N is for Not Really A Follow-up!

Notes on previous stuff seen here though, and images pulled from three folders and added to a set I got off Steve V yesterday, at the London Toy Soldier Show in Camden, and which opened-up a narrative for the other shots.

Marx's 45mm Air Force figures, with a rouge Space Patrol chap, in the same metallic blue plastic, waving his gypsy earrings about, at the back there! You get seven ground crew and four pilots, which, it being then, the 1950's, means the guy in a leather jacket is probably a milk runner from Transport Command (or whatever the USAF called it), next to him is the SR71 Blackbird or X-Plane pilot in high-altitude 'space' pressure-suit, along with two more conventional, fast-jet pilots.

 

With the exception of the sci-fi interloper who has the older flat base, these are all the later version with the raised under-rim base, and it's interesting to notice that the last pilot on the right has been sculpted to hold something? The hands are the wrong angle for a cockpit rim, and the arms are the wrong-angle for an access ladder, so I wonder if the sculptor's efforts fell on stony ground!

 

I think these are the ones sent by Brian Berke a few years ago, I thought they were gray, and I thought I'd published them, but they may be somewhere on the Blog already, without the needed Tags? Anyway, these are the recent reissues, and came in grey or this flat, sky-blue.

These are the contemporary figures from Deluxe Reading, and this image is courtesy of Chris Smith, as part of an eMail conversation we were having, following one of his donations, and the revelation that the orange ones were issued, over here, by Thomas in a header-bagged, oversized Jeep of theirs, which we saw here.

While I suspect these (MPC, Pyro or Revell?) come from a model car kit, as racetrack personnel, but they could be from a 1:48th scale aircraft kit, and go very well with the figures above, and the other set we saw in the Kennedy Space Centre a while ago, here. The paint on them will be OBE's, and there were at least two shot-runs, one in grey, one in silver, both a polystyrene 'kit' plastic.

 

So, thanks to Steve, Chris and Brian, a quick overview of USAF (and NASA) air and ground-crew, from over half a century ago! And the reason I hadn't got round to them before this, is because mine, mostly rimmed cream, chalky polyethylene (Marx Swansea?), with a few flat metallic-blues, are still in storage.

N is for November's Sandown Park - Civilian

Welp. Cleared some crap out of Picasa yesterday! But I'm running-about today, so don't expect the same posting rate! Here's another bunch of the odds from the recent Sandown Park show, and it's the civilian stuff.

 

I'm pretty sure these are French Dinky/Hornby (Meccano), but a quick Google just questioned that belief, I couldn't find them, although Google is so commercialised and generally shit these days, that's an indicator of nothing!

 

I have a larger sample in storage (these aren't that rare), and have had them for years, and I'm sure I found them or someone told me they were French Dinky, but they could be someone else? They are O-Gauge railway figures, and a vinyl rubber, of the old-school, quite dense/rigid, but stable (no weeping oily shite) type, and there were two tranches/issues, one with the little domed, concave cavity in the base, the others flat-bottomed.

 

Not sure on these either, I'm pretty sure they aren't the Marx set, one's similar, but the other isn't, and orange isn't a colour that associated with Marx, but they are more likely a US maker, than Hong Kong, just from the detail level?

 

One day I'll have to bring all the American Football players together, which will force me to research them properly, at which point I'll probably find a web-site with many more than me, that ID's all of them! And thanks to Gareth Morgan for these two, he let me pick through a mixed lot he'd found.

 

Copies of the Marx Power Mite road menders (two to the left), and a knock-off of the Blue Box copy of a Dinky to the right. One day I'll have to do a page or post just on the three - Dinky, Marx, Blue Box and all the copies!

 

Merit newspaper seller from the magnetic Driving Test game, a pretty-good knock-off of the Britains farm-girl, and another cracker-sized athlete.

 

Another question-mark here, it's not the common Hornby-Triang set, still being issued today I think, included with most of the steam locomotives, and many train-sets, so maybe Playcraft, Bachmann, or someone like Jouef? Driver, fireman, and some accessories for the locomotive?

 

These are also a bit of a mystery. The figure sets, as accessory sets, were vinyl, and issued on small runners, so I think these hard polystyrene examples must have been from a gift-set of some kind, it needs a Corgi expert, which I'm not!

