L is for Louche Lucite Layabouts!

We seem to often arrive at Lik Be during Rack Toy Month, and while I tried to resist poking the Northern cow-pat of competitiveness this year, reader Keith Harrison mentioned he had all the missing clear-plastic 'Vitrine' LB robots, of which we saw the other three of, here;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2023/07/lb-is-for-lik-be.html

 

And he kindly sent some fantastic images of them to the blog; 

 

Family Photo!

 

Base marking - clear as mud, as usual!

 

Wotan's favourite; 'Wotan'!

 

'Rocket Robin', with a partial 'Lobster', whose paint has mostly worn off, but I suspect these may have been decorated with spirit-based art markers, or something equally susceptible to rubbing and fading?

 

Keith also sent this and the next two images, these look like they might be from the same batch/source/origin as the 'eraser' set I got a while back now, as a trio;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2020/10/s-is-for-serious-score.html

 

But here as a full sextet, and with 'Traffic Cop' being in a semi-transparent dayglo green, rather confirming my suspicion back then, that they are some kind of silicon, not really an eraser rubber, but rather a smudging rubber! However, sold as Dragon Master Fantasy Figures, not erasers like my sample, by what looks to be Tiarri Management Sevices?

 

We've seen these Moon Platoon chaps before, and they were both poor shots, here we can see they are carried by Imperial Toys, (updates to those posts by the time I post this) who, although a US importer, seem to have got a lot of their stuff into the UK, but whether by design, or some back-of-the-warehouse accident I don't know, maybe a buyer's tie-in with one of our novelty importers, like WHC/Success? However, not necessarily this set, just other Imperial stuff.

 

While these are the 'Tesco Finest' version of the sucker 'bots with the - as yet - unascribed mark which may be ATS, AST. STA or SAT, but probably isn't T-anything! I've seen these before, occasionally, so they do seem to have been a 'thing' compared to the commoner ones with airgun blasted blobs of colour, so someone obviously stipulated a better level of paint on their contract? The point here being, it's rare to find them this clean and paint-complete.

 

Many thanks to Keith for all the above, and it got me deep-diving into the image banks to see what was waiting for next-time, which is this time now, or what I could add from the archive;

 

So sticking with the robots first, and this image was sent to another Blog, upon request, many years ago, and got lost in a lack of tagging, or got deleted, it doesn't matter, there's no meaningful relationship with the strange little men over there, now! I suspect the falling-out is more about Bwreakshit than Blogs!

 

We have, in the intervening years, seen all the gaps filled, and then some, but as a guide, it's a new image here at Small Scale World, and from the top shows;

• 54mm hard polystyrene, chrome-type finish
• 25mm hard polystyrene, chrome-type finish
• 54mm hard polystyrene, brushed-aluminium finish
• 25mm soft polyethylene, gunmetal plastic (as supplied to Culpitt and HG)
• 54mm sucker types (marked with a crude HONG KONG)

Here's a gum-ball capsule-machine window card, with 'Stern Gang' as what looks like a pencil top (bottom right), in the same flexible silicon as the sucker chaps. Note also, the cracker-toy motorcycle, the troll, the other robot and a bisque Wade Whimsy knock-off, among other things . . . the mini abacus!

While this looks like the 25mm, polyethylene, gunmetal plastic ones, as Spaceimens! Also supplied to Culpitt and HG Toys, so we have them as play-set accessories, cake decorations and gum-ball prizes! We only need to find them in Christmas crackers for the full "House"!

Which brings us to the Astro-Spacemen* element of that/those original donation post/s, with the same treatment, we have;

• 54mm hard polystyrene, gunmetal plastic, painted both sides
• 54mm & 25mm soft polyethylene, gunmetal plastic, painted one side
• 54mm soft polyethylene, various colours, painted both sides
• 54mm soft polyethylene, white plastic painted one side (as supplied to Clifford)

* I have mentioned on several occasions I have trouble pigeonholing these, as they are armed (spacemen), but wearing NASA kit (astronauts)!

 

• 54mm & 25mm soft polyethylene, various colours, unpainted
• 54mm Nylon or a propylene, and 25mm (as supplied to MPC, Pipin and Tri-Ang), all finished in silver or gold chrome-effects, which can be removed with a five-second dip in TFR or oven cleaner.
• 25mm hard polystyrene, painted matt-white. 

