L is for Lots of London Loot - One of a Few!

A fair bit of stuff has come in over the last few months, most from Peter Evans, some from the late Michael Hyde's estate, some of it donated, some of it paid for, but often not for much, and some bits which have got in there, but may be from other sources, because they all got shot in batches. So I'm just going to post it all as H is for's.... but as L's! With many thanks to Peter and thoughts for Mike and the Brother who survives him.

 

Useful bits and parts including most of an Airfix 88mm gun and tractor, but the obvious item of interest is the box at the top left, which is a further packaging of the teeny-tiny AFV models we've seen a few times now, such as here - as Empress.

 

Another box of bits, half of them Rocco Minitanks, the rest quite an eclectic collection of components, beebo's and oddments! The Rocco will prove perticularly useful, I have a large tub with most of the main range (the first 150-odd numbers), and many of them are missing the odd bit!

 

Unbranded, as a generic, the Hing Fat American revolution figures, not sure it all the poses are here, and for reasons of intrinsic idiocy, I photographed the majority of the poses present in the red, and only the remaining odds in the blue, when it would have been better to shoot them the other way! Another project which went on the back burner, but will be done one day is a page on/of the Bicorned/Tricorne forces from Marlborough to the French/Indian wars, and I can shoot the blues then!

 

A bag from The Toy Project, which I didn't open, but which had some useful bits in, astronauts from two sourses, a kitten and a puppy and a Corgi/Dinky (?) firefighter. The kitten looks like it might be from a board game?

A cereal premium Wellington, I only mentioned them the other day! And a blow-moulded bear, which was probably flocked once, and almost certainly a key ring, the use of the latter employment leading to the loss of the former coating!

 

The vatican guard from MM, one of the more eclectic sets of 'HO/OO' figures, and almost certainly from Mike's collection, he had got around to undercoating one-each of the three poses, the full set is covered by Dave over on PSR, from the style and material, I wouldn't be surprised to learn of a connection between these and Caesar Miniatures?

 

The Life-Like State Coach kit, it seems to be complete, so will get a making in the future, if only so it can be photographed 'whole', it's an old Miniature Masterpieces tool, a strange tie-in between the - then - nascent giant, Revell and the soon to fade Adam's Action Models. Thanks again to Peter for getting all this to the Blog.

F is for Follow-up - Pyro Sailors

By way of a follow-up to his own donation to the Blog, Brian Berke has sent the following to add to the post with the Pyro sailors from April gone . . .

The Pyro Schooner model kit came with colour-matched runners of the figures we previously saw as stand-alone marine-modelling accessories and - for a second - I thought "What a swizz, you had to buy two packs (of the seperates) to get all of them!", then I realised the kit has two duplicate runners!

However Brian further reports that the later iterations of the kit (Life Like and Lindberg 'Classics' boxings above) don't have the figures included, which is odd as Pyro being gone (for the moulds to move-on/change hands) you wouldn't be able to source the little set we saw last time, or not with assumed ease?

I guess it was a separate mould, which would make it a smallish, man portable tool, which may have been nicked at some point, damaged or lost? Anyway, whatever happened to the figure mould; many thanks to Brian for the follow-up!

T is for Two - Follow-ups

A couple of things which pertain to recent posts, or maybe not so recent in the case of the second item, but which can go together for an eclectic post!

I was very impressed by Brian's pictures of the Charles W. Morgan (I nearly wrote Henry!) the other day and he sent a couple of uncropped/cheat shots to show how they are done. This one shows how he got the horizon shots, and it was simpler than I'd imagined, he just held them up to the sky!

While here Brian's using natural light to get those atmospheric shadows. I can't get these results outside with my little Nikon's, I have to find shade, use a tripod and then employ flash, yet still get quite smoky or flat shots (as the recent and forthcoming board-game pictures attest), if I tried this kind of shot (without flash) they'd be blurry.

I used to get better outdoor results with the old Fuji Finepix's, but they were also the least robust and shortest-lived of the five cameras I've had now, and six I've used since 2007, so it's a 'swings and roundabouts' thing with these digital cameras and you just have to try and see!

