M is for Military Marvels from 'Merika!

So, around the same time as the show the other week, I got a lovely parcel from the other side of the pond, and having covered the show a couple of weeks ago, and Peter's stuff from it, last week, it's time to show gratitude to Brian Berke, by sharing his plunder with the rest of the loyal readers, and we're starting with the military, in what was a vehicle-heavy donation.

This should be a Renwal readymade, very much in the same vein and size as the similar Airfix Attack Force, or stuff we've seen here from Injectaplastic, Jean Hoefler, Manurba or Norada, but this one isn't fully-marked, and has already led to a follow-up! It's quite 'space-tank'y isn't it?!!

 

Gilmark's Sherman behind and a lovely, early, polystyrene, US-made Lido jeep, trailer and gun in front. Following the pattern of the 25lbr and quads, I suspect some artistic licence from the 1950's dime-store supplier, with the very British limber added to a jeep, and a gun closer to the early war 37mm, which, although quickly rendered ineffective by advances in German armour, remained far from obsolete, retained as a very useful infantry support weapon, and which WAS towed by jeeps, among other tractor-vehicles.

 

It is a sad inevitability, that Royal Fail have to take their boatman's coin from pretty-much every parcel from Brian, Chris or Peter, and on this occasion it was the Auburn jeep which paid the price. No matter, I will glue it, and before the cyanoacrylate dries whitish, shoot it with the Airfix jeep for that post, on the Airifx blog.

 

Annoying though, as I'm pretty sure I have the original Auburn Rubber 'rubber' one somewhere (chunk of PVC), and having the polyethylene replacement turn-up is a fine showing of the other side of that coin!

Also the Auburn one I think, or 'based on', although we have seen various versions here over the years, not least the Banner, Bell, Lido and Merit ones, but unmarked and a clean mould-shot, so probably one of the US 'army man' issuers rather than Hong Kong's finest?

 

These on the other hand, are Hong Kong, but rather uncommon 'German' blue plastic, probably from Ri-Toys (Rado Industries), and one of their bagged or carded rack-toys of the 1970/80's, but equally possibly a sub-pirate, the tank being a cruder copy of the Blue Box one, than I remember Rado being responsible for!

 

Brian kindly put these to one-side when I mentioned them a while ago, and it's the Faun 6x6, NATO-era, 10-ton Bundeswehr truck from Roco Minitanks, with a load of assault boats and the larger rubber-boat.

 

Interestingly, I think that grey wheel, is the early sign of 'styrene-rot, and it's only the second time I've seen it, but on the other occasion it was A) also Roco product, and B) also from the 'States, probably AHM over-stamped stuff from the late 1960's? On that previous occasion, I rather blamed the climate in Florida - well, Americans themselves, seem to blame Florida for most things!

 

It's not like the brittleness of dying polyethylene, but more like the Mazak-rot you get in early die-casts, the grey bloom eventually getting fine cracks in it before crumbling, more like biscuit. As with other plastic diseases, I'm sure it's a batch thing, but whether it's down to too-high or low injection temperatures, incorrect operating-pressures or corrupting additives/inclusions . . . as yet, as far as I know, that work hasn't been done.

Many thanks to Brian for all these, and there will be more on the Renwall tank next!

M is for Minor 'Euro-Makes'!

Actually I'm going to tack a major on at the end, whom we've already revisited once in this occasional series, entering it's third month with at least 12 posts still to come, plus a combined comparison/round-up post at the end. And today, some of the European makers we haven't yet looked at.

From a 1970's Vollmer catalogue, are these wagons, which I think missed the wagon posts a few years ago, they look to be Preiser, but the horses are the smoother, simpler ones more commonly associated with the Roscopf wagons or some Hong Kong copies. Indeed, I think I've mentioned before, that I'm not sure what the relationship is between the three or four (Noch seem to have carried other people's product before they embarked on their own, now Preiser-equalling, range), so I can't add much beyond that the similarities are obvious?

 

While this is the 2000 Walther's (Terminal Hobby Shop) catalogue, and we see what are clearly Preiser, in a 'simple paint', we actually saw this earlier in the post series, but I scanned it again!

 

Not sure if these are from Merten or Preiser, (they have the arm'y/leg'y look of Merten?) but again a rolling-stock and trackway manufacturer, getting 'simple-paint' samples from another maker, to enhance their catalogue with a basic set, it's all part of the 'brand-loyalty' work, isn't it? Add a couple of Pola buildings, a level-crossing, some track plans, Heki trees . . . and 'Fleischmann' people!

