A is for Astronauts . . . in a Tin!

Back to space! It's been quite an eclectic mix this Rack Toy Month; not as many foreign (European/ex-Soviet) or domestic sets as some years, but Hong Kong and/or China are synonymous with rack-toys, so it's no bad thing to have concentrated on them, especially when the whole month has been a bit 'on the hoof' and 'off the cuff' this year.

Also this is hardly a rack-toy, having all the markers for an overpriced museum gift-shop novelty, however rack-toy versions exist and it ties in nicely with an earlier post on small-scale space sets and continues the running mentions, this month, of Pioneer being behind or involved in a lot of this more recent (1990-2010's) stuff.

Astronauts in a tin, it does exactly what it says on the tin! Distributed by PMT Holdings (a quick Google reveals pooping llama key rings on Amazon!) and sold by American Holiday & Surf Shop, the exclusivity is unknown, but may well be so in this perticular packaging/contents configuration, although Google says single outlet (St Michaels, Maryland), so maybe not?

More of a rack-toy configuration (contents differ somewhat; see below), and now branded to XY (Xinyu), and the last time we saw Xinyu here it was in the context of AFV play-sets containing Pioneer die-cast vehicles, so the persistent link is there! Astronauts have a plain finish in this set.

The contents of my set, as manned stations the satellites are all subscale although the landing module could fit two Airfix or Giant spacemen (in the imagination - not phyically, there's no door!), but not the 40mm figures in the set, however as unmanned science or communications satellites they can pass for HO-OO-compatible gear? Shuttle and rocket though are clearly sub-scale generic die-cast/plastic fare.

A third configuration, unknown, some image I saved ages ago from Amazon or Alibaba, branded to some phantom nonsense (there are 'branded' suppliers on Amazon whose names have clearly been generated by AI shoving lumps of syntax (or random letters) together - Watinc, Ainolway (think about it!), Oocome, Cvcbser, Trswyop?) and again, new items but only one figure.

The current offering from Amazon is a top-end set with just about everything seen in the other sets (differen rocket) and then some (claims 44 Pieces), branded to deAO, I have had Toy Major stuff from the same brand-mark, and they clearly came direct from an Amazon warehouse, so an in-house phantom-brand, I suspect!

The 'meat and two veg' here at Small Scale World is always the figures, and here they are, referencing the coloured patches on early (and much sought-after) Kinder spacemen, and about the same size as Kinder's smaller offering, I suspect only coincidence, and around 40mm, polystyrene.

Now if these were Pioneer, that would make a third set, in a new plastic type, so, again it points to the caveat I gave earlier in the month that as a die-caster, Pioneer (if it is them again) may have been buying in the figures themselves.

It would make it much harder for someone like Galoob to sue for the combat infantry knock-offs, for instance, if Realtoy sent them to Pioneer and Pioneer fingered a minor third, fourth, or fifth-party who had already moved on!

That some of the other - die-cast - contents have come from Pioneer I have little doubt.

PS is for Pitiful Spectacle!

Heeheehee . . TJF's decided to have a 'rack toy' day in Rack Toy Month!

How lovely . . . did I mutter something about his incredible insecurity a while back? 

Hahahahahaha!

 

T is for Two - Indian Canoe . . . s

These arrived yesterday, hot-foot from New York in time for Rack Toy Month, and caused a bit of a quandary as I am working on a larger overview of canoes, to which Brian has already contributed nearly a hundred images, and while I fancied a 'T is for . . .'  post, I thought I'd better save these for that postponed 'season', however, Brian also suggested they should be Blogged now, and checking his images I realised we will see them lose, later, so here they are as a bit of a rush job, in the rack-toy bags with header cards.

This is a dinky little thing, and going on the card art, possibly quite early? A hard polystyrene canoe with two soft ethylene crew; one paddling and the other getting belligerent in the stern . . .  well either that, or having a dance-off/sing-song, which is not to be recommended in a lightweight, flat-bottomed vessel!

Novel addition here is the carpet/floor wheels, two pairs, forward and aft, and the fact that the figures are specific to the canoe, being plug-ins. The boat-wobbling loon is a Crescent copy, while the captain of the vessel looks more unique, having some points in common with the flat copies of Gibb's Indians or other figures in this old post also out of Hong Kong - his oar is a short-shot, but you can paddle with a stick, it just takes longer!

While this one is so long I couldn't find a decent background (in a hurry - hedging all day!), so shot the card separately and the canoe just fitted an old foolscap folder cover! It's eleven-and-a-half inches (29cm) long, a proper canoe!

A bit like the 'thing' that most 54/60mm toy figure totem poles are better scaled to 1:76th/72nd scales, so most 'big scale' toy canoes are a lot smaller that they were in real life, although some were one man, so it's not so clear . . . but this beast is definitely a 'war canoe' . . . you could pack eight Timpo Indians in it at a push!

The crew include another copied Crescent figure, a Britains clone and the paddler who I used to think was a Cherilea or Hilco (?) sculpt, but he keeps turning up and might be of German origins? I'll do the research before the 'season' and we'll nail them then! He has a separate paddle, and they too are plug-in, but brittleness has removed the plugs of the two fighters, or removed them from their plugs which are still in the receiving sockets in the hull of the boat!

And many hanks to Mr Berke for the timely donation, the rest will be in an 'H is for . . . ' post at some point, where I have 12 or so articles waiting now!

ABC is for Another Batch of Copies!

Why I haven't come-up with that heading before, given the number of times we've covered ABC here is one of those mysteries only the gods will have an answer to! Most of these are from Chris Smith who seems to have had a good lock-down as far as finding esoteric Hong Kong output goes, as he adds more poses/images to the ABC story and another (earlier?) chapter!

