U is for Unknown Wild West Flats - 3 - Known 'Hong Kong' of Origin

On to those unknown Wild West flats about which one fact IS known; that they are from Hong Kong! And we have seen most of them here already I suspect, but I'm literally 'box ticking' a whole box with these four posts!

Flat, 35mm'ish copies of the Crescent/Kellogg's 54mm solid Indians! Obviously copied by hand rather than pantograph, and copied poorly, with bits missing (the tail of the archer's headdress!) or badly moulded.

I have a single yellow one, so there must be more, and likewise the slosh of gloss-blue on the other addition to the line-up could be home paint, but I suspect a minimally-painted version was put out there at some point.

Those of you of an observant persuasion will have noticed that the two eagle-bird men are very different sculpts, one having a feathery hood, the other 'fish-scales'. I have a dozen or so of the red ones and there is quite a bit of variance, but the 'Hong Kong' mark is the same on all of them, so it's hand-copied straight to multiple cavities I think!

We have definitely seen these on the Blog but I had a couple of loose ones in storage and couldn't remember whether or not I mentioned last time that they are scale-downs of the old Gibb's 'Toob' flats from the USA, I don't have any copies of the Gibb's US Cavalry poses, but it has to be wondered if they too were pirated, at the same time? Still missing the wagon!

These are semi-flat and probably accompany some of the smaller mounted figures you find from Hong Kong, I only have the one pose and the two figures - about 45mm. Along with the first lot they are a soft polyethylene ('polythene').

U is for Unknown Wild West Flats - 2 - Common Type - Pod Feet

So . . . we've visited these a while ago, as direct a result of the original article in Plastic Warrior magazine issue 15 and I muttered about three types in storage, well; here they all are, only there were four types and a fifth, similar chap!

This is the sample size I'm working from, with little clue-wise on the cards apart from the possibility that the larger version may be Italian, I would only have written the note if one of the Italians who came to the old Russell Square Toy Soldier Shows had told me so?

The cowboy poses; from the apparently commoner (and certainly more numerous) version. Their colour-scheme differs from the Indians greatly, being a cold, metallic palate with a few blues and greens thrown-in to reinforce dampness!

Compared to the Indians (next shot) they also lack mounted poses (spell-check wants a 'posse'!), I expect some more to turn up at some point, indeed, I expect more poses all-round; I think we're looking for a 20-a-side for a minimum 40-count?

Funny!

Note three different poses of lassoer, including a Britains Herald copy . . . or if these are as early as they might be; did the Britains sculptor have one of these Flats on his desk? I thing it's the flats plagiarising, as there is derivation of other makers figures too.

The Indians come in fiery reds, yellow and oranges, along with some fawn/brown ones and the odd bit of marbling. They have 19-poses to the cowboys' 16, but as we will see in a minute, there may be a 21 count for these chaps already?

Again there seems to be the influence of various other fully-round figures, including Bergen/Beton and continental plastics?

The four types I have now;

On the left are larger (possibly Italian) versions, without the little pilloti or 'columnette' between the pod-foot base and the figures. Actually the metallic-red cowboy ends-up slightly smaller as a result, so the copying was probably by pantograph, with some variance in the size change/difference between the two sets.

In the middle the common versions, with to the upper right three soft plastic ones, which could be from the 1970's, and may be Christmas Cracker things, or those Maltese 'throw from the window' things we looked at with the zoo animals from the Swagman's Daughter?

Bottom right are those previously claimed as WHW, I think that's obviously a red-herring now, and while these two are a tad chunkier (they've been fattened-up to demi-rond!) and obvious copies, they are probably 'after' the common set.

Also; 1) I think the marbled one I shot with another silver firer last time was actually from one of the other two sets (possibly the 'Italian' set, he was quite large) and 2), both these small samples add mounted figure poses to the grand total, which if they are also from the common set (as sculpts) would give the 21-count as a starter for the Indians?

Then there's this chap! Better finish, new pose, with more substantial, sharper chamfered baseletts/pod-feet, the chamfer is reversed from the other sets as well.

I kept the other figure in the pack in case it was the delivery vehicle, like cereal-premiums, but after photographing them it's obviously some dealer's nonsense, the figure's damaged in two places but the bits aren't in the bag! And if he belongs to the common set, he's in the wrong colour!

If the musing by myself last time about cigarette-premiums is anywhere near the truth, there may only be two or three types here, with a larger variation of sculpts - by way of cavities or replacement moulds - within the full set, but I've sorted enough figures over the years to be happy with the demarcations I've given them at the moment!

