A is for Another Retro-Rocketeer!

This one's courtesy of Peter Evans, I said we'd probably see more, before the end of the year, and this is current, PMS carried, and a slightly different take on the pull-back motor/white-button oeuvre, but again following the trend this year, for deformed NASA astronauts, and/or cartoon spaceships.

 

You push down on the Rocket racer's head, and an energy storage spring is set to fire, a quick release and off he whizzes, release slowly though, and you get a limp phutt! It's a bit of fun which will probably get passed-on to charity, but imagine getting this in your Christmas stocking, as a kid!

F is for First Flying Saucer

Except, they're not saucers are they, they're domed, and it's not my first, as I have the wonderfully lethal Marx Mystery Spaceship, and its half-controllable, 20-kiloton, kinetic-engine, with air-raid siren wind-up! But, this is my first 'full size' Hong Kong, placky-tacky, big-box toy, and I think it's one of the more common designs, not least than because PMS reissued it without stickers, a few years ago, also branded to a 'JS' (?), and claimed for China on a rack-card.

 

This is the older version, with NASA stickers, and while it was a bit grubby, which may have contributed to a cheap price, it cleaned-up near new, abart from playware to the gummed-paper flag.

 

What was known as a 'bump-and-go' toy, an eccentric steering, at the front, allowed it to escape obstacles by changing direction every few seconds, like a robot vacuum-cleaner, but it doesn't collect dust, or cats tails!

 

I don't know if the PMS issue had the original markings, or a new China-related message, but as far as I know the original was an unbranded generic?

 

One vinyl, one paper. Another Sanddown Park purchase, it ticks a box!

F is for Fugging-bluddery!

It's Rack Toy Month! It's fugging rack toy month and I totally forgot! To be honest I'm still not really in the mood, but at some point you have to get back on the bloody horse, don't you? Also, I'm not sure what I've even got in the bag for RTM, and I've promised to post a donation first, so, we'll see?

 

But I found these a few months ago in an almost deserted discount store in Borden, so they'll do, for a start . . . Rack Toy Month everybody!

 

Not a cowboy to be seen, I guess their sets had sold first! The slightly thinner copies of the Supreme/SP Toys Wild West, here under the banner of PMS International again, with two Indians and a plastic shrub per-bag, plus one of the previously seen scenic pieces, from the top: Totem Pole, 2 Tee-pee/tipi's, air-burial platform/lookout, and camp fire with tripod and pot.

 

And I think they were about one-fifty each, so proper rack-toy price!

UFO is for UAP - Imperial / CEM / PMS / Titan - Sammy Steel Series, Micro Adventure, My Adventure Journey, Space Adventure, Space Explorer

So, the last trio, except as Sammy Steel it extends to nearly a dozen sets, and two or three of them were issued as generics in France by the looks of it, but for the purposes of this post we're looking at the non-Sammy Steel sets issued in the UK and Germany, which are a trio.

 

For the Imperial US/Australian Sammy Steel story (which seems to include Titan Toys here, but I've not seen them in packaging), this is the start page for a four-page explanation;

https://mikestoybox.net/2014/07/12/sammy-steel-series-1-mighty-max-knock-off/#jp-carousel-6429

 

So, my two are in the middle, both PMS (which - at the time - might have meant a 99p Stores exclusive?), with the card back to the left and a generic from feebleBay on the right, although decent shots of the rocky one have escaped this post, it may be in storage?

 

We get two identical flying saucers, but only on the outside, as even then, they are different colours, while the inner liner is very-different between them both. To go with them is a rocky 'meteorite' based on what is supposed to be a volcano sculpt!

I didn't really notice that the German one is another card, and while I did shoot it in its entirety for the group shot at the end of the first post in this sequence, I don't have a decent single card shot! This was imported by a CEM?

I haven't opened this PMS set, but you can see the 'rest of the world' generics have all the contents of the Sammy Steel sets, but in new colours and without the Sammy character figures, although, I'm pretty sure I have him, the sabre-toothed smilodon (on the Blog somewhere?) and a couple of the other pieces not found in this trio, so they will all turn-up eventually!

