T is for Two - Four-Wheeled Wonders!

Between civil, military and space, there were lots of vehicles in the last lot of Sandown show plunder, but that's not such a surprise, given as how it started life as a train/die-cast show, those tables groaning under the weight of Furby 'plushies', Bratz dolls, Lego and Transformer stuff you see these days, are far more recent additions to the halls!

 

In its day, this must have been a common-enough pocket-money toy, as it's at least the third to be added to the stash I think, and while this isn't the best one, it comes with the driver, which previous examples were lacking, but which I probably have in the loose passenger/rider zone, so will hopefully now be able to properly crew the others with! It's a pretty-standard Poplar/Thomas PVC figure, but in white rubber, rather than the usual flesh/pink/brown tones; possibly to match the wheels he was shot with?

 

While this, Jean Höfler or Manurba (?) toy is another Mercer, and it could be the Mercer all the other plastic Mercers are copied from, but I don't think so, it's not even the best moulding out of all those US, French and Hong Kong ones we saw here at Small scale World, a while ago, so I suspect it's a copy too, from whichever was the better Mercer, one of the French ones, Schuco, Matchbox 'Yesteryears'?

 

I don't recognise the boy-logo, and Jean used a drum-logo, but the text is very much in the style of either maker. I've found the rest of the set on a locked foreign-language site, associated with the name Rosenberg, and have possibly ruled-out early Siku and Bruder?

M is for May's Visit - Combat Troops

Sand, green and field-grey, the proper 'toy' soldiers, and there were a fair few in the bag, along with several paratroopers, who are always welcome here!

 

The blow-mould has suffered from a bit of a facial collision, but might be a new colour, the other three have probably all been seen before, but it's all grist to the mill, and there's always new colours, or new-sized copies-of-copies to be found.

 

China copies of Tim Mee's Cold War warriors, possibly a new colour in the washed-out sand, but they'll need to be compared with the existing samples before I know for certain.

 

Modern mix of Matchbox and newer sculpts.

 

Modern, and dodgy hollow-backed rack-toy rascals, but with several sizes, a few poses and severl colour-ways, it will be a while before I've got all of them, or even most!

 

Japanese infantry from Rado or Hing Fat, covered before.

 

Odds and sods, the interesting one here is the chap in the middle who would appear to be one of the Pioneer die-cast accessory figures in soft rubber, and a new pose, to his left, our right, a less common Manurba-Tallon in grey.

 

Seen on the respective Airfix Blog pages, the yellow figures are new to the collection, and that's the beauty of these lots, there's always something new! Many thanks to Peter for most of these, one of the paratroopers was a purchase, I think.

T is for Transports of Delight

I know I'm supposed to claim to be a toy soldier and/or model figure collector, but vehicles have always had a place, not least because of the Airfix 'readymades' when I was a small-scale collector, but just as scenics and then spaceships started to feature, alongside Dinosaurs (quite recent) and erasers or cracker/gum-ball novelties, so mini and micro-vehicles have taken a growing corner of the stash for their own.

 

The fact that collected brands like Manurba, Pyro/Kleeware or MPC gave-up micro-AFV's, or the little trio of gun/armoured car/carrier thing, which came with so many rack-toys, was the start, but once you're into novelties, vehicles feature quite often, and these have all been added to the pile this year!

Actually, the exception which proves the rule - this came in some time ago, if the bedspread is anything to go by, it's been in storage for well over a year now, I think! A soft polyethylene copy of the Matchbox Greyhound coach, possibly from an earlier 'styrene Blue Box one, but starting to get a bit truncated, almost a 'deform', and smaller than the original. This may have been a put-aside from Gareth Morgan or Chris Smith.

 

A die-cast Benbros Qualitoy Gypsy wagon, these were the sort of wagon the itinerant knife-sharpeners, tin-smiths and other crafters would take village to village, all gone now, but there were still one or two on the road when I was a kid. Now rich 'celebrities' have fake ones placed in their gardens! This also shows other ways vehicles sneak into the collection, firstly my side-interest in wagons, and secondly; small-scale horses!

 

Two pieces of slush-cast lead, probably British, and a die-cast fire-engine, probably American? These were saved for me/donated to the Blog by Adrian Little, a while ago I seem to recall, and help with ID'ing them would be gratefully received! They may all, also, be board-game playing pieces?

 

Picked up in the September Sandown Park show, we have four from one series and a racing-car from another, all polystyrene, and all Hong Kong product. We looked at all my 'moulded-on wheels' micro-stuff a year or so ago, but there's also tons of this working wheels stuff, a lot of it marked W Germany, but plenty of British and HK lots, so these will join their samples against a proper look at them all one day.