U is for Unknown Wild West Flats - 1 - 'Wild West' (Flats!)

The reason for these posts (there's four of them) is actually a return to the figures in the next post, but I thought I'd get the boxed set out of the way first. Because it's a few weeks now since I sorted out most of the two lots of flats I can't recall if these were here or in Basingrad, nor can I remember whether we've had them on the Blog yet or not? No matter, if we have . . . here they are again, if we haven't; here's some new flats for the blog!

 

These could be European, they could even be Hong Kong, they may well be British, but from the nature of the box-art; a RCMP 'Mountie' and a First Nation chap being all friendly (The native has a war-bonnet on and inside the box has got his knife out!) I wonder if they may be from Canada?

Apart from the piece of artwork you can see on the lid; there is nothing, anywhere else on - or in - the box, liner or tray to indicate anything about anyone or anyplace, so still very 'unknown'.

There is some damage to most of them; either the Indians knife/knife-hand or the horses tails, mainly caused by the warping of the tray over time . . . but there are one of each good enough for close-ups!

Quality is better than Hong Kong, bases are deeper than Nosco and squarer-cornered than any European margarine premiums, so . . . British or Canadian? But 'Far West'? A bit odd for Mounties . . . maybe they are Hong Kong!

T is for Two - Card Forts

Competing with the Raytel (and other) forts in the mid-to-late 1970's (as seen here earlier today) were these card bulding kits from two of the bigger names in toys at the time - Britains and Marx.

Britains 1977 catalogue carried these four card play-sets, covering the main genres of their figures/vehicles and providing a quick and easy, affordable set of buildings or scenics. They reappeared in the '78 catalogue and then disappeared forever, I think? When they come-up for sale these days; they do fetch a premium price!

[Might take a minute to load, I accidentally scanned it at 600dpi, so it's ten-times the size of the Britians image, but I didn't realise until I was uploading it just now!]

Marx answered in their 1978 catalogue with these two, although they were scaled slightly larger to equip the world of Playmobil, known as 'Playpeople' in the Marx universe (the 52-page catalogue having no other figures in it, apart from the 12" Wild West dolls), they would nevertheless prove useful for 54 or 60mm figures.

The Marx kits are modular and slot-together for easy putting-away after play, the Britains' required gluing, another reason for their rarity today, but then I can't say I've ever seen one of the Marx ones, so they're probably harder to find! St. Marx Hospital . . . geddit!

R is for Raytel (Pershore) Limited - Wooden Forts

From the archive, and there will be more and more of this stuff as I get it all scanned-in, today we're looking at some wooden forts I will never have in the collection, because I have neither the space nor the inclination to start collecting those tatty, play-worn forts half-filled with a mix of Airfix and Britains 'Herald Hong Kong' one sees at car boot sales any day of the week!

You may not recognise the Raytel name, but I bet that if you're between 40 and 50-years of age, you had at least one of their products in your toy stash. Good, solid - now called - 'traditional' toys, although they have always been made and still are, there are several makers exhibiting stuff like this at the London Toy Fair every year, and we saw similar forts and vessels from Papo not that long ago.

I would add, that you can see in the image a loss of quality over the Tri-ang/Pedigree stuff those of us in the 50-60+ years bracket had, and upon which these seem based, thinner tubes on the chair and table, thinner wooden legs, plain blocks, plastic wheels etc . . . none of it is quite as substantial as the previous generation's playthings.

Close-up of the previous shot shows us the stuff we're interested in now, as 'grown-up' toy soldier fans, two wooden forts from their 1977 catalogue; a traditional castellated affair with buttressed corners and an unusual, hexagonal log-fort, from the frontiers of toy-land.

Main Street, Fort Town, Woodsville! There's a third and some blurb! Is that the proper spelling of Medieval?  Fort [John?] Wayne looks a bit like our childhood fort but ours was hand-made by our parents and had thick walls and deeper barracks along the back wall!

I like how the presence of a moat round the Mediaeval Castle is hinted at by a low wall; if the drawbridge is up, that's it - you'll have to wait 'till the post comes or the milk's delivered!

Having pointed out that the overall quality of Raytel's products was less substantial than those that went before, I would say these seem to be made of real wood and/or ply sheet, unlike some of their contemporary rivals who used pressed-hardboard, a forerunner of MDF and the stuff peg-boards (for rack-toys) were made of, which had a tendency to warp in damp, or collapse completely, if left out in the rain!