Meanwhile I managed to score these from Mike Harding, who always seems to find interesting things. Three FFL from somewhere, when I got the other one (below) a while back (Plastic Warrior Show 2019) someone suggested Argentina I think, but I'm now wondering if they might not be JSP or their Portuguese suppliers (Injectaplatic) as they are that same stiff 'Macau' PVC?

And there's clearly at least two colourways, I wonder if there mightn't be blue ones turn-up at some point, If they are Injecta'/JSP the three poses would make sense, as that is how they sold the slightly smaller Romans, one mounted and two foot per card?

I have no evidence either way, but will put both names in the tags for now. Taken from Timpo, obviously, but probably from hollow-casts, the binocular guy wasn't produced in plastic by Toy Importers?

T is for Thar' She Blows! (Brucie Bonus)

Not technically a pirate-themed item, but then over here ITLAPD has been and gone, but there's still a few hours of it over the pond, so very much on the cusp of the day; here is a lovely diorama from Brian Berke up there in New York, in which an early nineteenth-century whaler (the Charles W. Morgan - originally from Pyro) get a ship-to-ship message delivered by Captain Nemo of the Nautilus!

No blurb, but Brian said;

"A few months ago we went to see the Charles W. Morgan at the Mystic Seaport Museum in Connecticut before VOVID-19 closed everything down.

The whaling ship is the last of it's type. Whale oil was not needed when oil was discovered in Pennsylvania and the fleet of whalers was mostly sunk by the Union Navy as blockades to southern ports during the Civil War.

That's the background. I recently dug out a plastic kit of the Morgan and here it is on it's maiden voyage. Sadly it was seen by Captain Nemo, that's life! "

he added . . .

"Captain Nemo wasn't a pirate though revenge against authority started many a pirate on that vocation."

The Captain being actually consumed by a hunger for vengeance and hatred of imperialism; the British Empire (a fledgling America in the recent Radio plays!) which is explained further on Wikipedia!

Also - superb photography from Brian there, I thought?

As mentioned the model has had several boxings under three labels, Pyro commissioned the original tool, Life-like got hold of it in a tranche of ex-Pyro tooling in the 1970's (?) and dropped the name, although it was retained on the runners ('sprues')!

While most recently Academy-Minicraft had a shot, although that's a 1980/90's 'recently' I fear, I don't know if Academy still have it, but Minicraft went off to concentrate on hobby tools (I think) some time ago!

And many thanks to Brian for closing 'Pirate Day', as I think the organisers have simplified the title to, this year . . . in order to expand the concept?

V is for Vinyl Villagers

And so we get to the last phase/current production of Hornby. These are my least favourite figures from them and also the longest lasting by a far, they are also not unique to Hornby having been issued under various brands at one time or another. Indeed they seem to be aimed at the American Market and I believe they were first issued by Life-Like.

They have always - under Hornby branding - been about the most expensive railway figures to buy (per head) after Preiser, who's figures might also be pricey, but at least give you the satisfaction of knowing you're getting top quality. These are soft, rubbery and slightly blubbery - detail wise - PVC vinyl-rubber, with glued-on rigid bases, probably in a polypropylene.

First appearing in the UK as Hong Kong carded generics (upper image), I well remember one Christmas when our Father was home unexpectedly (he was usually enjoying himself in some bloody jungle full of CT or some mountainous desert full of something equally unpleasant!), he announced a 'Mystery Tour' and we were got up in our best kit by Mum and toddled off the Winchfield station to get the train to London (slam doors and sprung blue stripey seats that swallowed you whole). We thought he was going to take us to the York Rail Museum (that had been a previous mystery tour, and he remains a steam fan to this day). But we ended up in "The most famous model train shop in London", which I can't remember...but it was in an arcade off Regent Street or somewhere eqaully posh?

