F is for Follow-ups - Lucky / LB

I've been photographing all sorts of odd-and-sods in the last few months, had bits sent in by readers/followers, had three hardly-used photo-sessions at Sandown and several decent purchases in Charity shops, and I'm starting to sort some of it out into some sort of order, and we'll be dipping into it all between now and Christmas, starting with a few follow-up's to previous posts here at Small Scale World.

This is one of several additions to the Luck Toys box in the past few months, the others being either duplicates or below! He's missing his arm, but he came in a mixed lot from a charity shop, so A) I was stuck with him and B) it turned-out he was a new variation of base mark, but only for this figure, the base actually tying-him in to the firemen, some of whom have the 1112 coding, along with the race mechanics.

This was 50p at Sandown Park toy fair last weekend, he seems to be another of the Lucky, Clifford, OK [et al] figures, but not one I'm familiar with and the first in the larger 54/60mm range with the smooth base in a flesh-coloured styrene plastic of the generic 40mm figures we looked at here.

He's a paint conversion of a Minimodels racing-car driver, having a cigarette before the race, from the Scalextric series, but he's also lost his fag in the Hong Kong pantograph!

27-11-17 - I think this may turn-out to be a Roxy Toy figure, as will the smaller versions in the same pink plastic with smooth bases?

Ages ago we looked at the LB divers from the cake-decoration range (they were also sold from racks - witness the Lifeguard carded set in Plastic Warrior issue 166), with an addition from a reader a few days later; here are two more which came-in back in the summer some time. 

Since corrected to Lik Be / LB. There is no known connection between The Lucky Toys and LB, which simplifies things, but both are in this post, because of past connections, Blogwise.

P is for Paint Your Own! These Are Mine!

The reason I was light on critique, running through the earlier posts today, was that I wanted to bring them all together as it'll be god knows when we look at them again, and because I'd not shot the rears or obverse sides in the earlier photo-shoot! Call it loose-ends!

So . . . are they worth getting? Yes.

Firstly - if you do what I did and buy the deal-pairs they work out at £1.25p each; per figure. Now the average price - of all the figures in a sizable collection - is around £1, once you add up all the single figures, bags of shite, expensive lots, five of these for a tenner, 8 of those for a fiver, "Give us a couple of quid" (15 figs when you get them home and count them), charity-shop bags, it's about a pound a figure on the year, say. . . and let's be honest here: A) that's the intrinsic value at most, and B) that should be what you're always aiming for, this isn't Mesopotamian antiquities we're collecting here!

That's for the 54-60-mil bracket of course; it's about 50p per figure if you're a small scale collector, it used to be about 10p averaged over the year, but the big bags of HK shite don't happen anymore and I regularly watch mixed, loose, lots of HK/Airfix/Revell/Esci getting bid-up to silly-money on evilBay, so it's about 50p now.

Therefore one-twenty-five for brand-new, larger scale figures is a bargain.

Secondly, they are worth having, they are mostly decent sculpts, original designs (question mark over the Dinosaurs) and of a reasonable size for one task or another whether adorning a self, joining war-games armies, or getting a starring role in role-play!

Thirdly, they might very-well help bring youngsters into the collecting fold.

These are a tad on the small side for 54mm, at around 50mm dead, but they are delicate little princesses, so having a slighter countenance whilst standing next to your Starlux Napoleonic officer types won't be that incongruous?

They are single mouldings (only the Magical Beasts are multi-part), quite well-done, not very cartoony and 'different', these are nice figures, will paint-up well and are definitely worth a punt.

The real disappointment is this set. Don’t get me wrong, it's savable, they will make worthy role-play or D&D type character figures, the Centaur is a bit too-chunky to join the Merten versions, even though the scale's about right.

But overall, this set is cartoony in execution, it's not severe and can be hidden with paint, but it's also flashy (the only flashy set) and will need a lot of 'cleaning-up' and then there's this problem with the separate components not fitting and while I've had half a go at two of them, they'll all need work.