 

Two of them are marked Made In Hong Kong, while the other two have an additional stock or tool number, but wheels/axles tie them to each-other.

 

I'm loving this, I'm pretty sure I already have one, possibly in the same red, which may have been on the Blog already (another Chris Smith jobbie?), but I seem to remember it having damaged engine-nacelles, while on this new example they are all present and correct. I suspect this might be a slightly upmarket (but still budget-end) Christmas cracker inclusion?

 

 It's also a spinning-top, which looks as if it should also whistle or howl, through those slats in the bodywork, but I can't get a note out of it! Of interest is the three nipplettes arranged around the spin-nipple (all my own nomenclature!), which help to prevent it from tipping too soon, or wobbling, so, help keep it spinning!

 

The flying saucer (here seen after cleaning!) came with these and the items in the next image, all around the same size, but obviously from different sources, the plane here being a bubble-gum capsule, a small piece of generic pink gum, similar to that which came with the little tanks, being stuffed in the nose and wedged against the tapered body as the two were closed together.

The yacht could be another cracker prize, or a basic/budget bath toy, or even supplied with a piece of bubble-gum 'cargo'? It was a much produced/copied novelty from both W Germany and Hong Kong, back in the day, but this seems to be the best quality one (with realistic, relief-sculpted, racing markings on the marbled sails) in a growing sample of them (we've seen a few over the years, not least a whole card of Rado/Ri Toys ones!), and while unmarked, may be British?

The wheeled passenger-boat is all soft plastic, and probably the most modern thing in the post, maybe as late as the 1990's or 2000's, and could be cracker, gum-ball or rack-toy, while the HK copy of a Manurba mini-sub is one of several generations of piracy, previously seen on the blog as rack toys.

 

Once they've all joined their like-for-likes, we'll return to them here, hopefully with details to add, or just 'bigger-pictures' as far as numbers in sets, or polymer/paint colours go! I was going to add some Internet images to this post, but there's so many of them, they can be another - 'lazy' - post, another day! And thanks to all who save this stuff for me, in addition to those named above.

F is for Follow-up - Space Cars

Except they are more future-past cars, which look nothing like what we are driving now, nor will ever drive, being firmly locked into the 1950's aesthetic they were born out of! And while we're revisiting what were badged-up to Tallon, last time we looked at them, without any packaging, they are really 'just' Manurba!

 

I bought these from a mate on Saturday, although we haven't agreed an amount yet, and I won't actually pay for them until the BP Sandown Park toy fair next Saturday (put it in your diary now), but they are here and photographed, which is most of the battle won!

Blue instead of yellow, this time, and it's beginning to look like there's just the three sculpts? However, it is still up in the air and the canopy note last time - which was only musing - can probably be corrected to coloured canopies = Manurba/Tallon, and clear canopies = Hong Kong clones? As you can clearly see there are three different colours of canopy in this sample, which is what I was 'remembering' the HK ones to have had!

DC 77

RS 17

ZA 567

 

That's it really, it was mostly said last time, they all have a moniker/code name, and impossible speed stat's on their undersides, and we will revisit them again when the HK ones come out of storage, and we can look at them all together. In the meantime, here's a few bubble-canopy concept cars from that there Interweb;

 

1955 Ford Beatnik Bubbletop

1956 Buick Centurion Concept 1

1961 Ford Thunderbird 'Thunderflite' Bubbletop

Fictional car from a boy's annual or illustrated magazine . . . 1975, heehee!

(Don't know)

Ian Roussel's Thunder Bubble

http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2017/01/outer-limits-ive-also-read-it-was-named.html

 

None are particularly close matches for these toys, but the influence is undeniable, and they may be more closely based on other designs of the era, Dark Roasted Blend is a good source of images for this kind of stuff. There are many more, including more double-bubble canopies, of which the most famous is . . . 

 

. . . the 1955 Lincoln Futura concept car . . .

 

. . . upon which Batman's original 'Batmobile' car was based.

Citroën Karin concept car - 1980

M is for Merry Mass of Malleable Model Mayhem! 7 - Military & Marine

A shorter post, I suspect because Chris himself specialises in 'khaki', modern combat, WWI, II etc . . . and will hang on to any interesting things in that vein, although he sends plenty of shots as well as these donations, so it's no whinge, just an explanation for the shortage of images, also, I shot them in groups . . . but I've added Marine subjects at the end to make up the numbers!