 

This - the Jouef figures - is a personal embarrassment, as I think it's their third mention on the Blog, over the sixteen years, with the Mettoy Playcraft scans appearing at one point, and yet, despite seeing them go to storage, I still haven't photographed them, but they did appear in One Inch Warrior magazine, I think, in black & white, which doesn't do justice to the loud and leery paint job, of the Playcraft - ironically a Tri-Ang rival from the same Line's empire!

 

I have since found slightly better painted ones (in shade, not the two-colour stab-and-hope scheme), which may be Jouef origianls, from whose catalogue these scans are added to the previous shots! And playcraft sold them from the Jouef bags, so they were only ever nominally Playcraft! Also, didn't Hornby experiment with passengers pre-glued to platform sections at one point? Instant Stations!

From the same Walther's catalogue, this was, I think, the beginning of what has in recent years become a line to rival Preiser, and we have seen one or two here, a Bierfest stand springs to mind, and I will one day do the rude sets, of which I have several and they should have been in the 'Adult' naughty-post before Christmas, but they are in storage.

 

Noch were originally another prefabricated building/scenic's firm, like Pola, Vollmer or Wiad, and like them had a couple of simple figures kicking around the pages of their catalogues, in boats or something, from time to time, but in the last quarter-century have developed a range to rival Preiser, even as Priser swallowed-up Elastolin and Merten to stay ahead!

I don't know much about these, except that they are probably lead or whitemetal, possibly composition, and as listed in this old catalogue? Klinebahn (literally 'small way'), and in sets of six matching the lead of early Märklin, or the sets of Preiser, Merten and those above.

 

And, having just mentioned them, our third visit to Märklin in this railway-figure 'season', and no, we are not going to start investigating O, G, S, 1, BIG or any other gauge, that can be for another day, or for the A-Z pages! But I wanted to post this set of composition figures and - specifically - the interactive or 'working' guard, as it's just so cool! All in O-gauge.

 

The catalogue mentions the 1937 Grand Prix of Paris, on the cover, but seems to be actually the 1949 issue, as they started to recover from the national madness of national socialism.

B is for Bahnfiguren

A quick overview, or overfly, there's not much, of Roco's non-military figure sets, In which, with a donation from Jon Attwood and some dodgy scans of even more dodgy 20-plus-year old photographs, we get to where I think we need to be . . . a ticked box!

 

So, Jon sent me a nice pack of the Roco figures in one of his parcels, and these are they, sort of, this is one of each pose, which left me one figure short, with two spare, duplicate figures, so I shot them like this, and after a few weeks shot them again, with the two extra figures off to one side with the intention of musing on possibilities, when I remembered . . . 

 

. . . I had a couple of Roco railway catalogues, and all became clear! You can see, on the left-end of the bottom row, two ladies waving hankies! And twenty-two other poses.

Which means the second shot was rather redundant, but could be annotated to explain the situation! A nice set of sculpts, I would hazard a guess that it's one of the sculptors being used by Preiser at the time (mid-1970's), as the figures look familiar without actually being Preiser figures - although Preiser did supply several other brands.

 

So, main image is a scan of the early card as sent by Jon, and dating from that mid-70's 'Roco International' catalogue, and 49p in Beatties? An Airfix set at the time was around 18/20p, so they were always a bit pricey! Below which is the 1990's iteration, renumbered from 4466 to 40000, and joined by three-pairs of half-torso loco crew, at 40001, these may still be available?

 

Then to their right are the WWII Army Leader's we've seen before, and a comparison with early (US price code) and later header cards for the military sets. We will return to them all one day, and get everything to the same image quality!

Pirates is for Crazy Comic Piraten Serie Piratas Bucaneros Filibusteros Corsarios Berberiscos . . . and Then Some!

I didn't know how to tackle this lot, and ended-up with far too many images, some of which I know are other peoples, and which have been left out, although one or two have been kept in. Also, in the end I decided to go with the vague order they seem to have been issued in, but it's not necessarily a true timeline, so bear that in mind.

'THE' Pirate Premiums

 

Appearing around Europe in the early 1970's, there were different configurations of them, with the UK getting a paltry six poses which we have seen before, and other people getting the full twenty.