 

Note the plug-in dish/ariel and fold out ramp, scudding about loose in the blister!

I did open the PMS version of this one after I'd got the CEM one to keep whole! The lizard man looks better in green than the Sammy Steel orange, in my opinion, although the fliver/flyer/hover-bike is probably better in the original grey? And these are all - sort of - 20/25mm compatible.

So, six true UFO 'saucers' and three more esoteric designs . . . I hope these posts have helped some with the ID'ing of these which have confused for some time, and as I say, these posts are a bit half-cocked, and we will return to them when I get everything in one place, and find the few missing bits (I may have the meteorite/cave), maybe do it as a single page, with all the sets/links together in one place?

And this is only what I've found, there's probably more; more packagings, more importers, more brand-marks, and while I don't often address money here, I was going to have a long paragraph or two ranting about the money being asked/paid for the US/Aussie sets, only to find someone has one of these PMS cards up on evilBay right now for 50-smackers? WTF? These are recent, cheapo rack-toys, you should hope to get, or pay no-more than 15-quid for, and - intrinsically - they are a fiver's worth of tat!

E is for Eggie Business!

A few more capsule eggs, nothing terribly exciting, I wasn't really thinking about Easter this year, so neither looked out for nor searched-out anything seasonal . . . Actually that's a small lie, I did pop-in to Hobbycraft, just to see if they had anything this year; they had the dinosaur 'decoration' set last year with the small eggs, but they had nothing this year, it's always hit-and-miss with the discounters.

I Can't remember where I picked this up? I think it may have been the local hardware store, but branded to World of Sweets, unusual for having a lengthways split to the capsule (less of a choking hazard?), and the fact that the relief-flat dinosaur is over-moulded rubber - the back's plain black.

 

Found these on Amazon, still there; it was only the other day, with various whacky brand-marks! Twelve dino's in twelve eggs, best egg-hunt material, but no chocolate, which will disappoint some! We may have seen some of these loose, in one of various visits to these smaller-size dinosaurs, which as I mentioned the other day I intend to ID eventually, all on one page.

 

An eBay lot, just as filler for a thin post! From the seller's description, I gather these are from PMS International, who we have seen several times here at Small Scale World now, and were/are called Putty Surprize! / Mystery Pets Surprise.  They seem to have been issued as blind bag type things, with what looks to be - from the left; a hippo, owl, salamanda (?) and Koala bear. I suspect they glow in the dark too!

T is for Two - Cowpoke's and Injun's

Been busy yesterday annd today, but not on toy figure stuff, so nothing for a while, but let's redress that with a quick pair now, off to the wild, Wild West we are . . .

Bought this morning; we've seen various elements of large and small sets from this unknown Chinese maker, on two continents and under a dozen brands/brand-marks (Maxxi Toys, Stobok, Funtastic, Aliki, Liberty Imports), this one is PMS, and possibly a McColl's exclusive, if you can find a McColl's still open, some seem to have been saved for now, IF they have a Post Office attached?

My favorite of the four; waving a sawn-off, up-and-under in his non-shooting hand, while keeping a firm-grip on his bottle of hooch with the left . . . "You're mah bloody best mate you are, gee'us a fight yer' varmint, hic!"

This was in Picasa and may be a variation of a previously seen shot, but let's get it cleared; how the horses are put-together. A while ago I broke-up the 'everything else' folder and created thematic folders which are easier to scroll through, the wild West folder, for instance has 149 images, the old one was 3000+, but it means I can start to find stuff for 'bitty' posts, or to add to posts like this!

Also in that folder and originally downloaded from Amazon (probably last time we looked at them), I didn't note a brand (there were several!), and it's the biggest version of the many sets available, with everything - wagon, coach, Indian camp, sky-burial platform and figures + accessories and scenics included.

While these have been in the Rack Toy Month zone for more than two years and missed being published both last year and in this August's RTM, just gone.You can see elements of both Britains Swoppet's and Timpo in them along with copies of the Lone Star separate bases.