It's a shame because they are relatively unique in this vague scale range of 28-40mm (ignoring the [baby] Dragon!), it's like they came from another factory . . .well they probably did, no; that's not strictly true; I think the Princesses and the Magical Beasts share an origin, but the Princesses - being stand-alone sculpts - are more easily, better finished.

I'm glad I've got a set, but it's definitely caveat emptor if you go and buy them, I'm not recommending this set - sadly. The Griffon and the Werewolf/Ogre will probably swing-it if you do decide to buy!

Which is a point worth making actually; the book-box covers do lift; in-store, so you can check the contents of all the sets before you purchase.

Happy to recommend this set though, if Dinosaurs are your thing, these are lovely, the plates of the Stegosaur - for instance - are very fine, rigid enough to hold their shape, yet soft enough to escape rough-handling damage, surface detail is fine and they remind me of the WHSmith ones a couple of years ago, or those nicely painted ones which keep turning up in different pound-shop brands, TK Maxx et al.

While these are almost the cream of the crop, I'll try and track down an answer to the 3/4 sculpts question mark (Google says: x2 duplicate pose . . . fussa-russa!), but they are lovely sculpts, the horns are a bit disappointing, but if you remove them, you instantly have some really nice-looking horse-flesh, or if you texture them (the horns) and paint them up they'll look equally good as larger unicorns in 28/40mm scenarios or small unicorns in 54-60mm settings.

They are 35mm to the shoulder and about 50 to the crown, and may be copies of the Breyer 'Horse Crazy Surprise Horse Painting Kits' range of blind-bag craft collectables, with an added horn?

For the hell of it! Nine colours to work with if you purchase all four sets, but there are other sets as I said earlier today and maybe the owls or one of the plaster-casting sets have a grey, light-brown or some other colours?

All four sets are piled-high in The Works; Fleet, Basingrad and Farnborough in the last few weeks and still there last time I looked, go; check 'em out for yourselves, don't take my word for it - it's only an opinion! And if you wouldn't be seen dead buying stuff like this in the high-street . . . they'll start turning-up, badly painted, in mixed lots at car-boot sales or in charity shops in about 18-months time!

P is for Paint Your Own Unicorns

From the cover you'd be forgiven for thinking this was going to be wetter that the Princesses, someone in the marketing office came to the same conclusion, with the result the models have been put on the cover, which is useful!

Of the four sets today though; this is both the best of sets and the worst of sets, but it's all marginal!

Same as the others - only different!

Same as the others etc...

So, to 'the best of sets'; these are some of the nicest Unicorns out there, dense PVC with all the properties of polyethylene, they are anatomically horse-like, with fine detail well moulded. However; there appears to be only three poses with the first and third being the same.

It's hard to tell from the cover, but I think the one at the back left is a Photoshoped version of the one in front of it? I will check the remaining sets in the shop however just in case it's a mistake (as if they are different, or supposed to be; they are similar in every way; other than those two rear legs, and fit the shaped blister tray), yet, the box does state 4 unique models?

But also to 'the worst of sets'; the booklet has a collection of very simple games and puzzles, while the paints have two reds and two blues leaving little for wider artistic scope, but the 'projects' are all in the pallet of the cartoon artwork, so it's of no consequence if that's what you've bought them for!

Even the backdrop is the poorest of the four . . . won't stop me reusing it at some point!

As last! I would also point out that all the booklets have a separate RRP on the back cover, stating £4.99, so may be (or may have been) available separately somewhere at some point? With the whole set also RRP'd - to 12.99; two-for-ten-pounds are a bargain.

P is for Paint Your Own Dinosaurs

There are various other sets within the Activity Station range, there's even another set in the Paint Your Own theme - Owls (! Should I?), but with at least two peg-doll sets, various cheapie-Playdoh-substitute related sets, plaster-casting, beads and the like they are well worth a look if you are shopping for younger relatives in the next week or two.

Third Time Today!

Third Time Today!