They first seem to have appeared in Spain (and Portugual?) as Arial soap-powder/detergent premiums, where they are subdivided into five groups of four figures, and next time we visit them - when I bring all mine together - I will shoot them in this order;

 

http://chicledunkin.blogspot.com/search/label/Piratas

 

Full translation of that page;

 

Aunque estas figuras son mas grandes que las Dunkin, para mi es una serie totémica, la recuerdo perfectamente de mi infancia......

 

Although these figures are larger than the Dunkin ones, for me it is a totemic series, I remember it perfectly from my childhood...... 

En realidad son figuras de unos 5 cm, 20 piratas que venían en el detergente Ariel en 1971-1972 mas o menos. 4 colores mates preciosos (para mi los mejores del mundo, los europeos son mas brillantes y en america el plastico demasiado duro...) en plastico blando (lo que hace mas dificil encontrarlas sin defecntos) amarillo, verde, rojo y azul.

In reality they are figures of about 5 cm, 20 pirates that came in the Ariel detergent in 1971-1972 or so. 4 beautiful matte colors (for me the best in the world, the European ones are brighter and in America the plastic is too hard...) in soft plastic (which makes it more difficult to find them without defects) yellow, green, red and blue.

En el paquete recuerdo que venia un dibujo de los piratas agrupados en 5 series de 4, Piratas, Bucaneros, Filibusteros, Corsarios y Berberiscos. Si reunias una serie te daban un premio en metálico y si conseguias los 20 supongo que te darian otro mejor.....

In the package I remember that there was a drawing of the pirates grouped into 5 series of 4, Pirates, Buccaneers, Filibusters, Corsairs and Berbers. If you collected a series they gave you a cash prize and if you got the 20 I guess they would give you a better one.....

Debajo os pongo un scan del trozo de carton donde venian los piratas Dibujados, Aunque no pone el nombre de cada grupo yo si recuerdo cuales eran, El jefe de cada grupo es el primero por la izquierda del dibujo. Como veis, el orden en que los puse segun los recordaba no era el mismo del cartón, pero iba bien encaminado ¿no?

Below I put a scan of the piece of cardboard where the Drawn pirates came. Although it doesn't say the name of each group, I do remember what they were. The leader of each group is the first one on the left of the drawing. As you can see, the order in which I put them as I remembered them was not the same as on the cardboard, but I was on the right track, right?

 

Just a note on the first paragraph, he's not saying Dunkin did these in a smaller size, but that they are bigger than the other Dunkin he collects which are usually around 25/30mm and also tend to come in 20's.

We need some pictures here . . . 

In the UK, Kellogg's issued only six (top left image), with Coco-Crispies and Puffa-Puffa Rice (a Quaker Sugar Puffs knock-off!), and the same colours as the Ariel premiums, there are all four versions of Cascanueces in the bottom-left image. The duplicated olive-green figure and the two white ones are oddments who have come in recently.

 

Cereal Offers do them better justice here

At around the same time Americana bubble-gum were issuing them in Germany (and South Eastern France/Italy?), as Piraten Serie, with these two images from old evilBay auctions showing that in addition to the 'standard' four colours, they also got creamy-white ones

The above three iterations were all manufactured by Tito, a premium maker in Portugal, and most carry the Tito mark somewhere, along with the given name. At some point in the late 1970's the mould-tools migrated to Peru, where the colour range got much better!

 

This is my Peruvian sample as they arrived, they are of mixed parentage however, or might be, so these are the notes I made when they arrived, I've listed them alphabetically for now;

• Arrigon (the only figure marked on the feet)
• Al Epacha (Tito mark on trouser cuff, name down cloak)*
• Barbarrója 'Red Beard'
• Cara Cortada 'Scar Face' (letter 'A' is visible, might be bootleg)
• Cascanueces 'Nutcracker'
• Corsario Azul 'Blue Corsair'
• El Arana 'Spider'
• El Bisco 'Biscuit' (no Tito mark, reversed letter 'F' is visible, might be bootleg)
• El Jorobado 'The Hunchbacked' (no Tito mark, might be bootleg)
• El Manco 'The Lame' [hand not foot]
• El Pecas 'Freckles'
• El Pupas 'The Baby'
• El Tuerto 'One-eye'
• Ivan
• Jack el Negro 'The Black'**
• Morgan (no Tito mark, might be bootleg)
• Mustafa
• Papatalo ('The Unbeaten, Unconquered'?)
• Sebastian
• Taric (no Tito mark, letter 'E' is visible, might be bootleg)

* might be Ali Epacha or Al Iepacha . . . 'The Pasha'?
* *Not apparently a racist epithet, the features being clear and of European or 'everyman' appearance, with long straight hair, so; black-hearted, or up to no good!