 

Four bits of metal, the first is probably a coalman from one of the British minor-make wagon/cart toys in slush-cast lead or die-cast mazac/zamak, the little lead/whitemetal ringmaster, might be a cake decoration? But doesn't look to be that old, while the other two are obviously modern, aftermarket accessories for model racing cars, being Graham Hill in white, and . . . Andretti or Villeneuve, senior? Looks like Senna (again), but the helmet would/should be yellow?

Q is for Question Time - Fusilier in Fez

Can anyone ID this composition figure?

Possibly German made, but no base, so no base mark! And clearly an Ottoman infantryman from the period of the First World War, or from the blue, earlier . . . Russo-Turkish war of 1877? I'd love to put a maker's name to him. He's quite big as well; about 80mm?
 

E is for Eye Candy - WWI Cavalry

I shot these at the BMSS (British Model Soldier Society)'s show in Reading, two years ago, on Mercator Trading's stall (thanks Adrian), and they are pretty special; Holgar Eriksson's finest, WWI British Cavalry in the charge. Probably from Comet-Authenticast's set British Cavalry, Field Uniform, 1914, which was unnumbered.

The brown one may be Chinese or something, Eriksson's lists included dozens and dozens of nations, and often it was just a paint-job to create another catalogue listing, but only Boxer Rebellion types are listed to my knowledge, although #56 was an 'unused' number in the later sets. The same - painting to order - was true of the first Malleable Mouldings lists. Or, it could be one of his own figures, from Sweden?

B is for Big Box of Bounty - Sci-Fi, Cartoon, TV & Movie

And, so, sadly, we reach the end of the Chris's parcel plunder posts, with some very interesting or useful stuff, and some oddities, along with best in box, which might surprise some, but not those who 'get' me! It's all the fictional or funny stuff today!

 

Power Rangers - I think the two micro-vehicles are Micromachines, along with the Putty Patroller, while the smaller articulated chap (in the style of Polly Pocket or Action Fleet) is still unknown to me, although there are some in the bags we didn't look at in this past post, possibly Playmates, or someone like that? While the Black Ranger is from those key-ring capsule toys.

 

These are fascinating, probably from a generic rack-toy, they are somewhere between the Gordy-Pikit rack-toy Bi-Trons and more formal toy transformer types, two points of articulation at the shoulders, and frontal tampo-printing in silver and gold, I'll be looking out for their set on evilBay!

 

Similar fayre; a larger PVC-alike, marked-up to DIC Productions, Playmates and Tsurubaya, so 'Superhuman Samurai Syber-Squad', and again articulated only at the shoulders, and a smaller robot, missing a foot (could have one in the spares somewhere, from non-branded versions, or a similar Kinder type plug-together?).

 

The 'Free Comic Day' over-print is referencing an extant 'thing', the next date, is this coming May (2026), so I guess this was a promotional or freebie associated with that event, in the past. The event seems to be active in the UK, but the outfit behind it is based in the USA.

 

A fine selection of Manzingers, Grandizers, Transformers and/or Decepticons . . . or other things entirely! On the left is a stamper, with the design on it's base underside, at the back are two of the pencil-tops, which may form the follow-up to this post, while in front are two of the little mini's issued in the US by Ace Acme, but probably found over here as either capsule toys in gum-ball machines, or Christmas cracker prizes?

 

While the pair to the right are more traditional Keshi, with one 'proper' marked one (in the flesh-pink polymer), fully deformed, and one bootleg, almost certainly from gum-ball capsules, in blue.

 

OK, so, best in box! But first, the others . . . Three at the back may be from a short-lived toy line called Battle of the Planets (?) or something similar, each fold-open planet came with a handful of aliens associated with it, then we have two role-playing war games figures, one marked Grenadier (on the left) and numbered A 588, which I just cannot find on the Lost Mini's Wiki? The other, half-painted, looking like Minifigs? To their right are two marked Mega Bloks, from a line which has escaped me; I know of the little submariner figures, but these are fully-based stand-alone space/alien types?

 

Which leaves the two little 18/20mm blobs! BEST IN BOX! Against all the other contenders (the four sailors, the putty-coloured guy with the charm-loop, the lovely Napoleon on horseback, the two kneeling khaki infantry . . . ), and the reason is this;

 

I have two already, although I didn't realise it. I have one similar to the red one here, which is in the unknown GI's, as a presumed 1 or 2 cent/pence gum-ball prize, and I have a more obvious female space figure in pink, which is halfway down this page, and kept in the unknown space zone, now I know they go together, and there's more to find!

