge is affixed, while you can also see how they are hollow slip-cast figures.

I have two from a set I do know - Industrious Germany - which was issued in March 1939 as a set of 20 different professions and trades, of which I have above the fisherman (new acquisition) and the miner (we may have seen before here?). And you can see how the pin-badge is attached with a blob of chemical-fixer which may be an early two-part epoxy type polymer?

These too, seem to have had different issues (one being matt-finished, the other glazed), so take the date with a pinch of salt - look what happened to the accepted date of the Armed Forces plastic series!

T is for Two - Britains Armoured Cars

Just a quick one today, bit of lead to add to the pile! Actually it's not mine; both shot at Sandown about a year apart, thanks to Adrian for both.

The posh end of the market got you this rather smart beast in it's velvety-red box, based - I think - on a 1925 Vickers-Crossley pattern with rubber-tyred wheels, revolving turret and two-tone paint scheme, it's a beauty for it's age, but only for the son's, godson's and nephew's of the 'gentry' one suspects!

However! the poor could wish for this under the tree come Christmas morn', a slush-cast (sixpenny?) toy based on similar designs from the 'States and aimed at tighter-budgets - it has exactly the same play value when you're six or seven! And a bigger gun!

G is for Great Scott...What HAVE they got on their heads?

No...it's for Grey-Klip Armies by Grey Iron of course! I've been after a decent sample of these since...oohhh? 1981? First read of JG Garratt's encyclopaedia! Small-scale cast iron...gotta have some of those in the collection!

I actually do have one loose example (he came-in with a bunch of plastics from the James Chase collection's small scale), but I thought he was a Confederate soldier! And that's despite having R O'Brien's book too (which lists them all - I think?), but the trouble with having files on 30,000-odd toy companies and 400+ 'tomes' in the library is...you can't retain everything all the time, and a lot of it just melts into a mush of like names, places, sizes, materials, dates...and lets face it - he looks like Jonny Reb!

Card scans; I couldn't get the stupid machine (Epson, now you ask!) to find the thin edge properly, so it's a bit truncated, but still readable! They (Grey Iron) produced more in the larger sizes, but I think this was it for the smallies!

The figures; divided into a command group and a troop 'squad', set into a steel track (which will open your fingers up if you're not careful!), they are crude, sand-cast lumps and I love 'em! The dodgy headgear is supposed to be the smokie-bear/drill-sergeant/boy-scout 'Campaign hat', but really? Confederates...to a man!

A is for Armoured Car

This is one of my favourite pieces, along with a composition tank I have in storage somewhere which will be blogged here one day! I'm not sure of the material of this, but it would seem to be some form of ceramic, rather than a true composition, but it's a low-temperature fired earthenware such as a clay or terracotta, and in the worlds of marbles and doll collecting (both more populated hobbies than toy soldier collecting) would be considered a composition anyway.

A study of the image (click once and it'll open, or right-click 'open in new tab') will reveal it's very crudely moulded with a poorly-mixed material (that alone pointing to low-temp firing, with all the air trapped in those un-squeezed-out folds it would likely explode at the temperatures necessary to create 'china' or porcelain), which has lead to some shrinkage and deformation.

It's been loosely 'shoved' into a mould, the pressing of the hollow cavity in the underside forcing the material into the corners of the mould and - after firing - airbrushed with gloss enamels, brown over a yellow base.

The crudeness points to a craft piece or penny-toy, even a home-made, and while date is hard, and subject matter (vis-a-vis actual vehicle depicted) impossible; I'm guessing it's early, pre-WWII, but not as early as WWI, the design - such as it is - is later. Anybody got an idea as to the make depicted...or maker?

It's roughly 'small scale'; big'ish for 1:72 but a bit small for 28mm role-play. Also I wonder if it might actually be French in origin. If war gaming I'd say a 2lbr, it's bigger than an MG!

S is for Stringbag Fokkers

Yeah...but these Fokkers are other makes, phnar, phnar!!!

I am reliably informed by several collectors of these things that they are indeed Flybirds, not as you might otherwise have guessed; Skybirds. Although the tin-plate building in the background is Skybirds and looks a bit like my memory of the Primrose cafe at Eastleigh!

Flybirds were obviously tripping on the coat-tails of Skyirds, when these came in they were with a load of the latter leading brand's 'planes and the difference between the two was marked, the Skybirds being altogether a superior product.

I have catalogues for a couple of others makes, one American (not Monograme) and one British but they are not to hand at the moment, however the online Meccano magazine archive (which I will link to when I remember to find it!!) should contain adds for several of these early establishers of 1:72 scale as an aero-modelling ratio.