 

Check Juan's comment below for more on the origin/meaning of these.

 

A similar grouping but I moved them around and swapped a few colours out to make it a better image, a few months later, then kept both for the post anyway! The quality of these is as good as the Euro-issues, but you can see from the notes, that things are starting to go pear-shaped on the tool, specifically with the text and logo-markings, I now suspect these are all the ex-Tito moulds and not bootlegs, as we are about to look at some bootlegs!

At around the same time, some company in the USA, Rubenstein International Inc. (1977) started shipping these fellows in from Mexico, bags have multiple pose duplicates and what appears to be a limited number of poses, but that remains to be confirmed by multiple samples, and I suspect all 20 poses might eventually turn-up.
 

A limited palette of colours includes red, blue, yellow and white, similar to the Euro-issues, but look at the flash and the overall quality, if there are bootlegs out there, these are they, or someone thrashed the tool to within an inch of its life, between Peru and Mexico!

http://vmminiartemonocromaticos.blogspot.com/2010/07/p.html

This guy seems to have only used eBay images without captions or context, so it's not possible to conclude what any of this means, but interesting colours, and suggestions of other issues somewhere, I particularly like the jade-green set of 20 figures. But you can also see the olive and white ones I've started picking-up, so someone around here had issues of both . . . Bonux, Christmas crackers, Maltese festival treats?

It has to be pointed out that the size and levels of caricature of these pirates, means they would mix quite well with the Antipodean Crazy Pirates we saw here

 

But we finish with darker stuff . . . 

 

I was hoping Giselle over at Mokarex would have something useful for this post, as she still owes me about 40 images under the 10-for-1 rule, but her pirate page is shit, she's nicked the Cereal Offers artwork, but all chopped-up and low-res, while she's photoshopped some eBay Peruvian figures which are not the Kellogg's colours, the page purports to represent! Only two of them are right . . . Thieves are thick, you see, somewhere to the left of the bell-curve!

 

But we end with this piece of hilarity from Kent Specher in the 'States, image used for research purposes, with full acknowledgement, wouldn't want to blame anyone else for this dog's dinner of a complete joke.

 

First;  They didn't make tea, they made chicory-coffee! Ersatzkaffee! Then we find there are too many poses, Linde only carried 14 of the designs! Why is there a Tito/Ola ice-cream premium Roman from the Asterix sets in the middle of the already too-big group, at 'K'? And the colours are all wrong!

Unbelievable, staggering incompetence, make it up as you go along to make up for a lack of research; *sloppy* is - I believe - the term used in Pennsylvania! The truth, had he bothered to look for it, is here;

https://www.lindefiguren.at/fotogalerie-linde/piraten/

 

And I've posted links to that site several times I think; most recently when we looked at the spacemen! Again, I've translated the page for English readers;

14 Piraten gibt es von Linde. Von links nach rechts heißen sie: El Bisco, Patapalo, El Arana, El Pecas, Corsario Azul, Tarik, Mustafa, Jack el Negro, El Jorobado, Morgan, El Tuerto, El Manco, Arrigon und Cara Cortada. Der Name ist am Rücken oder an den Beinen zu lesen, daneben sind die Linde-Piraten natürlich immer geprägt. Die zarte Kennung kann leicht übersehen werden. Am häufigsten ist die Farbe blau.

There are 14 pirates from Linde. From left to right they are: El Bisco, Patapalo, El Arana, El Pecas, Corsario Azul, Tarik, Mustafa, Jack el Negro, El Jorobado, Morgan, El Tuerto, El Manco, Arrigon and Cara Cortada. The name can be read on the back or on the legs, and of course the Linde Pirates are always embossed next to them. The delicate identifier can be easily overlooked. The most common color is blue.

Wesentlich seltener sind sie in den Farben gelb, grün und rot.

They are much rarer in color yellow, green and red.

20 Piraten wurden von der spanischen Firma TITO produziert. Nur 14 davon gibt es mit Linde-Kennung. Ob es Al Jepacha, Sebastian, Ivan, Cascanjeces, El Pupas und Barbar Roja (siehe Abbildung) auch von Linde und auch in weiß gibt, bezweifle ich. Die Tito-Piraten wurden in Tüten verkauft. Tito produzierte auch die bekannten Dargaud-Figuren. Die Linde-Piraten waren natürlich im Kaffee.