 

With a robot type and another GI 'space marine' here, I now have four in three or four poses (my blue one may be the same as this red one?)! Does anyone else know anything about them, have you got a bigger sample? They are all very clean, so maybe not that old, but I've had mine for over thirty years? Again, possibly cracker novelties over here, and maybe the small tree-crackers, at that?

 

I thought the finger-puppet was a new, fourth pose, but it's a duplicate, so may be a candidate for future painting, and I had hoped to have a fourth pose in the follow-up, as I found one in gold-paint, days before Chris's parcel arrived, but can I find it again? Can I hell, I'm sure it's in Picasa somewhere, and I've poured over the dozen or so folders it should be in, but I can't find it again, so it'll have to wait!

 

The dull yellow one is a Pokémon I think, and was found towing the French wagon when I opened the box, I have no idea on the bright yellow chap, who's been rather washed-out by the flash (Ben 10?), and the other has been seen before, here at Small Scale World, and is a rubber-jiggler, best described as a duck-billed platterpenguin! He wouldn't stand up!

 

Marked Bandai, I know nothing else about the gold winged chap, the robot is from the Buck Rogers eraser set, through which, upon Blogging here a while ago, we realised Bushy the Coppice really had started his counter-blogging nonsense!

 

The tall guy, looking a little like Moorcock's hero Elric of Melniboné (in a blazer!)  is probably a relatively recent Gashapon figure of some Japanese TV 'anime'? While the figure on the ground is . . . 

 

. . . looking like a Star Wars knock-off of Princess Leia? She's either a poorly-moulded short-shot, or another of the sand-washed beach finds, I think that Deetail Arab, in an earlier post, was, and she may go with that set of green knock-offs which were posted around the Internet about 15-years ago; were they South American, or Japanese?

 

Cartoony bits include a Jolly Jumper, faithful mount of Lucky Luke, most of a Gantoy knock-off of Muffin the Mule, missing his nodding head, he's a first sample, so stays! The weird doll-thing is looked-at below, while the pig is from one of those pre-Kinder, Hong Kong, novelty animal families.

 

We've looked at the rabbit as a teaching aid, and the orange-red blob is a Mini Bogglin, there's actually a huge bag of them in the stash somewhere, so they will get a proper post one day, but it's not a priority here!

 

This 'doll', I've seen before, that chap who was doing the beach-combing displays of polymer-shite washed up in the West Country had one, less this weird one-piece, clip-over, romper-suit, like this one his was missing its head, so your guess is as good as mine, but numerous enough to be known by some - are you one of them?

 

Manta Force from Bluebird Toys, figures and robots, I think these are the 'bots attached to the sides of one of the larger toys in the range, as they are mostly missing their bottoms (tracked units), as they were interchangeable, in that larger set.

 

Two seasonal house-burglars and a Kinder gnome, I think the one on the left is all new to me/collection, not sure on the gnome, it was a multi-issue line which ran for several years (most of a decade?), so there are a lot to find, and I do have lots about the place, but I haven't brought them all together, or compared them to the Sammler Katalog's, yet!

 

Two Matchbox, late production (Universal) on the left, a Bluebird Havok needing a base on the right, and one of those odd rack-toy 'Walker' pilots we've seen here, along with a Dr. Who viral robot 'Cybermat', actually in a much larger scale, but useful!

 

Two characters from Pif Gadget, the French kid's comic, here manufactured by Brabo, but similar figures were issued by others including Yolanda, a Micky Mouse pencil top and a Donald who looks to be almost certainly Xandria from the Netherlands? He's seen better days and all four could use a clean, but a sample is a sample!

 

Many, many thanks to Chris for all this autumn's fine plunder, he doens't have to do this, and it does all provide answers (the 'Best in Box' for instance) as well as new questions, and with so much to find, it's only the help I get from Chris, Peter, Trevor, John, Adrian, Gareth and co., which helps us all, to get to that ultimate bigger picture.

B is for Big Box of Bounty - Civilian

I rather broke the rhythm with the last post, it should have come after a bauble post, of which there are still one or two in the queue, but, hey-ho, worse things happen at sea, much worse! Looking at the civilians from Chris Smith today, and there will be a follow-up!