To be honest I thought they'd gone-up here 14-odd years ago, as they were in the first bunch of 54mm purchases at one of those last Dave McKenna-run Birmingham Toy Soldier shows in 2008, 9 or '10? Anyway, high time Benkson joined the tag-list!

Of the various Hong Kong swoppet copies/piracies, these (available under various names and as generics) are the ones most sought-out by dodgy-dealers, as the spears get used with Crescent or Lone Star medieval swoppets, the tomahawks get thrust into the hands of Blue Box knights, and the necklaces get re-used on the Britains Swoppet originals as they are the same PVC - caveat emptor and all that!

Hugh's Handy Helpful Home Hobby Hints - Curtainsider!

H6-5! Best said in a West Country accent; Curr'un Cider! We're returning to the previous post with a simple fix for that rather leery truck we saw.

As it comes from PMS, stickered-up to within an inch of its life, and hardly the low-visibility or 'subdued' scheme you'd want on a military vehicle; with the sun on it, I fancy you could spot it from the International Space Station!

But they are all simple paper stickers and were mostly destined for the bin!

The removal revealed weirdness, moulded into one side as full cavities in a stencil style, the letters ABCOK, which is then fully mirror-reversed on the other side so you can see right through them both like the two ends of a tunnel?

Now does this mean ABC  OK, which might mean the vintage ABC is still extant as part of the modern Chinese toy industry (very unlikely)? Or is it poorly selected random letters because someone detailed someone else to select and cut some letters into the tools for some inexplicable reason? Or is it a more insidious hidden-behind-a-sticker thing, like the abbreviation for 'American Bastard Customer' or 'All Brit's Cocks'?

I doubt we'll ever know, if it was an Early Learning thing on un-stickered civilian versions of the toy it would be ABCDE or ABCXYZ or something wouldn't it? I suspect sample text on the CAD drawing which was accidentally transferred to the CAM tooling and reversed 100% for the other cavity! But there you are - spurious letters cut into the sides of the truck for no [apparent] reason!

I then cut new plain paper stickers from heavy parcel labels and coloured them in with a Sharpie! Simple, but effective, although the sides needed about four coats of Sharpie to lose all the pen-lines and hide the letters underneath. I used an old agate nail-buffer to smooth the sticker down especially round the edges and the four corners

Neatly converts a leery truck into a logistics curtainsider, although pretty fictional and we have to ignore the wheels for now! It's a sort of 5½-7½-ton rigid-bodied puddle-jumper (with a 'big-rig' cab!), around 1:48th/40mm compatible. And as you can see I left the 'sensible' stickers front and back for a bit of interest! And thanks again to Peter Evans of PW for the PMS Truck.

H is for How They Come In - November 2020

Right, now I have 26 posts in the 'H is for How . . . ' sector, and there were 25 until I turned this into two, so there may be 30 or more by the time we've worked through them all!

Also it's a year since I had to call the ambulance that would ultimately end in the loss of my Mother last January, and while I carried on blogging while she was 'only' unwell, it did tail off, to a complete hiatus in the new year, and one of the first things to go was the How They Come In posts.

Now life's all just the long slog of dealing with the estate (a nightmare for another day), it's time to clear these off the laptop, so, in the vague order they came in, that's what I'll be doing in the run-up to Christmas, alternating with other posts to 'mix it up'! And we're starting with this little lot that Peter Evans sent the Blog last November - shots taken on the 5th of that month, they may have got here a day or two earlier

Four modern rack toys and a loose bunch of bits, including the Culpitt's dove-ring we saw in a small poultry/birds follow-up a year ago. The loose figures are the rubbery Shing Hing (SH) we've seen before, they were (still are?) big-bucket stuff in big-store Smyths and are dominating evilBay-lots of this type at the moment!

These aren't in the main picture, so may have come from elsewhere (Charity shop!), but the photo was in sequence with Peter's stuff (taken half-an-hour later though?) and he's certainly sent similar to the blog in the past, so for now - they came with this lot! One or two maker's; sea life, they'll get sorted with all the others for a sea life overview at some point.