The previous two lots, all being LB (for Lik Be) production, while this last lot is mostly clones/copies/piracies, with the LB additional poses for the MPC, Pipin and Tri-Ang issues, off to the bottom left, which are taken from MPC's own figures, split between their 54mm and 70mm sculpts.

 

Also, the pair between the first two rows are the 54mm, soft polyethylene fakes, and marked Hong Kong, under domed bases, one pretending to be an LB original, even down to the paint, the white one being from the Shimmel blister-carded Flash Gordon sets. The four more obvious rows are;

• 50mm, soft polyethylene, various colours, unpainted
• 23mm, soft polyethylene, various colours, unpainted
• 50mm painted & 25mm unpainted, both polyethylene soft plastic
•  25mm hard polystyrene, brushed-aluminium finish

There's a more blobby, silver/gunmetal one below that last row, of unknown origin, and an unpainted figure above the MPC group. What sets that last row apart from the other LB output, is that they are unmarked, as are all the MPC mini-clones, but, a lot of the Tri-Ang supplied ones were marked. However, the late Nylon/'Propylene 54mm ones, still in bakers and cookshops in the 2000's, were also unmarked, so a late thing, or a Culpitt (or similar) takeover thing?

We have since (recently) added 45mm copies in at least two plastics, so both sets of previous overviews (and these originals) will need to be superseded by a new round of posts, in a year or two!

 

One of the sources of the - at least four types of - sucker figure, are to be seen on these gum-ball sample cards, from 'Liberty', and, at 25¢, not that long ago? Also of interest are hard plastic 'vitrine' animals at the tops of the cards, micro-mini dinosaurs and sports 'monsters', both probably of a PVC-alike material.

 

While the whole bunch appear to be available here, as Star Warriors, on an unbranded, generic card, I think we've seen better images of them close-up before now, but these cards carry their own nostalgia! And we have all six robots and two poses of the Astro-Spacemen.

 

And, thanks again for Keith's kicking off this deep dive! Best rack toys ever . . . in the moment!

M is for Medieval Metal Men

So to the other half of 'antiquity', the newer half, although where you place the line is anybody's guess, hidden as it is, in the murk of the Dark Ages . . . is it Arthur and the end of Empire, the rise of the Carolingians, or the fall of the Carolingians, or likewise the Byzantines, or the fall of state fortresses, and rise of private castles?

 

War gamers place it later, with the coming of gunpowder, as a series of major rule changes!. . . If I asked you, you'd all have a different answer! But in toy-soldier land, it tends to mean fully tinned-men, or men in tights!

 

Oh, look out! We've got a new upload screen! It's got a colour graphic and a dotted boarder, that was worth the geeks' wages, wasn't it! How many changes since 2008? The original was fine, all the images went in a temporary folder as thumbnails you could return to, and import in ones or multiples. Every change since as either been pointless tinkering, or actually a negative experience/detrimental . . . Sigh.. And while they used to be hosted on Googles servers, they're now all 'in the cloud' to be lost in an instant, if the Internet breaks!

 

Anyway, onwards and upwards, these Cherilea 60mm's were, I think, given to me by someone, possibly Isaac, as 'unsellable', and while they don't have a huge fan-base, all box-tickers should be after a set, and while even I didn't have many of the Crusaders, I've always liked the standard ones, of which the chap on the right is one, and he has the shield with the late Sharna Ware shield motif which matches my lancer! 

 

Marx 'Men in Tights' (was it called 'Men in Pantyhose' across The Pond?), a bit scruffy, but a good clean will spruce-up the priest, while Robin (or, would it have been Robyn?) needs a dab of glue. Not sure if they are Marx originals or tatty Rado rissues?

 

A couple of nice Markus Hinton marked 25mm knights, painted to a nineteen-seventies standard, and a pair of nice box-tickers.

 

As are these two, indeed, almost every recent show lot or Chris parcel, has produced a variation of this shot, with both a Hong Kong copy (left, new colour?) and an MPC original on the right, of the 40mm medievals.

 

Another pair, and more Titan/Strawberry Group handled Supreme knights, I should have all the poses by now, but they are in various different places, and I don't know how many I have in silver, how many in black? And I've always rather liked the all plastic, yet Deetail vibe of them. While there was a gold issue, but possibly not in the UK?

 

On the right, a useful addition to the stash of Cherilea 1st version we saw here;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2025/10/d-is-for-dustbin-lids.html

 

And a lump of chewed polymer from Shotts in Scotland, which will head straight to recycling, but I photographed everything for completion!