News, Views Etc...Plastic Warrior No.172

Came-in last week? Maybe a week or two ago, I'm so busy, I'm re-reading it/reading it properly for the first time as I do the review! Another corking issue with something for everyone . . . 

 Articles

* The issue kicks off with a wonderful four-page, evocative piece from Peter Nussbaum on Normans (and Saxons) using the imagery of the Bayeux Tapestry to weave (sorry!) through the story

* An auction report on a sale at Willington Auctions reveals some interesting 'Britains archive' figures with assistance from Sarah at the auction house

* Peter Evans studies Polytoys from Monaco, I can pink-text a past post now!

* Daniel Morgan returns with an unscheduled 'Herald Notes & Queries' looking at the Robin Hood set and some of its anomalies

* While Michael T. Hyde also returns with another of his lovely round-ups of ecclesiastical subjects, looking - this time - at Nuns

* Recent production under the Lineol branding is compared to its Airfix donors by Andreas Dittmann

* A return to Napoleon from PL Cunha is most welcome, I still remember the first one (issue 154) and this is another fine line-up of Emperor-corporals!

* Fred Barratt expands on his Elastolin cover shots with more of the same and some blurb!

'What The !&*$?' has five queries for subscribers' to ponder-over.

• Anon seeks help on two cowboys who look very Crescent compatible but aren't!
• Brian Heaps asks a pertinent question about the Olympic Sportsmen and who actually made them - I would add they come is different sets, colours and sizes!
• Marx-alikes (or Heimo-alikes!) need further identification for Rainer Maul
• Mathias Berthoux seeks more on RP variants
• The figures we saw here from Chris Smith (link) still need further work, it looks like they may prove to be SAE!

* Replicants are looked at by Tom Stark, with revised Highlanders of the '15 and the '45

* The plastic version of Barrett & Sons coronation coach is discovered by Colin Penn

* A follow-up to Scalextric shows some of the figures on David Pomeroy's bench, highlighted by the editor.

Regular Features

* 'NEWS and VIEWS and other stuff ' covers

• There's some data protection nonsense
• The death of toy show promoter Bill Lango is reported by Paul Stadinger
• Tiger Hobbies announce a shipment of Plastic Platoon into the UK
• C&T Auctions next date is posted (12th December 2018)
• A request for pictures of Solido Belge boxed or carded sets - to the Editor please
• An explanation of the small ads regimen!

* 'Readers Letters' include

• Peter Cole muses on boxing and figure size
• Thanks for the recent PW show from Brian Heap
• Graham Apperly likewise waxes lyrical on both show and magazine
• Memories of Airfix's diminutive figures comes from John Purse
• Colin Penn discovers Klutz figures with card play-sets in charity shops
• Peter Watson follows up on Pirates with reference to the movies
• More on box sizing from Thomas Stark and John Rafferty who also asks about suitable glues for figures
• Pascal Crouchet follow-up on his own previous Hugonnet Elizabethans with some Café Pecheur ones!
• Chris Goddard ID's figures from two articles in PW171
• Brian Shorthouse attempts to drink too much rum - the editor tells him you can't!

* 'What's New' covers recent releases from;

• Plastic Platoon - Vietnam era GI's (with news of scenics; available from Tiger Hobbies in the UK)
• Chintoys / Engineer Basevich (via Steve Weston)

o   Conquistadores (Chintoys set 009)

o   Zapotec's Azteks (Chintoys set 015)

o   Russian Medieval Nomads (EB set 23)

Plus all the usual readers small-ads and a commercial supplement

Covers - Elastolin Scenes by Yves Escarre photographed by Fred Barrett

Contact details, as always, are . . .

Facebook

Blogger

eMail; pw.editor@ntlworld.com

And they are on Paypal.

M is for Mixed Menagerie of Mermaids

The title covers it, a few mixed mermaids - representing all the main toy-use polymer groups!

At the back right is the Resin one we saw a while ago, still available from The Works, leaning against her is a small gum-ball/capsule machine charm in a hard, undecorated styrene.

To their right (the viewers left) is another resin lump, a recent purchase from Penn Plax and one of a set of Disney stuff for fish tanks, note how much better finished it is than their treasure chest, or Easter Island statues.

In front of that lump is a little polypropylene 'Polly Pocket' type thing of the same Disney Ariel/Little Mermaid figurine, probably Bluebird/Kenner for Disney Stores? The tatty-paint pair between the two Ariel's are polyethylene Hong Kong lumps from the 1970's, I suspect they belong with a group of rather eclectic sculpts which include a turtle with gwee-tar and a W-shaped sea-serpent?