PMS blister-carded set; a few leery orange figures of poor quality, a weird gun which is everywhere on Alibaba at the moment and a truck with huge stickers which looks as if it's supposed to be advertising a fantastic movie or a two-player 'shoot-em-up' video game!

The artillery piece reappears in this set, nominally credited to an obvious phantom-brand (sticker, as an afterthought); Toys as Fun, and imported by Habib (UK) Ltd., from an unknown factory in Shantou City, the figures (two balanced 'armies' of randomly picked poses) also share poses with the previous set, but are different mouldings.

From the same source comes this farm set with the larger type of animal, although when I say 'farm' I'm following the packaging and ignoring the inclusion of a bison/wisent buffalo, and the palm-tree! I had actually found one of these in my local, independent, everything-cheap store a few weeks earlier, which I had de-bagged (Ooh missus!), so they are the photo-shot on the right, Peter's will remain a mint-bagged example.

Comparing the contents of the three sets; you can see that the figures (1-3) are very different in both size and finish, with the PMC's (1) much larger and yet cruder than the Habib/Fun set, who are finished to a higher quality. Likewise the farm palm (6) is larger, yet cruder that the also Habib/Fun 'combat' pair (5). A whole jungle (4) from a few rack-toys . . . you wouldn't get that from Airfix, Britains or Timpo bargain!

But the guns - from both sets  -are identical, suggesting the contents of both are bought-in 'mix-and-match' from more than one (or two) sources. While, from the construction method, the 'fire-brigade' helicopter also came from the gun-maker, and is a copy of slightly better ones we've seen before. The tank is what it is!

This, though, apart from the weirdly poor/odd wheels/tyres, is a bit of a zinger! I had seen them on feeBay and Ali' in various sets/configurations including singles from one of those multiple listings where wholesaled set-contents are broken down as a shopping-list, and I thought I'd got one, but didn’t find it when I put Peter's away, so may only have the one still.

But, wheels aside, it's good for Hong Kong/China shite! The forks would make it more of a Zundapp than a BMW, but in the heavy 750cc class, and it is perfect for taking the old Britains Deetail figures who; being pretty indestructible PVC; seem to survive their die-cast mounts in some numbers.

The other item was a large, infant's floor-toy of an insurgent's 'technical' pick-up truck with twin-cannon in the rear cargo-bed. It seems to have a hole in the cab-roof for an emergency beacon/light, so there may be construction, police or fire versions out there? Imported by Goodiez Ltd., another new tag for the tag list!

I really can't hold on to this larger, poorer stuff, so after photographing it (I take a dozen or so against future posts) it went off to charity in time for someone to get it for Christmas, and I thank Peter for sharing it with us first, along with everything else in this post.

*****     *****     *****     ******     *****

Added 20th Nov. 2021 - My version of the farm set turned out to be a blister-carded set rather than the header-carded bottle-bag set of Peter's donated one, contents were the same but under the added stickers was a clue to either a manufacturer, or another phantom-branding . . . 

. . . namely Wei Ni Da, who real or phantom are currently offering this on Egyptian Amazon! So wheels within wheels and another brand-mark for the tag list . . . as I asked on Moonbase the other a while ago, "Does it never end?"!

P is for Posts Passim!

One of the things I like to do here from time to time, as I'm sure you've noticed, is a few posts with a narrative tale or connection running through them but with the first post covering both Wing Lung and the Knight Toys I thought we'd already got in the tag list, with these, it was a question of do I go Wing Lung/Knight-Knight-Wing Lung or (as has been the case) Wing Lung/Knight-Wing Lung-Knight, such is the executive stress / excitement level here at Small Scale World!

As the figures are dominant the first follow-up was the Wing lung, and this post is [was going to be?] a briefer affair, leaving as many questions as it arrives with.

Two sets, this is the first and they are in no particular order, of immediate interest is that we get two brandings; JE Toys and PMS (more usually associated with 99p Stores, but I think this may pre-date those now defunct emporiums of tat) on a sticker, the back gives us a clue that PMS might have imported this set from a wholesaler in Spain?