 

I've said before you can never have everything, but you can have a damn-good try, and this Dulcop man-at-arms, seems to be one I didn't have (or don't recognise), although, of course, now I definitely do! And two of my favourite 'toy' knights, the Lido pod-feet chaps, also in need of a good clean!

 

The 'orphan' photo! One belongs in the sci-fi/fantasy post, and two belong in the previous post, but for two ten-counts the executive decision was that it go here!

 

A nice Cherilea smallie, in the less common green, a small Italeri, the game piece mentioned a couple of times, here at Small Scale World, recently, and the two figures from the Revell/Miniature Masterpiece decorative chariot kit - I seem to remember the Gowland & Gowland  instructions suggesting it be used with a table-lamp stand, or bookends! In this insipid white 'styrene, however, probably the Glencoe reissue?

 

I'm never too sure about these, but I think it's three (slightly darker) PVC-rubber ones from Marx, behind, and two polyethylene ones from Tudor Rose, in front, but they could all be Marx, and have been reissued several times, including the multicoloured rack toy knock-offs a few years ago - and yes, I know we're into RTM, but one thing at a time, it's too damn hot . . . and now, humid!

 

Closing shot is all small scale, and unlike yesterday’s ancient clones, these are all Giant Originals, mostly the late versions, but one, in green, of the trio of strange dancing loons I question-marked in my original One Inch Warrior article.
 

And, again, thanks to Adrian Little, Brian Carrick, Colin Penn, Isaac, Matt Murphy, Martin Fahie, Michael Mordant-Smith, Paul, Peter Evans and Trevor Rudkin for their input at the show.

T is for Tyo Typical Types

Well? A sort of theme was the space-sets I managed to pick-up over the weekend, and the matching loose figures, from two genres we've covered here recently, so a quick post on them, and the bonus was getting two-more brands associated with them both.

 

Haglon taking the Lik Be clones, and Trafalgar the MPC copies, Trafalgar Toys (better known for their tie-ins with LJN, Mego and the Hong Kong subsidiary Lion Rock) would have been a rival to WHC, Grossman and the like, and, indeed, this card may be in the archive as LJN?

 

But Haglon (Hagemayer) were more of a shipping operation, as far as I understand it, like with container ships, port space and warehouses in Holland, shipping all over Europe, and apparently adding their moniker to some of the stuff they shipped-in, that would have extended far beyond toys, which were probably a minor concern among all the household and garden goods, haberdashery, pet supplies and the like? And I'm sure I've seen this card as a generic. We also saw them as Woolbro a while back;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2023/07/lb-is-for-lanky-bods.html 

 

As supplied by Haglon! The 50mm knock-offs of LB's finaest, apparently limited to four poses (did they pantograph one of the Clifford sets?!) are not hard to find, although it took me a while to garner a decent sample, I'm now going for one of each colour! These came from four sources over the weekend.

 

MPC originals, in two slightly different shades of red, we looked at their oeuvre here;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2024/04/mpc-is-for-many-plastic-cosmonauts.html

 

and these are grist to the mill, but again, there comes a point when you are just looking for individual 'better' figures, or a specific pose-colour combination, and these are clean!

 

Seen in the link in an unreadable, but probably generic set (next to the Payton bag), the Trafalgar ones are the better versions, very close to the MPC, solidly formed and with thicker bases than the other three or so variants.

 

While these are the Henbrandt/Hing Fat third-generation (like Payton's, but worse) sub-piracies, and again, of limited use, but they'll all be sorted into the master collection, before any are passed on, probably to charity, but that's all a few years away, still.

 

Tim-Mee, so keen to cash-in on Star Wars (AND Battlestar Galactica, everyone forgets that was a year later), grabbed one of the MPC sculpts, with the barest of modification, and there was one in the plunder, last weekend, which was lucky for the completeness of this post!

 

Which gives us, from the left:

• Haglon-Hagemayer/Woolbro (and others?)
• Tim-Mee
• MPC
• Trafalgar Toys (et al)
• Hing Fat/Henbrandt (et al)

Making more and more sense, every time we visit them, and thanking Adrian Little, Brian Carrick, Colin Penn, Isaac, Matt Murphy, Martin Fahie, Michael Mordant-Smith, Paul, Peter Evans and Trevor Rudkin, for their input on the day or over the weekend.