20 pirates were produced by the Spanish company TITO. Only 14 of them are available with Linde identification. I doubt whether Al Jepacha, Sebastian, Ivan, Cascanjeces, El Pupas and Barbar Roja (see picture) are also available from Linde and in white. The Tito Pirates were sold in bags. Tito also produced the well-known Dargaud figures. The Linde Pirates were of course in the coffee.

And the Linde are logo-marked and likely to be slightly different-sized copies (I don't have any, so I don't know for sure), most of their stuff was copied, as Kent would know if he'd read the series of recent articles in a certain magazine I won't mention, by an author I won't mention either, as neither would want to be associated with this in any way, but Kent knows!

 

What Kent has here, what's in the above image, is either Peruvian  product, from the old Tito/Ola/Dunkin (et al.) group of tools (likely, with the Roman present) or Mexican bootlegs, and which, from the state of it, the colours. and the Roman (!!!!!!), is a test-shot or factory sample of some kind, probably off of evilBay, to which, with no knowledge of the subject whatsoever, he added a shit-ton of text with no research or checking of even basic facts with all the available resources!

 

19 pirates! Not Linde's 14, not Ariel's 20, but 19 . . . and a Roman, in a different size! "Look Ma, I gave them all letters!" But he thinks he can come over here and tell me I've got 'Lots wrong'? Staggering arrogance.

And if you're wondering why some of my Rubenstein images are the same as his, it's becasue we took them from the same seller about a year ago!

O is for Odd Squad!

Some, but not all the National leaders (neither US President), a couple of famous Generals, but most missing and two Göring's ('Goering'), this was always a bit of an strange line-up for a set, but it's quite popular (although not particularly rare in either size), and is overdue for a box-tick here!

271 Army Leaders World War II, also issued in the larger 1:35th scale a few years later as set 450, itself an odd act, as while it made them compatible with the Italeri and Heller kits of the day, there was no history of 50mm stuff from Austria (or Germany), nor any forthcoming range of matching vehicles or other kits from Roco.

The 'data list' on the back of the card is in a different order to the presentation of the figures on the other side, who are each in a separate blister with their title below. I seem to recall the large scale set come similarly packed, but in one row?

Two Göring's; there are two Göring's for some reason, a hundred allied or axis generals missing, but two sculpts of a fat face-feeding Nazi airforce arsehole, when Roco only made a few aircraft and all of them post-war helicopters - did they do a Storch? Where's Himmler? It's a very odd choice of figures, no Monty or MacArthur? Patton's absence explained by already being in the early US figure-sets (seen earlier today).

If you're going to have even one Göring, where's the Dowding or 'Bomber' Harris? A De Gaulle, but no Vichy? Speer, Franco, any Jap, Manstein, Guderian, poor old Paulus . . . Zhukov? It's an eclectic line-up to say the least, but they are very well sculpted and all pretty recognisable as to whom they are meant to be!

While back to the Goering thing; I guess the sculptor played with a few alternative sculpts and two of them - for the one personality - were considered so good, they couldn't choose which one to run with, so ran them both? It's also worth noting that the two figures are to all purposes the same sculpt - from the waist down! But even then - you have to ask - why didn't they then make-up the set to a ten-figure count?

M is for Monogram's Many Mates

This post only tells a part of the story of the Monogram sculpts, not least because it mostly deals with the Revell versions, which are quite different, through the Roco-Minitanks copies - which are the wrong scale! The post came out of an eMail conversation with Gisby, but I'm not blaming him for any of this complicated drivel!

Original Instruction Sheet

Although not as obvious as other much pirated figures (Airfix, Lido Wild West, Elastolin Romans, Britains animals et al), the original Monogram set US Army Military Figures, is up there with them and there are at least three main 'families' of figures to look at.

Firstly there is the original 'kit-figure' set and the various derivatives from (in a possible. vague order of appearance) Pyro, Renwall, Hawk, Adams, San/Marusan, Revell, SNAP, UPC and Life-Like (among others!) Lesser players include MPC, Strombecker (four figure set) - and IMC?

Then there are the soft polyethylene Hong Kong piracies, from around 10-or-so definable sources, most were sold as generics but one or two can be attributed, not least a small set carried by Marx. Small Scale World briefly looked at some of these (the generic carded sets) in the past.

Note; the 1973 IPMS/MAP kit list is no help at all in this matter, listing only the Tamiya set and the Monogram (as 1:32nd scale!), but most of the sets branded to the above were out (and still around) at that time, the SNAP/Adams/Hawk set came with a howitzer and sandbag emplacement and appears separately in the listing though.