The contents are much-of-a-muchness, with figures that could be from Pioneer or Supreme (softish vinyl) or someone else, and are copied from the larger polyethylene ones associated with the Wing Mau Trading Co., and Hing Fat. And an eclectic mix of vehicles and accessories which may be from several of the lesser makers in that part of the world.

I would point-out that the early CGI image on the back of the box is quite sophisticated and would have required a large memory to render, prior to being converted into a '2D' .jpg or .png image for print.

The second (or 'other'; there is no order here) set is branded to the aforementioned Knight and Fancy It Agencies Ltd., the same combo as the toob, two posts ago, with Gausini in the mix on that occasion!

Contents are similar, but less, with the vehicles replaced by die-cast jets. The rocket, people-carrier and figures are the same, however the street furniture is different with the large 'facility sign' being a copy, although it's not clear and the different artwork could be batches rather than copying.

In all the complication of trying to ascribe rack-toys to producers, the only thing that really matters to a figure collector is the figures, and these are they! Soft'ish PVC vinyl and around 30mm, there only seem to be the three poses in this size - here compared with the venerable Airfix set.

As I said above the donors were probably Wing Mau (Hing Fat being the next-generation pirate) but the maker could just as easily be Pioneer, Supreme or an unknown party. Also I think I logiced (I know, but it should be a word!) that Wing Mau (or their owner) were probably middle men, while early Hing Fat seem to have copied Rado Industries late stuff, so even the donors are a question mark!

Indeed given that Pioneer are essentially a die-caster of small vehicles, and given the number of figures associated with their vehicle sets now, both home-branded and generics/other brand-marks, it may be they were themselves buying them in from a third party, in which case I'd be tempted to say Supreme/SP Toys, but, their own 40mm figures are so poor, they can't have produced the more delightful figures we've seen from Pioneer associated sets!

Now JE Toys are known to the die-cast collectors (there's a less than clear thread here), while PMS are an old-school importer/sourcer/wholesaler from the UK via Hong Kong (now also with offices in Shanghai and India) and not the in-house brand I'd suggested when I kept finding their stuff in 99p Stores - mea culpa!

While - with two sets in three days jointly fingering Knight/Fancy It - we might assume they are a joint shipping-branding exercise, who happened to select another set/set-combination from whichever middle-man in Hong Kong/China was putting these together to hawk round the trade fairs in the 1990's. They now seem to have moved out of toys and lost the fancy knight on horseback!

The few JE Toys the die-cast guys have identified seem to be at the poorer end of such production, garish decorated and slightly squashed, die-cast uppers on plastic lower-halves (I think I may have some of their AFV's), while these (the upper set) are more Pioneer in quality? Equally if an import from Spain (juguete Espania?) there may be two JE's under discussion here!

The two motorcycles in the initial set above are completely different, one a reasonable quality, mostly die-cast with plastic finishes, rendition of a Harley Electraglide (or Roadster?), the other a cheap, generic, all-plastic model of a Japanese street-racer of the sort you might find in a capsule-dispensing machine, Christmas cracker or lucky-bag type setting, so probably came from two different of the up to 600-odd [at any one time] yet to be named (within the hobby) toy makers recorded in Hong Kong over the years?

So it all proves nothing other than that it's never clear, wheels within wheels . . .

T is for Two - Current Production, 'Real' Rack Toys

The driving force behind the origins of Rack Toy Month (RTM), was the phenomena of August being the quiet month , the slow news month, the hot humid month when one hasn't always got the energy or inclination for deeper articles requiring much research &etc, coupled with a seasonal drop-off in readers/traffic as people go away . . . well; this year there seem to be more people at home, but circumstances have meant the year's not 'panning out' in any way, and I've not been here so much!

Another reason behind the RTM thing was that it allowed me to clear some of the less salubrious stuff, which has some validity, but might not be of interest to all, and this post is one of those!