At the front is a clear-blue, polystyrene, cocktail-glass decoration I rescued from a party in Berlin in the 1980's (and one of the oldest-sitting non-25mm figures in my collection), unmarked but likely a Hong Kong generic, although the Germans had lots of plastic novelty makers a few years earlier, so it could be domestic production?

The other bright-blue tailed-girl is an unmarked - probably 'China' - mermaid, similar to but not Soma (who's mermaids' are better sculpts), she's probably from a generic 'Toob', rack-toy or possibly via cake-decorating? She's a modern substitute PVC-like rubber/elastomer.

You can judge the scales from the approximately 28mm Polly Pocket alike.

That's a mixed menagerie of mermaids!

BS is for BraveStarr . . .

. . . but it's probably bullshit!

I've been told (by 'old guards' in the hobby) these were produced as BraveStarr knock-off figures from the Mattel action-figure TV tie-ins, but having used BraveStarr (or Brave Star) myself in the past once or twice, in-fact I now believe they are Galaxy Rangers' knock-off's from Galoob's similar action figure line!

There have been several robotic or Sci-fi type Wild West themed things in popular culture over the years including the original and recent re-hash of Westworld (where they are meant to look human), DC's Weird Western Tales and later Johna Hex, while Tex Arcana - I think (Arcanna, Arcaana?) - is another one, and there were various short stories in Metal Hurlant (Heavy Metal).

Morbius did one I seem to recall (or was it a 2000AD Tharg's 'Future Shock'?), where we see them from the backs round a camp-fire, all Stetson's, gun-belts and leather jerkins, talking 'supper' until in the last panel they are revealed to be aliens - eating a human? I may have invented the last bit; the pink monkeys may only have been herded into the corral, for eating later?!

Anyway . . . Galaxy Rangers not BraveStarr or Brave Star or Brave Staar!

So far I've tracked down 10 foot-poses, but they do keep turning-up, so I'm not 100% sure if this is all the poses. Robot 'cowboys' with ray-guns, I'm told (yep; by the 'old guard') they were Hing Fat branded (but don't know what the header card said, or if it was Hing Fat's) and are seem to have been issued in the same colours as their (Hing Fat's) MPC Astronaut copies.

The second figure on the top row and the first on the bottom row (both blue) are 'fem-bots' being clearly modelled as females!

Mounted Figures; three of the four poses found so far, the reason I've only shown three is not down to a lack of robot horses, but that the fourth (below) doesn't sit well in the saddle! The middle-one is another fembot and there are only the two horse-posess found so far, each coming in black or several shades of oxide red-brown.

The black horse above is the sporty, turbo-reconnaissance number with aerodynamic cowls over the head and tail and an overall streamlined or slim look, the brown ones are the broader, heavy APC's for ramming stuff and kicking things about! They even have Star Wars AT-AT knee and shoulder-joints and a scaled-down AT-AT head!

The other rider on the left, on the right the three commonest versions of one of the standing figures; the mould tool obviously flexed badly, and you find more figures with flash down the leg than without.

But the flash can be either side and is very heavy, needing carving away, rather than the usual light-slice with a scalpel, it's frankly easier to paint it as a scenic shrub or rock, or short-circuiting flames! I'm guessing they were two cavities, next to each other and the 'bridge' of tool metal between them would bend upwards, allowing both legs to over-spill?

They are - Like most Hing Fat stuff - a bit on the small-side, around the 50mm mark and are here compared with a right eclectic bunch of ner'do-wells I had to hand as I sorted some of the 'space' stuff.

From the rear.

They are - Like most Hing Fat stuff - a bit on the shite-side, both in sculpting and finish, but they are pretty unique, so I think a good paint-up and some scenic-basing would improve them considerably, especially given there's nothing to really judge them against. Singly they could also be used as stand-alone 'Mechs' in small-scale war-gaming forces or for steam-punk stuff.

Several of the figures have jet-pack type objects on their backs, while the fem-bots have wild manes of hair.

I'm not terribly happy with the photo's on this post, I think I did them a bit hurriedly, so we may return to them one day, or I'll take better images for the Hing Fat entry on the A-Z - when I get round to it!

 

03-10-2020 - Confirmed as 'Galaxy Cowboys' by Hing Fat (phew!) on Sean's Fantasy Toy Soldier Blog, and thanks to Chris Smith for pointing me there; they'd been there all along!

F is for Follow-up - Britains Trojans . . . again!