Re-boxing under Revell ownership

Still the Monogram tool and brand-mark

The final group contains the ones we're mainly looking at here - the Revell-sculpts' based Roco-Minitanks copies and their UPC piracies in nominal HO-Scales. Giant also lifted them in an HO-compatible size, but we're not looking at them today; they'll go on the HK Blog . . . one day!

Revell used the Monogram set as a basis for their own (this box was probably issued sometime between the two above?), but kneeling-down the radio and flamethrower operator's, straitening a couple of other poses and both dropping some and adding newer sculpts. It was this latter set which Roco used as the basis for three of their 'HO' sets, the only sets they produced in soft polyethylene.

However, in the Roco sets, the sculpts were divided, some duplicated and the sets contain a few other poses, including original Monogram sculpts, variously taken from AFV crewmen which can be found in military model-kits (of various scales) from one or more of the companies (in the first 'family') listed above.

So, set 117 US Soldiers Combat Group was the first outing, and it contained the fighting 'infantry platoon' poses, along with the flamethrower, bazooka-man and mine-detector, but not the No.2 on the bazooka, who would be held over for set 141 US Artillery Group.

This is the type two packaging with the AHM/Airfix panels removed and a white panel/flash where the earlier sets had had a blue one (see below), I think the 'Z' prefix on the codes is the AHM designator for Roco, they used a 'U' prefix for the MinimoverS which were supplied by Umex/Roskopf. Walther's used similar coding for their suppliers, but only for the Terminal Hobby Shop (and now online) cataloguing . . . I think; not on actual packaging?

The 14-figure count includes two identical marching poses and an officer we will return to at the end of the article. The second radio-operator (large set) and officer are additional to the two donor sets, but I don't know which kits they are taken from - yet!

The earlier packaging, seen here on the second polyethylene figure set with the blue-panels on the obverse and AHM box on the reverse, they were imported into the UK by Airfix to begin with (you can - in good light - just read 'Airfix Products' under the "United Kingdom"), while Roco-Peetzy handled European sales. I seem to recall Riko took-over the UK marketing as Airfix dropped Roco in favour of their own growing lines of 1:76th scale AFV kits and the more 1:72nd scale ('OO-HO') readymade polyethylene vehicles?

The larger figure-25 suffix in the product-code is the US price-designator; twenty-five cents, US Airfix used the same system, as did UPC, below.

Again we have other figures from new sources; the seated figure with the rifle is from the original Monogram set, but I suspect the guy holding his 'bum-roll' is a Revell sculpt, while the various artillerymen will have been taken from various older 1:35, 1:40th or 'box-scale' AFV model-kits from the list of companies above - Adams had the 120mmAA I think?. The MG and Mortar vignettes are from the Revell version, and we get the missing bazooka-crew No.2.

I have no idea if Roco had a licence to reproduce the figures, or just copied them on-the-fly, I don't think Revell had taken over Monograme at the time they first appeared, and the fact that Roco would join Esci in later copying Tamiya sculpts (Esci also plagiarised Airfix and downscaled their sister company Italeri's 1:35th figures) suggests piracy?

Also neither Revell nor Monogram showed any interest in the smaller-scales at the time; although Revell would turn to it later (with re-boxed Esci!), so may have turned a blind-eye, or even tipped-a-wink at a toy fair, but equally they could have been fully-licensed? The figure next to the two seated figures is Patton.

UPC's box-art; above (large scale, channelling the Revell artwork) supplied by Gisby, below (small scale) from my collection appears to show basic training helmet markings and an oversized Hotchkiss on a Vickers' tripod!

I fired a Vickers once; I must have been five or six? Dad woke us in the middle of the night and  drove us to the School of Infantry at Brecon, where his staff (he was commandant) had set up the gun on the small pistol range/SMG butts at the back of the old wooden barracks (which would be unchanged fifteen-odd-years later when I stayed in them, winter 1984/5!), he then had my brother (four or five?) and I fire a 50-round belt each into the sand to wake the garrison - all totally illegal; even in those days! I coughed in the fog and nearly broke my teeth on the firing handles!

They (UPC) copy both the previously seen sets for a 27-figure count (even to the duplicate marchers!), probably pantographed; all the detail is there, but they are a tad-smaller, they are also the only polyethylene set in a polystyrene line-up, and the funny little bases (more Revell than Monogram, but all Roco) were copied as well.