Both donated by Peter Evans of PlasticWarrior magazine, this will probably go-on to charity, as I have little use and less space for a large, pull-cord motor, carpet-toy, warplane!

But don't think it's not appreciated though, a second set of images are on the dongle for eventual inclusion on the A-Z Blog entry; the bigger-picture being of import . . . it is quite literally - all grist to the mill. And PMS have shown more valid stuff in the past, so will have an importance in the final picture of the 'whole'.

While this is also lacking figures, apart from a simplified action-figure knock-off who probably won't interest loyal readers of the Blog (I stand to be corrected if this is your 'thing' and you follow the Blog!).

Red Deer are currently to be found in independent general stores, although it's almost certainly a phantom brand, however wholesaler-invented rather than retailer-invented, the contents included stuff previously seen in other branding by both Poundland (GE or Funrise) and the now defunct 99p Stores (the above PMS for instance, or Top Toys), actually; the tank - I think - was previously seen carded by Funtastic in Pounland?

Anyway, both out there now, and many thanks to Peter for sending them, another rack-toy box, ticked!

D is for Dem' Bones, Dem' Bones, Dem' Plaaaaasssstic Bones - Carded Sets

We have seen these before, the last two years-running I think, if not the last three, but they keep changing the packaging!

Last year Brian sent us shelfies of the purple card (they had an orange one the year before!)*, but then donated a sample to the Blog, which arrived after the event so I've been sitting on them even since, this year he sent shelfies of the new black-card! I've only gone with another shot of the orange one in the card, as there are lots of loose ones now, and it's the only carded sample here, but you get the idea!

In the meantime I'd found an aluminium-silver and gunmetal-bronzy one in the storage lot, so the sculpts must be over ten years old, probably older, although maybe not - then - Dolgen Corp., or PMS? The samples from Mr. B from two years ago, and the 99p Stores ones (from nearer Christmas, I seem to recall?) vary in shade slightly with light and dark tans, the lighter being the UK (PMS branded)  and some Dolgen ones.

Also shelfied from Brian (in 2017) were the Walgreen set, which he also then sent to the Blog last year, so a quick close-up of them; you get 4x4 poses for 16-figures in an 'onion-bag' net, and they are rather floppy!

They are also rather tall! but there are no rules for fantasy undead skeletal corpses brought back to like and they could have come form god-knows where, or when!

Thunderbird Two! No! But . . . when we were kids, birds peanuts came in long red net-bags (they also came in Christmas stockings and I still prefer them to salted ones) with a similar tie, but it had a bigger slide and more substantial loop which was shorter, fatter and more rounded, and it looked like a red T2, I had a whole squadron of them!

You don't need the warehouses' piled high with plastic tat, we've come to expect in the last forty years, kids raised to imagine, will. And as the planet's journey toward a looming death speeds up, this is something parents and parenting need to recognise and address.

*Checking the posts over the last few years it's all a bit complicated and we have almost over-seen these now, but I think the order of card-graphics is Orange-Purple-Black!

T is for Two - B is for Big Boys & Blow-Moulds

The first of these came in from Chris Smith a while ago and have been languishing in the 'Follow-Ups' folder, an odd folder with most of Chris's-, some of Brian's- and the odd bit of my- stuff and a few screen-caps or scans! But they are worth a stand-alone post . . . 'cos they're lovely!

Chris thinks they may be Spanish, which might make them single purchase kiosk items (but not 'sobres' as they'd be hard to hide in a paper envelope!), and I think they are superb. Slightly generic, slightly GI, blow-moulded combat infantry types ready for beach, bath or garden!

Shared with everyone - cheers Chris!

These aren't blow-moulds, but they are big! From Mr. Berke; the US-packaging version of the figures we initially saw here at Small Scale World from - the now defunct - 99p Stores under the PMSlabel (firefighters as well) a couple of years ago.  4" clone-conversions of Tim Mee and Matchbox GI's, although the hidden 4th-one was a bit Airfix German, running, I seem to recall!

No brand but look for the distinctive card if you're in the 'States - cheers Brain!