Another contender for best in box, I found the A-suffixed marking first and thought I/Chris had found a group of sculpts missing from the Lik Be (LB) listings, but it looks unlikely, comparing all four. However, they are rather fun, and obviously, back in the day, a touristy thing, at a price which would have been well below the hand-carved wood, or poured resin alternatives, probably sold as a set in a window-box, but possibly separate too, and, were there a D or E suffix, more even - I hope this is a complete set?

I think of them as; 

414 - A private owner or ‘weekender’, motor not sail!
414 A -  A Trawlerman.
414 B - The ‘Old Salt', probably also the local  Pilot and/or Harbourmaster! 
414 C - A Russian or Eastern-European 'jobber’, or seaman for hire.

A nice set of modern, maybe even still current China police, we did some work on these a few years back, rather by accident, with much help from a series of shelfies from Brian in New York, and it's something I'll have to return to when everything is brought together, as there are many to formally ID, even if they are on the blog somewhere already.

But for a while we were making headway, with stuff from Dolgen, Greenbrier and Jaru et al., over there and Poundland, Pound World and 99p Stores etc., over here. Where a group of Western companies will carry the same set, and another group, another set, with other sets hanging in independent convenience stores, and people like HTI sourcing yet more sculpts from somewhere else!

As with the oft-mentioned (because both Brian and Theo have sent stuff for it) firefighter page, there will need to be a police page, a footballer page, and page on motor-race officials, spectators and mechanics, with better posts than so far on fishermen, divers, cricket &etc . . . all these things take time!

Likewise, these game-playing pieces! I don't know this lot (but they may be in the archive somewhere), I know the guys with suitcases, I know the people waiting for a bus, I know two or three sets of busts, and while several of them are police/espionage/crime related, and I think these three (of four?) will be of that ilk, I currently don't know!

Three polystyrene Blue-Box copies of Dinky mechanics, and one of the lesser sub-piracies in grey polyethylene, as an aside, I picked up three of the Marx construction worker copies, mentioned in passing in the Military plunder-post the other day, at Sandown park, so they are in the queue, and it's another example of a page that will need to be produced one day, all the road-work and construction figures!

We've either seen this guy before, or the matching motorcycle rider (possibly also from Chris), and I do now know who he is, he's The Lucky Toys, in a 3-inch scale they usually didn't touch, next to him is a marked Funrise figure, and a small novelty badge (a simple pen-clip slip-over), for which there is a drawer, somewhere!

Farming; the figures on either side (children?) may be connected, but their differences match their similarities in number - I think they ARE the same source. He looks as if he should be holding a sack, or a lamb?

 

The second figure is possibly Lemax, from the Christmas Village (enough items listed now, for a busy city!), becoming quite common over here now (it was a US thing), with two Garden Centres known to me stocking them, the squirrel has lost it's tail and looks like a gopher!

While the larger is another of, or from the same source of that multi-series, multiscale, multi-issuer range which was around in the 1990's, as die-cast vehicle and big-box play set accessories who will need a big post one day!

Seated figures include a Blue Box tractor driver, a couple of Tudor Rose (or copies - green and yellow chaps), a possible Thomas in blue (top right), a possible Blue Box copy of Marx dolls house figure (painted woman), a more modern driver and a couple of racing car drivers with some vintage.

A real mix here, with a Marty circus horse, Zoo Quest hunter (Ariel), HK copy railway figure (pink), two Slater's or similar O-gauge railway figures, the painted kid is marked (C) 98 & INRES if that means anything to anyone?

The chap with the charm loop, might be a European product mascot/premium, and one of the major members of the animal forums uses an identical one, as his sizer for animals and dinosaurs, so when I become more active on those than I have been so far, he will prove very useful indeed, but I don't know his origins?

Likewise, the chef, is probably a product/retailer mascot of some kind, he's on a plinth (poor photograph, sorry). The figure far-left could be Kinder, or similar and is a reduced-scale Playmobil clone, and the guy in blue overalls might be Supreme, but he looks too well detailed?

Firefighters, with a possible Pioneer or Realtoy (painted, sand base), two Matchbox (silver), and several others, far right is probably French, and from a die-cast (or aluminium?) fire appliance, and I think we've seen the brown one, bagged!

Many thanks as always to Chris for all these, and everything else he shares with us, I'll gather a few bits for a follow-up, and maybe get something out tonight.