#3039-29 - US Combat Group Soldiers, miss-attributed elsewhere to 3022 (actually a crewless/figureless artillery kit); I have set them out in the photograph  as they are laid-out on the instruction sheet - numbered top-left to bottom-right from No. 1 Bazooka man, to No. 28 seated, with the machine-gun as No. 26 and the mortar unnumbered/un-illustrated on the sheet. Full US catalogue listing with price in cents; 29¢

The third and last set manufactured in the soft polyethylene by Roco was 154 US Parade Group, 16 figures, but only a few new sculpts, again taken from Revell or Monogram (I assume) and probably from the various Jeep kits available in the larger sizes.

Contents give us a fourth 'George C Patton'esque officer standing, a variation of the 'actual' Patton figure from 141, but with standard combat trousers instead of the cavalry jodhpurs, two drivers and seated solder and officer, I guess the officer is the one in a side-hat, pointing?

On the far left (where Mr. O'Connell puts me!) is the 154 version, you can see he's been pantograph-copied from the larger 141 figure to his right. In the other shot is a usable miss-mould on the left, next to the standard figure. I could probably get him back with a bit of hot water, but I like to keep them, in hundreds of figures he's the only one who's turned-up! He looks like he's just spotted something dodgy and is about to un-shoulder his rifle?

Returning to the officers, there must be one [early?] Roco AFV which came with a crew-figure (US half-track?) as two of these (left hand figure) slightly larger versions have turned-up in polystyrene, but they could be further piracies? The base seems to be Roco, but could have been added by the owner, and I've found no other poses (from all three sets) in the same material.

Standard Roco-Minitanks in the middle and UPC copy to the right.

One day I will tackle the big-job properly, but for now, just a couple of shots which have been in Picasa for a year or three since a sorting-out. I have dozens of samples of this type of thing, along with one boxed set (may be Adams or SNAP?) still in the garage somewhere, and they range from the big 60+mm box-scale 1:24/5th or 1:30th figures from . . . not sure; Aurora, Pyro (?) or Renwall, through the standard 'early kit' sizes equating to 1:35 or 1:40th and the smaller 1:48th or 1:50th of the late Aurora and others, but with dozens of copies - sometimes in different sizes - it will be a major undertaking!

What we have here is - I think - on the left: Revell late/reissue in paler green marked (1) and 1st generation copy (Hawk/Adams/SNAP ?) at (2), with the same copies to the right compared to sub-piracies (Marusan/UPC ?) numbered (3). But - and I stress; they could all be by other people!

You can see that each copying reduces the size slightly, and the detail noticeably, especially on the 3's, it doesn't help that the pale flamethrower isn't in-line, but I can assure you the 2's are slightly smaller, the 3's measurably so!

Like I say; it's a big job, but not impossible! All the Aurora and Bandai 1:48th-scale smallies are elsewhere and a few are ID'd and in their company's box or tub, but these are the bulk of those early US model-kit makers' US troops. 30 to properly attribute, the supposed Stromberg set (I can only find die-cast Landser and a plastic pit-crew!) may be the pale grey-green foursome, bottom right?

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As well as the three polyethylene sets seen above, Roco-Minitanks produced a number of figure sets in the harder, glue'able polystyrene, and therefore I've put together a quick listing of those non-vehicular sets that might be most use to 1:76/72nd gamers, HO gamers should already be familiar with them . . .

Roco Minitanks Listing - Figures & Accessories Only

117 - USA Infantry Combat Group (polyethylene, ex-Revell/Monogram)
118 - US Assault Craft/Raft (Hong Kong piracies exist, same as 239? See also 363)
118A - Life Buoys/Floatation Rings (dealer's-list foul-up or late-90's reuse of the code with different contents? See also 363)

132 - Anti-Tank Obstacles ('Dragons Teeth' in various sizes + barriers)

141 - US Artillery Personnel Support Group (polyethylene, ex-Revell/Monogram)

154 - US Infantry Parade Group (polyethylene, ex-Revell/Monogram)

185 - Pine Tree Assortment (6 trees, like Faller, Merit et al)

218 - Tents & Cargo/Supplies (German WWII Zeltbahnen, copied by Eidai)

- single tent (four-joined Zeltbahn)

- double tent (eight-joined Zeltbahn)

- 2 drums

- barrel

- 2 different boxes/crates

- sack

233 - 2 Motorcycles (one with dispatch satchels, one without)

238 - BMW Motorcycle with Sidecar

239 - Large Rubber Dinghy (Hong Kong piracies exist, same as 118? See also 363))

249 - Bases for Battle Scenes (supplied by Bellona/Micromould)

251 - USSR/East German Tank Crewmen (10 figures)
252 - USA/NATO Tank Crewmen (10 figures, ex-Tamiya)

255 - 10-Man Tent (NATO 12x12)

258 - Guardhouse with Gate (figure, sentry-box and barrier, also issued as 851?)