I Found this after the follow-up, but it's not a follow-up to the follow-up, but rather 'just' a follow-up - if that makes sense, which it won't to Mr. Erwin Sell; he's too stupid to comprehend the literary concepts of narrative-thought, stream of consciousness or thinking out loud and consequently thinks I'm mad!

To be honest I'd rather be mad than that stupid, still - at his age - it's his choice to remain so. My writing is obviously too . . . err . . . 'clever' for him, but he insists on reading it and jumping to medical conclusions or psychological diagnosis . . . sort of making it up as he goes along, again? What do you think Hugh? I think he's probably the mad one. Are you sure? Yes, he's twice as mad as I'll ever be, can we get back to the post now? Do we have to? Yes, I'm afraid we do! Oh . . . OK then.

I knew I should have at least one copy of Hector (the Trojan!), is anyone else listening to the new version of the Iliad on R4? Achilles wasn't very nice to Hector tonight . . . not very nice at all! In fact; I would go so far as to say he rather ruined Hector's day.

A sub-piracy from that unmarked set which may be French or Italian bazaar (rack toy) figures rather than HK, but may be sourced in Hong Kong anyway, and a rather insipid pink polyethylene, he had been missed when I rounded the others up for the main post the other day.

B is for Bug Eyed Aliens

Or F is for Follow-up - Roswell (link)

There aren't many bug-eyed aliens suitable for use with 50-70mm figures, even allowing for the fact that they can [presumably] vary in size, and indeed do vary in size - according to the legions of 'abductees', most of who seem to be poor 'white trash' from the deserts and trailer-parks of the continental USA, rather than the 'victims' being randomly distributed around the world and from different socio-economic/educational backgrounds?

And this is not to ridicule them, I have seen a 'UFO' (tale told in link), it's just to register my suspicions as to the weighted nature of the - self identifying - subject group, and the levels of alcohol, other controlled substances or even a desire for 'five minutes of . . . ' that might be involved? Apropos the previously told tale . . . it's now obvious a [very fast] drone would fill all the criteria.features of our 'UFO' were they playing with such things in 1984!

Although - even as I write this (Wednesday night/Thursday morning) someone channelling synergy on the World Service has just stated the new head of world chess (and one of the organisers of the Russian World Cup) claims to have be abducted by Aliens!

However, I have digressed; there are not many . . . etc . . . etc . . . and we looked at examples of a few of them last time, so having brought the last lot together with the storage lot, the follow-up post is similar in coverage to the previous post, but we can spread them over more images!

There are others, the Mars Attacks cereal premium figures for instance, which will get a separate post some day.

When we looked at the skaters/boarders, I said there were others sets available, and I had most of another set in storage; these being footballers . . . and a referee? Clearly they have been watching too much terrestrial telly on Zargbalg IV!

The bases are much smaller, whether this points to two waves of all these sets (I'm still saying there's a set or two remaining to find!), or just that the boarders got larger bases for some reason, I don't know, but the soft semi-transparent PVC/rubber polymer, the shade of green, size and sculpting of the figures in the two sets otherwise matches.

I actually had three more of the - believed to be - capsule/gum-ball machine, prize figures, the two reverse-colour duplicates of the ones we saw last time in one place and the orange one somewhere else as he'd come in separately and I hadn't put two-and-two together or he came in at that moment everything was getting thrown into storage - anyway here they all are together! Note; the orange one only has three digits per hand, the others four, but they all have three toes! Now fully explained with additional manufacturers here - Soma!

The lower image shows a scaler with the stamper (below), a Galoob 'bug-eye' from the Trash-Bag Bunch and a couple of the above greenies. I love these figures and if anyone has any they don't rate/want, I'll be a happy recipient! Or even pictures, how many poses/colours are there? We will definitely return to them sometime.

Having mentioned him (or her, who am I to sex an alien?); here's the stamper! I always stamp the card in their storage bag so I have a sample of the stamp as they invariably dry-out over time. He It's a resin moulding, glued to a generic ink-stamp 'capsule' which is probably bought-in from a company specializing in such novelty stuff, and is of unknown origin/maker.

This is odd, around 70mm, it's hollowed-out in the rear like that battle-babe from the other day, or the cheapie royalty I mentioned at the time, and again it may be a cost-cutting measure, or an aspect of a known character who's escaped me?

He looks like he should be holding something above his head, and probably comes from a larger play-set of some kind, but as hinted; 'rack-toy' rather than big-name branded?

Anyway - it's another bug-eyed alien, it's in the collection, and it's finishing this post!