He then announced we could choose our Christmas presents (we knew Mum had got us a home-made chipboard model rail layout [with gloss blue pond and brown roads) from the local auction house as we'd helped put it on the roof of the Morris Traveller!), and he gave us a budget, it was not large given the mountains of train sets on offer.

We ended up selecting a Hornby blue diesel locomotive with two coaches and some goods wagons, tankers mostly (better crashes if volatile chemicals and fuels are involved - it was a figure of eight track so crashes were a permanent feature!). There was a small quantity of the 'budget' left, and while my Brother had rather lost interest I choose some foam hedges and a header-carded bag of unpainted multi-coloured Hong Kong civilians (that we'll cover another time) and while I was umming and arring I remember also seeing the above card! Long story, short punchline...how it should be!!

Below the HK card are various shots of loose figures showing colour variations etc...note the guy in the straw Stetson and Levi jacket - clearly aimed at the American market, or at least not particularly British.

These figures are still being issued by Hornby after some 30 years, and it would be nice if they would design or commission some new ones, but as they now own or hold the rights to Bachmann Europe who were themselves issuing re-packaged Preiser in new paint jobs here in the Uk in the late 1990's, we'd probably only get more of the same anyway (news on new railway figures here on the blog in a forthcoming 'Product Review' and there may be discounts included?). The larger cards above are the older issues and the small one is the current packaging. The figures are getting a bit long in the tooth and showing their age, indeed the clothing style is 70's rather than the 80's Hornby released them in.

The lower shot shows the only 'new' figures from Hornby recently, sadly they weren't original either, having been issued as 'MADE IN CHINA' carded 'pocket diorama' type mini-sets a couple of years earlier by Dollar Tree and Toy Major  on each side of the Atlantic. They were subsequently issued by Hornby in large play sets, first as Battle Zone (2000) and then a decade later as Codename Strike force (2010), both are still easily available.

A couple more angles on the fritz-helmeted GI's, and the fence units that accompany the farm animals, they again are not typically British in appearance, but are great for Eastern-European villages or ACW stuff! They have a simple peg fit sectional construction and are a manufactured in polystyrene, while the GI's are a modern rigid ethylene/hybrid or propylene.

Reviewing the photograph after publishing - the lying rifleman seems to have a British elasticated helmet cover from the late 80's, the running guy is all Fritz'd-up for eyerack, while the rest seem stuck in a Da Nang time-warp!...and is that a PIAT?

Thanks also go to Bernard Taylor for his help collating info for all these Hornby Triang posts.

W is for yet more Wagons

Some of the odds and sods...

This is the stage-coach from JCT (Japan Toy Corporation?) and a covered wagon almost certainly from the same  (or a similar!) source. These are about 1:50, with 35mm figures, which means they don't get much bigger in small scale collecting, or much smaller in large scale collecting!

The Tudor Rose wagon against which the previous sets would seem to have been aimed. this was a particularly daft 'covered wagon' as it had one central axle! The horse appears without the locating holes for the wagon, I'm not sure what rode them, as the mounted Tudor Rose figures went on soft plastic versions of the horse used by early Airfix, Ajax, Archer, Bergan, Beton, Giant, Lido, early Riesler, T.Cohn/Superior et.al.

That's because it's a Hong Kong copy of the Thomas for Woolworth's/Quaker Sugar-Puffs mail-away wagon, the Tudor Rose wagon's have the same horses as their mounted figures! Likewise the un-pierced horses are from the same Thomas source.

Britains metal coronation coach for QEII, this was the cheapest, smallest version of several by this company.

Clockwise from top left, Life-Like circus wagon, these were also - I believe - supplied to Walthers (Terminal Hobby Shop) in the early 1960's? Prieser Circus living-quarter trailer as supplied to Aristo-craft. [The Life-Like wagon is also - I believe - Preiser] Two small wagons from Christmas crackers, Einco Indian Village wagon and horse, Del Prado wooden kit that came with the 'Build Your Own Castle' part work a couple of few years ago, and another mini-wagon from a Christmas cracker, of slightly different design/style to the other two.