Scenic backdrop - Check! Four PVC Models - Check! Camera - Check! Batteries - Check! Photograph - Check! Stegosaurus - Check! Brachiosaurus - Check! Triceratops - Check! Tyrannosaurus - Check!

The models are denser PVC and differ from the others we've looked at today (which are all unmarked) in another way, they are clearly marked down the belly "MADE IN CHINA", they also look similar to other dinosaur models, but without comparing all the boxes of them it's not an easy call - there are thousands of toy & model dinosaurs out there, yet the bulk of them only cover about 15-20 'headline' species and three poses; standing, walking and running, so they do all look similar!

The booklet this time covers various dinosaurs (in addition to the four 'project' breeds) with thumbnail sketch-biographies and there's a simplified timeline of the eras. The graphics of the booklet are firmly geared toward a Jurassic Park meme, while the box is attempting a more 1950's pulp-look I think, but not that successfully.

With black, white, the three primaries and green; I think the Dinosaurs get the best six-pot, paint-selection of the sets we've looked at.

Third Time Today!

P is for Paint Your Own Magical Beasts

No - Once you've painted them they won't help you win the lottery or stop that bloody Walters' [with a s!] blogging, they're not that kind of Magical Beasts, the word they needed was 'mythological', but it's too long and complicated for the target age-group of The Works 'Paint You Own' Activity Station sets from Top That Publishing/Tide Mill Media. But mythological they are.

Did I say earlier that they are seven-quid each or two-for-ten-pounds, in The Works now; this one is aimed as squarely at boys as the previous one (posted below) is at girls, and it's no good quoting some califon-eye-ay PC bollocks at me, some things are as old as the hills and gender-preference is one of them, sure tomboy girls will love this set and glass-haired Quentin's will want a set of Princesses . . . well; I've got one and I 'aint no nancy-boy! What-choo sayin'? Ooo's the daddy round 'ear!

Same format, same pack-drill; artwork is Hobbit'esque, the mighty Smaug, a bit of a disappointment when you see the model!

Four models, 6 paints, brush, booklet, card backdrop . . . tray . . . book-like box.

The figures; this time we have (from the left again) a Dragon, Centaur, Werewolf and Griffon, so two from heraldry and two more fairy-tail/fantasy types.

You may have spotted in the previous shot that these are more complicated models, with the problem of undercuts solved with multi-part construction; these have been fettled badly (if at-all?) and then seemingly glued in a hurry with no effort, as a result they are relatively easy to pry apart and trim to fit, before being glued together again.

I glued them with my go-to for PVC; plumbers sealant. The brand I'm using at the moment is Polypipe SC125 Solvent Cement (active ingredient: bisphenol A-epichlorohydrin epoxy resin [AV MW<700]) which wealds PVC instantly. However it's an old tub and has started to dry-out, so it needs to be blobbed-on with a toothpick, which fills the joins nicely as it shrinks tight on fully drying (overnight).

You can also see the 'Werewolf' looks more like one of those alligator troopers from 2000AD (was it the Judge Cal storyline?) and will make a better troll or ogre or even 'The Beast' for a Paint Your Own Princesses' 'Beauty'.

The Centaur got the same treatment and the other two need work, but I did these two for the photo-shoot!

Confirming the brush quality compared to the quality of the usual 'craft brush' efforts, it's a synthetic squirrel or sable, and won't last long, especially if you use it with old school spirit enamels, but for the purpose at hand, not too shabby at all!

This time we get a green, but at a cost to the blue, which one needs for all the other blues, and purples, so a bigger remiss?

This booklet gives potted histories of other mythical (Unicorn), fantasy (Ents), folklore (Black Shuck) and even horror (Dracula) beasts between the painting 'projects'. The fold/crease-distressing on the booklet and box is deliberate graphics, not my having sat on them for years!

Another useful scenic backdrop we will see again occasionally.

Again; the Consumer Info. panel for those who want it, and you may have worked out by now that there's more to come . . . Dinosaurs in a while!