Small scale; the most interesting is probably the chap on the far left, who needs a paint-strip, but seems to be a Hong Kong copy of an Eko copy of Airfix's first series 8th Army, we've seen similar here, but not that pose I think, and the base is the giveaway!

 

The US marine pointing is also interesting, as he's not from the Aurora 'HO' sets, but is in the same style, might be AHM? Three from Redbox's Motormax (ex-Zyll), a Blue Box vehicle-mounted equipment operator, three commoner Airfix piracies, a Skybird and a kit figure (at the back) make up the company!

The big guy is marked C-P Inc, which/who, I believe, are a subdivision of US Toy? They who make the sets of ten in two colours (five of each) mostly civilian 54mm rubber figures. These are a very brittle (from new) polymer, of the Nylon/Propylene feel, and I have some others somewhere (among the first large scale figures I got), and equally damaged on the extremities, so early-to-mid-2000's, maybe the late 1990's?

The heat-shrinkage Lido-copy German from HK, is fun for being a 'new' pose, albeit, dying backwards, and the Monogram which looks like many other copies, is hard plastic against the copies usual polyethylene, so may be one of the shop-display figures which came out of those early kit-makers, as the painting has a casual, but practised 'factory' look about it?

A 'Bonux' FFL shaking his fist at someone, but unmarked, normally the unmarked ones are in brighter colours, not the Bonux olive-green, so I think he's a useful addition? Some Hong Kong to sort, more of those Naval looking hard-plastic vehicle/vessel crew, and the one on the left is a colour-variaton I think, while the one on the right is probably home-painted?

 

Three useful HK copies to be sorted into existing samples, another US truck-rider and a couple of more interesting figures, the sandy one modern'ish, the other part of the ever-expanding 'might be Pioneer for somebody else' oeuvre?

 

Pitrates! It's all you're getting, as I never know, at this time of year, with an empty or near empty Pirate Zone, what I may have for next year's ITLAPD, so they have all gone there, in order that I at last have a few shots for the Intro-post! What can you spot anyway?

 

Ships and vessels, two of the Hong Kong copies of Triang Minic's waterline battlefleet, a smaller one with added hull from another maker, a yacht which looks like it should be from a board-game, but wouldn't be very playable with that keel, so maybe a 'working' sink/bath-yacht from a Christmas cracker, or a real-water race game?

 

The tug is another Triang copy, the raft is a Manurba copy, yellow boat is a Kellogg's cereal premium, and a more recent take on the old baking soda novelty and the orange cruiser is a novelty candle-holder for cake-decorations!

 

Many thanks again to Chris Smith for all these lovelies, and if you keep scrolling past the gold-lamé nutcrackers, I added a couple of images to yesterday's Crescent/Kellogg's knights post.

H is for How They Come In - Sandown Park, November, 2 of 2

It's not that I'm trying to beat 2017's post total, that's an imposable target, this late in the year, but we’ve had a few wet days here, which I've used to get some of these folder's cleared-off the PC! Second half of the plunder from the last Sandown show now.

 

A Speedwell Japanese soldier, who had lost his head in all the excitement, already glued back-on, it's not a good job, and as the rifle and hat have been re-painted, I will probably strip him right back, re-do the head with pinning and repaint him more realistically, as a spare, someday.

A Timpo Indian from the earlier solids, taken from hollow-cast moulds I think, and a probably home-cast, probably modern ACW in whitemetal, but he's pretty enough and was in a bag with other stuff!

 

Hong Kong diver, resin anthropomorphic pig, a horse which I think is a bit of Dom-for-Heinerle and a driver sitting on an unrelated crate of bottles in a dense vinyl. The figure itself is polystyrene, and may go with that grey one which keeps turning up?

 

Three odd little aliens I know nothing about, might be Kinder and one has a plug on his foot, along with a Heimo-Bully Dalton brother (Averell or Jack?) from France's Lucky Luke comic strip.

Horton-Trix-Briains Lilliput station staff and passengers,

along with a hotel porter (red jacket)

Acédo Jungle plastic from France

Mostly Marty-M Toy (May Moon) WWII, but the driver is another colour and may be from a different maker, while the chap down the bottom with the marbled Lido knock-off, is taken from the Swoppet mortar man and will be from a third producer.

 

Other figures with the driver include a modern pirate, Manurba swivel-waist, modern cop and - probably - French bazaar cyclist, although he may be a board-game piece or cracker-toy?

 

From the sublime, to the ridiculous, is unfair, but exactly the sort of occasion for that phrase! Lone Star's swivel/jointed-limb farm animals above, we looked at a complete with tab cow here, and, Kinder wildlife below.