B is for Big Box of Bounty - Vehicles, Bits & Bobs

Well, luckily I have a day off, today, as I have a ton of plastic shite . . . Sorry, 'polymer loveliness' to sort and photograph, from the BP Sandown Park toy fair, yesterday, where I had a excellent day, but before I get started on that, here's the latest instalment of the plunder-posts from Chris Smith's most recent donation to the blog, which is all the man-made stuff! 

 

This is rather nice! A probably French farm-cart, in that heavy, hard-toffee-like polystyrene material, which I suspected was probably French, but sent these images to the authors of FIM, just in case they hadn't seen it, however, they were familiar with it, and were also of the opinion it is French.

 

It has a lovely tipping-action, via a lever at the front, and may be missing a probably removable back-board or ladder-rave, wheels seem to be the same polymer, while the white tyres are a polyethylene, I think? Maker still needed though?

 

This is how it came out of the box, with a Pokémon (?) hitched-up!

 

A Blue Box Austin champ, which seems to have been deliberately cut-back, in preparation for some conversion, or super-detailing? It will go in the spares for now, while the little PVC Galoob knock-off is new to me, Blog and the collection.

 

The weird landing craft belongs with various generic rack-toy 'army men' and diver sets, and while having various holes in which it looks like something should be plugged-in, is found just like this, in sealed sets!

 

More rack-toys with a militarised executive jet and one of the MPC mini-plane piracies, all useful, and the Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcar (which Dad jumped out of, on many occasions), seems to be one of the slightly bronzed-silver versions which are harder to find.

 

The submarine is from a modern rack-toy, or rack-toys, and we've probably seen it here in sealed/shelfied set/s in recent years, and is a useful loose addition. The racing car is from one of those credit-card shaped (and material) novelty sets, I have dinosaurs in the collection somewhere, and there are several sets of jet fighters.

 

The sports-car with lenticular 'window' is an old 1d or 2p gum-ball capsule-machine prize, while the locomotive is a modern (possibly Kinder) take on the old erzgebirge toy, where several wagons, or coaches, would be hooked or tied-together as a full train.

 

Three cracker-toy type bikes/motorcycles in the front-left 'row', with the larger bike we've seen before in various greens or spray-camouflage, associated with the Supreme/Ackerman, 'Fritz-helmeted' PVC figures, while the chap on the right is a Hong Kong rider, I think, used for both motorcycles and the quad-bike type machines?

 

A couple of flags (Norway (R) and semi-fictional 'African', left ) and what I suspect is the top of an animal 'toob', being a spinning map of the world, possibly seen here as a shelfie, I can't recall, but it looks familiar? One feels it's just the accessory for a evil Doctor's lair in some superhero or Bond'esque scenario, as the conference table!

 

I'd love to know where the axe comes from or who it belongs to, the shovel will be from one of the eight or ten-inch Action Man/GI Joe rip-offs, the pistol looks like a Christmas cracker prize, and more specifically, the mini, tree-crackers? I think the lantern with clear-marble lens is a doll's house accessory, due to its diminutive size, similar tourist items tend to be larger and have a pencil-sharpener secreted about them!

 

Part of a rack-toy bridge, an oil-drum, which may be Airfix and a rather nice, probably Hong Kong made wheelbarrow, which could have conveniently been for that yellow figure (Chris reports Eric Critcley as confirming him being a French farmer and not a cowboy), but it's too big!

However, with so many farmworker and construction/road-worker figures in the 'unknown civilian' zones, I'm sure it'll fit someone, even if it doesn't actually belong to them! Soft polyethylene with a very small wheel, is it from something cartoony like Bob the Builder?

 

Bits of the 'Bucking Bronco' jig-toy puzzle, a Richard I label which may prove useful one day, clearly it belongs on the base/plinth of a statuette or figure of some kind, which may come in, or already be in the stash, without a label?

 

The other casualty of Royal Fail's comprehensive parcel-mashing programme, was the blob to the right, which deserves a restoration! It's got the Airfix Reconnaissance Set's German dispatch-rider at it's core, with the wheels of a US M3 half-track either side and something on the back, and would seem to have been a home-made sci-fi bike thing, with the rider, now headless, painted up like a Soviet general on May 1st!

 

Marx (?) on the left, modern rack-toy/play-set boulder on the right!

 

Manta Force from Bluebird/Tomy, both missing bits, but both usable, and while other Manta stuff is in the forthcoming Sci-fi post, one day we'll redo all the Bluebird overviews, which were back near the beginning of the Blog and well overdue for an updated treatment, and these will be useful for that!