P is for Paint Your Own Princess

Currently in The Works for seven-quid, or two-for-£10, but going fast in the consumer-fest which precedes the celebration of the non-birthday of the Little Baby Jesus, are these 'Paint Your Own' sets with four figures to paint, contents are 100% China, but the whole thing [idea/concept?] is licensed to Top That Publishing and copyrighted to Tide Mill Media at the same address.

We're talking princesses, and if you think there's more than a passing resemblance between these 'generic' princesses (hey; you get four of 'em in one place - and they become pretty generic!) and the princesses of a certain Florida-based culture entertainment house, you'll be on the nail!

Attractively packaged for the coming season, the cover lifts to check the contents which pull from under the window in a tray. The brush is a good one, not the usual stiff 'craft' effort with the same bristles as a tooth-brush; always the biggest disappointment with this type of thing when I was a kid - even 'household name' model manufactures used to put shit brushes in their 'starter kits', jeeze!

Here are their Royal Highnesses; they are in a medium-soft PVC vinyl resin, about the same consistency as bendy-toys, but without the bend! What I consider 'standard' PVC! And they each have a name . . . auuwh . . . bless!

From the left and moving to the right we have; Princess Olivia of Aqualand (it's very wet), Princess Sophie of Varovia (Russkie = fake-news central), Princess Georgina of Ratania (it's a rodent's nest) and Princess Alice of Galantine (artist running out of ideas!) and I'm not making this up - somebody else got paid to do that! Where do they advertise these jobs? "Wanted, copy-writer - must be capable of mawkish nonsense" . . . I could do that!

As you can see there is also a cardboard backdrop, which I have to confess will feature here again from time to time, like the little flower-meadow thing which came in one of the Insect sets (I think?) about a year ago, and which has reappeared from time to time; so this will prove useful with other cartoony, fantasy or girly subjects I'm sure!

The booklet that accompanies them has each princess given a painting 'project', between which are relatively brief versions of old fairy tales involving princesses! This illustration reminded me of the old Ladybird Book on the Princess and the Pea, but I think it's all new artwork.

Six water-based PVC paints are included - mercifully full, unlike that magazine premium Tardis we looked at ages ago, along with the useful brush, no green - you have to mix that yourself - although, despite mixing instructions in each project for all the pinks, mauves and purples [deemed necessary] there is no instruction for green, but let's face it -  it IS about the first thing we ever learn . . . along with playing the triangle and spelling 'Granny'!

The Consumer Information Panel. If you're wondering why I've said so little about the figures, it's because that's coming later.

A is for Armstrong Whitworth, not Northrop, apparently!

This post will - unbeknown to you (if only I could keep my gob shut) - be accompanied by frantic Googling to check facts, and will probably have been last-minute-edited at the time of posting!

Returning to what used to be so 'rare' it's existence wasn't known, and is now becoming a bit of a perennial - this being the second or third we've seen now?!

However, previous investigation suggested it might be a Northrop experimental; one of two if memory serves, both of which were well within the early war (World War Two to the youngsters) date I have pinned on the original first run of the Palitoy aircraft range from which this model comes.

In fact (the bit which will have been frantically Googled in the last few minutes!), I was told by a chap at Sandown Park this weekend that it was an ArmstrongWhitworth design the AW 52, something which hadn't even featured in previous research, and as the [just found] link [hopefully] shows - that is the case, with the strange pipes coming of the trailing edges which never quite matched the vanes of the Northrop designs.

Like the other examples we have seen (and unlike the rest of the Palitoy range) the aircraft type is not listed among the markings, which are otherwise just as 'vocal' as the other models we've looked at with - from the left, looking from below;

Palitoy Regd.

Non Flam.

CAS

____

CAS

Made In England

The CAS being almost certainly British Cascelloid Limited, the parent company's name; the retail trademark Palitoy being a play on the founder's name, a Mr. A. E. Pallett. Celastoid being the 1920's trademark of rival British Celanese Limited's cellulose-acetate, aircraft modeling parts.