261 - 20-Man Tent (two NATO 12x12's joined, many Hong Kong piaracies)

263 - WW II German Soldiers (15 figures seated and marching)
264 - US/NATO/Bundeswehr Soldiers (15 figures seated and marching)
265 - Russian Soldiers (marching, 2 officers, 8 soldiers, side-caps)

271 - Set of WWII Personalities (9 figures, 2 Goring's)
272 - US/NATO/ Bundeswehr Soldiers (20 marching GI's, ex-264, small set, off the runner)

272 - US/NATO/ Bundeswehr Soldiers (20 marching GI's, ex-264, large set, on the runner)

288 - Assorted Sheets of Modeller's Plastic

298 - US/NATO/Bundeswehr Soldiers [sitting] (, ex-264
299 - German WWII Soldiers

300 - 8 Officers, 2 Map Tables and Chairs (6 standing, 2 seated/stools, Vietnam-era, ex-Tamiya)
301 - British WWII Gun Crew (6 kneeling/squatting, ex-Tamiya)
302 - 16 Soldiers Infantry Group (Bundeswehr types)

308 - US Gun Crew (6 figures)
309 - 16 Tank Commanders/Drivers (NATO/Bundeswehr types, upper-torso's only; for hatches)
310S - Infantry Group 'Afrika' (German WWII Afrika Korps - limited edition)

317 - Barbed Wire

319 - 28pc Set of Ammo Boxes

342 - Fence and Gates

363 - Assault Rafts with Life Rings

450 - WW II Personalities (set 271 reproduced in 1:35th scale)

463 - US / NATO Tank Commander Figures (Gulf War? ex-Tamiya?)

542 - Sandbags

550 - Artillery/Munitions Accessories Set

614 - Nissan-hut (US; 'Quonset-Shelter', standard accommodation hut)
615 - Nissan-hut (US; 'Quonset-Shelter', extended administration/facility/classroom building)

851 - See 258

Roco Railways

40000 - Station (24 undecorated civilian figures, also supplied to/issued by Kibri)

40001 - Loco Crew (painted engineer and fireman from the steam-age)

Might as well do the UPC as well . . .

'HO Pocket Combat Series' Military Vehicles (definite pirates of Roco Minitanks, not sure if Marusan carried the whole line, and supplied UPC or if UPC were the pirates; supplying Marusan with a limited range?)

#3011-29 - German Armored Car 234/2 (also ex-Marusan)
#3012-29 - German Armored Car 234/1 (also ex-Marusan)
#3013-29 - U.S. 2 1/2 Ton Truck 6x6
#3014-29 - U.S. 2 1/2 Ton Truck
#3015-29 - Self-Propelled Howitzer
#3016-29 - General Patton M-48
#3017-29 - Self-Propelled 155-mm Gun, T-245
#3018-29 - Tank Medium PzKfw.V Panther (also ex-Marusan)
#3019-29 - General Patton M-47
#3020-29 - Half-Track Rocket Carrier
#3021-29 - General Sherman Tank M-4
#3022-29 - 120-mm Anti-Aircraft Gun M1A3 (not US Combat Group Soldiers, see #3034)
#3023-29 - German AA Gun 37mm
#3024-29 - German Tank Mark IV/Fl (also ex-Marusan)
#3025-29 - German Tank Mark IV/F2 (also ex-Marusan)
#3026-29 - German Tank Mark IV/H
#3027-29 - German 20mm Quad AA Gun
#3028-29 - Half-Track Munitions Carrier
#3029-29 - Sound Detector (also ex-Marusan)
#3030-29 - Self-Propelled Anti-Aircraft Guns (also ex-Marusan)
#3031-29 - Half-Track Quad AA Gun
#3032-29 - 2 Jeeps M38A1
#3033-29 - 155mm Gun M2
#3034-29 - US Combat Group Soldiers (combined contents of Roco sets 117 & 141)
#3035-29 - Honest John Rocket
#3036-29 - Tiger II
#3037-29 - Self-Propelled 8-inch Howitzer