D is for Donation - Chris - Historicals and Ceremonials

A bit late with part two today, as it's tomorrow already, but I crashed-out after work. At the grand old age of 62, doing 80-odd miles, stuck behind hesitant fuckwits in KIA's whilst also doing deliveries, rather takes it out of you, and I keep nodding-off after work, waiting for the weather forecast, which I then only half-hear! Anyway, they can stay up for a bit, with maybe just a Capsule toy post later today, and another donation-pair tomorrow proper - Thursday? Chris's older era and ceremonial toy soldiers and model figures, sent to me, to share with you;

 

Medievals defend against a Roman attack! The de rigueur shot of post-Giant and Giant knock-offs, I've been quite fortunate, in accruing these over the years, especially as a small-scale only collector for years, and it's the only way to obtain enough of them to start drawing conclusions, sorting their horses from the many Wild West sets, working out which lot go with which fort, & etc., so the more, the merrier, there's often a Quaker in the mix, and red horse is he, this time!

 

As if the cowboy pencil sharpeners weren't enough of a find, these, also 'Germany', are lovely things, a bit outside the toy soldier sphere, but absolutely within the whole lucky-bag, Christmas cracker, dime-store novelty oeuvre.

 

I'm not sure the two 'stakes' go with them, and I haven't worked out how the triggers work, they don't seem to hold the band, and may need reversing or inverting, but very interesting things! The channel is match-wood dimensions, so careful with those eyes, kids!

 

A few days later, after an email tutorial from Chris - The notch at the thin end of the bar collects the rubber band (red is original, manila is a replacement), then one of the flat edges forward of the notch, locks behind the trigger, pushing the trigger down, when you touch the trigger, it pushes the bar 'arrow' back up, and the - tensioned - rubber-band does the rest! 'Health & Safety' disc on the business end suggests mid-1970's onwards?

 

And eclectic bunch here! The Piper is a modernish tourist keepsake, as is the Lifeguard, who, almost matching the Horse Guard I got at November's Sandown Park show, is another of the - previously seen here - G·G ones, to join the Guardsman we've seen in the past.

 

I love the Russian (?) OBE standard-bearer conversion, from a Herald Guardsman, and the little chap is a rubber key-ring, but can anyone ID the Mountie, I assume he's a Canadian Tourist thing, from the size, and casual pose, he's hard 'styrene plastic, with a quite thin base for his size/scale? Or, is he an accessory-figure from a 1:24/1:25th model vehicle kit?

 

Two of the many figures accompanying various versions of Noah's Arks, not Blue Box, not Holly, and not New Maries, nor the Arco one (which was also another brand's - RAE), who's Noah was fatter than the pink one in the middle, and moving on to him, although similar, and having one of the three-digit codes, I suspect he isn't Holly or LB (Lik Be) 'funny animal' stuff, either! So the search goes on for both origins!

 

Ah, not sure if these were Chris or Peter, I suspect Chris, but I found them down the back of the bed a few days after I had finished sorting both Peter's third tranche, and Chris's latest parcel! One of the newer discoveries on the right, he's missing the 'styrene icing-pick, one of my favourites in blue, from Christmas crackers, and a 1990's Lucky Bag jobbie, with a shit-ton of flash!

 

And it's the first time the two on the right have been compared side-by-side, they go well together, and are marching off the same foot, a big band could be possible! Equally, those cake-spiked red plastic ones we've seen here a couple of times, are lacking a bass-drummer, I wonder if they are the same size . . . but they are standing at attention? 25-30mm between the three of them, all polyethylene.

 

Two MPC original 35mm's on the floor, and a victorious Hong Kong copy, in what I think is a new colour, to me at least. I've said before I thought I'd blogged these years ago, but it seems I just imagined an article in my head, while handling them, back in Berkshire, and didn't even shoot them, so that article has yet to come, but will be worth the wait, as there's packaging for both types, but I'm pretty sure my HK sample only adds black as a third colour to the MPC red and silver? So blue is all new!

 

This is fascinating, Chris said he'd seen them described as wood (it's obviously plastic), and by Van Brode, I couldn't find anything online, until I added 'wooden' to the search terms, and then found chapter and verse on them. They were made for the Van Brode Milling Co., by an unknown company in West Germany, a sticker on the base stated, for the cereal offer 'Sculptured Treasures of History's Immortals', which was a mail away, one bust (of twelve) per request, for which 50 cents and 2 Crisp Rice wrappers had to be sent first, presumably if you had multiple cents and wrappers, you could 'request' more, at one time?