Because stuff sometimes hangs around in Picasa for a while, until I work out what to do with it, or wait for a suitable post to slip it into; this has been hanging around since the last Sandown show in September (Mercator Trading to thank for both) and now's clearly the post to slip it into.

Around 1:50th scale, this bears all the hallmarks of the aircraft range (without the 'CAS') but is part of a small range dated by vehicle collectors to 1948, this could mean the aircraft models too; date from later than suits my previous pontification, although I think this model (with a replacement wheel) has more in common with what I consider later (flat colour) issues of the 'planes (such as this flying wing) rather than the flecked/recycled/waste-plastic ones, but clearly more digging needs to be done!

Previouslyon Small Scale World (this post will reappear at the top of the results page - scroll down!)

T is for Two - British Farm Items

This post should really be F is for Four... as they all came in different lots! These are a few items from recent charity shop buys, which happened to fit together!

The calf came first (with one of the goats below) with a mixed bag of mostly zoo animals and I was chuffed to get it as it's a flocked calf from Wend-Al, about a week later I picked-up the farmer in a bag of farm people . . . well I say "...farm people", there were a couple of mechanics and a superhero too!

He is Wend-Al too, so I now have a burgeoning Wend-Al farm collection of err....two! I rather like his painting, compared to some of the versions in the Philip Dean book, this one could pass for Richthofen or a young Goring walking out to their World War One 'string-bag'!

The calf from both sides, one (left) side is a bit threadbare (or should that be flockbare!), the other (right) is a bit grubby, but they are hard to find in any condition so I'm quite pleased with him. As far as I can tell from the aforementioned book the flocking was undertaken by Wend-Al themselves, some firms tended to use contractors?

One of these came with the calf in a bag of mostly zoo animals, the other came in a bag of mostly farm animals, with a few zoo animals, such is the logic of charity shops, they were bought at the same time from the same self!

The other came in an entirely different lot altogether, but both are Cherilea, the smaller from the old lead hollow-casting mould, the other - the first's replacement - designed for polymer injection-moulding and slightly larger.

However they share characteristics and were possibly from the same hand; the treatment of the fur (hair? I think goats have hair not fur!) is very similar, but the second sculpt has a better handle on animal-flesh and a slightly less static pose?

Since the chickens came-in earlier in the year and especially since the start of Barney Brown's series in Plastic Warrior magazine I am watching out for these, and it turned out there was another kicking around, this one with slightly better paint and the belly-mark; missing from the new one.

They both also have the red starey-eyes (or remains of) Barney mentioned in relation to the pigs in part one of his series - part two may be in the next PW which will be due in a couple of weeks, PlasticWarrior's Blog; if you need to subscribe! They are all a bit tatty for purists, but they will suffice as 'box-tickers' until something better turns up.

C is for Colorbaby's Colourful Combat Mission from CB Toys

Many Thanks to Peter Evans for sending this CB Toys branded rack-toy to the Blog, he found it in Gran Canarias (I believe), imported by Colorbaby of Alicante, Spain, there are other versions of these out there as we will see at the end, so keep an eye out if you fancy any of the componants, several of which are useful, and in both main scales.

Colorbaby have a website: www.colorbaby.es

You get; a handful of mostly Matchbox US Infantry copies, a 'rigid-raider' rubber boat (sans motor), a drug-runner's speedboat (!) a rather well done sandbag wall/emplacement and a sub-scale LVTP-7 (or are we up to 8 these days?).

Colours are wacky, which is how some of us like our rack-toys! And these are sub-sub-piracies, much smaller than the originals, with signs of re-sculpting; simplified detailing etc...

Two of the figures are taken from the New Ray (also Toymark) AFV set's crew of ten or twelve years ago and which (the figures) we looked at here (also see below) quite a while ago.

As I've said the sandbag sanger is quite well done, the bags are a bit uniform in shape and a pit rigid in the posing, but they have a nice texture to them and would paint-up well and let's face it; who's sandbags are actually that good?

Also; look who's snuck into frame - it's our old rack-toy friend 'Rambo-man' with his one-handed M60 action and the everlasting, never-twisting, magic ammo-belt!

One of the figures has a serious tumour which will require surgery, this is usually a sign of the mould-shot being removed from the tool too soon, allowing still-liquid, pressurised polymer to break out of a weak-point on the products cooling surface, like magma from a fissure in the Earth's surface!

The figures are otherwise unmarked.

So to the more useful bits (the sandbags are OK, they're useful too!), the rubber boat, it would benefit from an engine, but experience tells most collectors have a spare Britains or Timpo outboard kicking around somewhere, so that shouldn't be a big problem, failing that you'll need a paddler, today's is from Matchbox, who's own boat is in the comparison-shot to the right.

The LVTP is - on one level - good, but on another level; poor. It is very like the old Airfix 'readymades', with no under-detailing, just a big hollow space but not for carpet wheels, and the nose doesn't look right to me (could it be a model of a scaled-down Chinese PLA copy or Japanese SDF licensed version? [Wikipedia says no]. But it is otherwise a nicely tooled model for what it is - a rack toy - and will definitely be useful for war-gaming, if only due to the price it's likely to be found at . . . this one was only two Euro's - and that's if you throw the rest of the contents in the bin?

I was rather taken with the juxtaposition of consumer information panels giving the message that the soldier force might be a threat to 3-year olds!

The New Ray/Toymark figures in the centre, the reverse of the CB's and the much-modified dancing loon we looked at about six weeks or 80-odd posts ago, how many other variations are out there?!!

Here is a video on Youtube of a larger set with more realistic colours being opened and sorted, three LVTP's for a pittance?

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9ECU3YId70

JTSH is for John Talbot Savignac Hall, Rear Admiral!

Yes - they did naming differently in the Victorian era, I'm plain Hugh David! It's the eleventh of the eleventh today so a bit of a quiet reflection, we looked at his 'Pom-Pom' yesterday and I thought I'd pay what little tribute to him I feel able to.

Looking good in his Tropical or Summer Dress 'whites', there is a slightly sterner picture of him on the Indian Navy website; he's also on Wikipedia, taken when he was older, the above shot is of him when he was a Commander.

JTS - as he was known - was my Grandfather on my mother's side and he rose to become the first Naval Chief of the Indian Navy after Independence - serving in the post for one year, from the 15th Aug 1947 to the 14th Aug 1948, during which time he reorganised the newly independent Indian Navy and - along with Lord Mountbatten, Commodore Nott and Commander AK Chatterji (who would himself go on to command the Indian Navy) among others - prepared a ten-year plan for the development of the new Navy.

The plan was thrown into chaos a year later when a tropical typhoon damaged most of the fleet.

His last ship - isn't she beautiful? At various times - I believe - known as HMS, HMNZS and HMINS Achilles and latterly as HMINS and INS Delhi (I'm not sure about the first prefix of those last two?) she was a Light Cruiser.

The open bridge is a surprise on a ship of that size and date, but there had been a war on and sailors were weathered, rugged sorts back then, they probably enjoyed the fresh air and excellent view!

She is flying the Indian flag, so this must be a 'Delhi' shot, as there is a full ships-company parade going-on and the ship is flying the ensign of a Rear Admiral, it may well have been taken on her name-change day, or even Independence Day?

And - the above image doesn't appear in a Google image-search result's page, so new to the internet?

Airfix made a kit of her sister ship Ajax, which I was given - for obvious reasons - too young to do it justice and I made a predictable hash of it, although I still have the turrets in a spares bag somewhere!

His role as a rather symbolic bridge between the colonial and independent administrations left both governments slightly embarrassed by my Grandfather and he never got the knighthood he probably should have, retiring to farm apples in Kent and run the local Civil Defence, he died before I was born, so I never knew him.

I wish I could ask him about it all now, Gallipoli, the South China seas and Indian Ocean, pirates, pom-poms . . . Achilles! My Granddad drove HMS Achilles . . . get in!

Sorry granddad . . . rest in peace.