 

The source (Worthpoint! So ex-evilBay), stuck with the carved wood fallacy, but they are antiqued plastic, possibly polystyrene, although the sample sent by Chris is now cracking in a very convincing old-wood drying out fashion! The cracks are not crumbly, and there is no dust, nor stickiness, so a new form of plastic death? Too large a single-shot or density of moulding? But, given all the Cleveland, Kellogg's and Total busts around the same time, a lovely addition to the collection.

 

As is this, presumably a US tourist thing, it's a slush-cast pewter/whitemetal bust, around the same size as the Van Brode Napoleon, around the 3½-4 inch mark, and over-painted in a silver, which may have been brighter once?

 

A capsule-toy ninja, a rather nice knight, in the style of Schleich-Papo-ELC-Wilco, and possibly from the latter's now defunct range, and one of those possibly, originally Fontanini or Manurba (?) gnome sculpts, but common in various forms, materials and sizes, and various formats, here as a key-ring hanger.

 

The knight's 'heraldry' reveals his origins in China, where they've given him a very ornate and oriental embroidered surcoat, which is not following the laws of heraldry, or the rules of the Collage of Arms! Unless someone was granted five wind-wraiths, on a field azure, matallique!

 

Two, probably factory-painted, Assyrian flats, almost certainly German, but without the catalogues in front of me, I couldn't begin to guess the maker! The horseman's lance is too far-bent to risk bending back, but they still make a nice pair with some age.

 

A nice sample of the separate head guardsman, we looked at their fort, a long time ago;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2010/08/t-is-for-tower-fortress-with-soldiers.html

 

I'm after a bigger sample of these, while the rest are buried in storage, as I'd like to do a photo-shoot of all the 'legal' drill poses, possible with these, the At Ease, can only go on the Easy legs, but the officer, Slope Arms and bugler can go on three different legs for instance, and there is half-a-post in the queue, on that subject, but involving the larger figures with oblong bases! So thanks again to Chris, for these and everything above . . . and below!

 

Pirates . . . come back in September!

G is for Gigantics - Giant Monster Insects

Except, it can be argued Spiders and Scorpions are not technically insects, but they meant well! Originally issued by Fundimentions, (Miner Industries/MPC) when General Mills became involved they were re-branded AMT/Ertl, but MPC and Airfix boxes can be found, although these (below) are the common iteration; certainly in the UK.

 

I got mine out and shot the boxes a few years ago, and then scanned them, a while later, I didn't shoot the kits, as they were unmade, but as they are quite simple, I hope to do them as future modelling projects, with posts on them, here, then.

 

There was originally a fourth model, a Giant Wasp, but it was only issued in the early days, and I won't speculate on the reasons for its lack of re-issue, nor will I 'research' it by nicking other people's stuff, one day, hopefully, I'll just get one! 

 

July 2022, and the lawn's looking a little better than in did the previous summer when I shot the board-game .gif's! I think I got two of these from Modellers Loft, one at the old site off the M25 (Coulsdon Road/Brighton Road?), the other at the Croydon Road shop (I believe they're now based in Bournemouth?), with the slightly crushed Scorpion box, being a Car Booty prize!

 

 

The original reason for my interest in them was the HO/OO-gauge-compatible figures, and while the Giant Wasp isn't listed here, it seems to have had the same figure-count/pose distribution as the 17-figure Giant Scorpion set.

 

Each kit contains, in addition to the monster insect, and figures, a few scenic items, in mixed scales, and card 'corner' to make a display for your kit. And - if I work this out right, below this post you'll find three image-dumps, of the scans I took a week or so later, one for each of the three sets.

 

Other people's research;

 

Blog overview;

https://parlorofhorror.wordpress.com/2013/08/16/model-kits-amt-gigantics-1975-1979/ 

 

And he did a Wasp video! 'Funland' has never been less fun!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwMOp306rDg 

 

Gigantic Wasp on Scalemates;

https://www.scalemates.com/kits/fundimensions-1-0503-gigantic-wasp--605514

 

There were also flyers for a magazine included in two of the kits;

 

Giant Tarantula

 

Giant Scorpion

It seems to have been a very short-lived enterprise?