So, that new chapter first; Chris has found some unmarked figures, of higher production value/quality than ABC, but of the same poses ABC use. The conclusion has to be that these copies of UK figures must pre-date the ABC's and make the ABC figures, the poor 2nd generation copies they are.

Lower shot shows two of them with their Crescent 8th Army donors, while the sample also contains a Britains 'Khaki Infantry' pose, standing firing, which we haven't seen from ABC yet. You can see the bases are more substantial than ABC's and have a flat edge.

Here we see three of them compared to the green ABC (middle) and sand figures, at this point Chris didn't have a direct comparison, so they were a 'stand alone' set of 'new' Hong Kong Piracies, but . . .

. . . Chris then found some more sand ABC's, with two cross-over's, the Tommy-gunner seen here in the left-hand comparison shot and the running with bayonnet fitted, along with a grenade thrower - right-hand shot, although these don't have the ABC mark which could confuse, but those ABC US Marines in dress uniform, with the three versions, have some unreadable examples, so I think they all are ABC?

Which gives a [running?] total of six poses in the ABC set, seven with the Britains shooter and up-to nine (or more) if the missing Crescent poses ever turns up in either set, or more conversions/Britains sculpts?

Meanwhile, my only contribution is these two which I found while looking for the 'Zulu' versions a few weeks ago; two marked-ABC copies of Britains running swoppet in solid, but with the feathers (unlike the Africanised version), both of these are rather-poor short-shots, the brown one particularly, but I've never claimed these to be Hi-Fi, just high-interest!

I also had these Britains Herald-clone Union troops come in, they are unmarked versions of those issued within the ABC / HK / CMV 'family', a family to which we can probably add Past the Post, they may all have been independent but they seem to have shared ideas, production values or source material . . . packers, shippers or import agents!

Trees in the background are also courtesy of Chris I think, from one of the lots he's sent over the last year or so, the contents of which are languishing in a group of future 'H is for . . . ' posts, but they happened to be at-hand when I shot the ACW.

So many thanks to Chris for the images, donations and all round support - he found an absolute blinder earlier this evening (25th Aug) which I promptly paid a little too much for, but, well, they're for another day! Cheers again Chris.

O is for Original Generic Primogenitor?

This is a bit of fun, bi-lingual (English-Spanish (or Italian)) but with no branding or clue to branding, however it seems to be either contemporary with, or - more likely - an earlier iteration of the figures later cleared in header-carded bags by Toyway?

It's probably a little beyond the Rack Toy classification, through contents and price-bracket, but it's still a collection of Hong Kong/Chinese plastic-tat, so in to RTM it goes! I took two sets of Photo's so have picked the best of each for this post and here it is in its entirety.

The packaging was a bit dog-eared, and while I straightened it somewhat with an iron, it was a temporary fix for the photo-shoot. Note how different the two vehicles are in the press photograph on the back of the card.

Close-up; the figures were obviously pegged-on randomly, as there are two pairs here where all four poses could have been used, something to keep looking for, as their finish is different from the Toyway ones.

The vehicles have a lot in common with the set of three 'fliers' from Blue Box, but here have those strange motors which if you push them too hard, slow down! So you give them a steady push and they sort of grind themselves off the kitchen counter at snail's pace using an 'inexorable momentum drive' engine!

In the artwork they have red or sky-blue transparencies, but mine both have blue-black canopies which show little of the crew-interiors, and if there is any clue to brand it would be in the logo on the bonnet, which is a meaningless W-plus!

Direct comparison on the left, a reminder of the Toyway's contents on the right, the two vehicles and the flag don't seem to have been carried across, but the hillock/rocky-outcrop and both items of ground-equipment have been, while Toyway always include the four poses.

The main difference is that the Toyway are plain gunmetal 'silver', while the generics have a coat of flattish or 'silk' finish silver paint. The blue / black / pink & red detailing is the same on both issues.

On the base we have clues to both unknown firefighters and mechanics we looked at a year or two ago, plus other figures which may or may not be in the same hard polystyrene, the farmers are common is a dozen versions of softer polyethylene and I have yet to encounter hard plastic knock-offs of the Airfix US Infantry, so as always with these art-room/press images; one can't take them as evidence of anything, and with no brand it's not proving much-else!

I suspect these will be found in old 1970's catalogues; Kays, Littlewoods, Index or Argos, here in the UK, whether the Spanish had similar I don't know, they could be seaside whinging-stopper's too?

A trizion lenta seems to be with slow traction but it could be with slow friction in Italian if the 't' is a poorly printed 'f' - A frizion lenta? And was this an early Pocketbond import?

08-07-2023 - US imports (with a different sticker on the bonnet of the 'saucer') are clearly marked (C) G.L.J. Toy Co. Inc., Syosset, N.Y. and 'Made in Hong Kong'. According to the US Coastguard (the wonders of Google - and the fact GLJ seem to have been in inflatables (and bendies!)) they also had Offices at the Toy Building 200/5th Avenue.

N is for New Ray!

Following on from the previous posts and getting the obvious title above them, this is a quick look at one of the 1:32nd scale sets, non-military.

Taken from the Country-Life line, and in a third graphical style, I believe this set dates from around 1999 - the date may be on the reverse of the card but it went to storage before I bought the lovely A3 scanner I'm now using!

It is in the catalogue we saw in the previous post, but that example is in the brighter green graphics and sharing an assortiment code; 05232 with seven other sets - again, there may be a numerical with this one, but it'll be on the back with the bar-code, so whether it's the same or not I can't say!

Not the best shots I'm afraid, sometimes direct, bright sunlight just washes the camera out, it doesn't happen often, but summer seems to be when! Bottom left has the foot figure showing the course to one of the 'spare' horses, the other three shots are of the wall jump and show-jumper. PVC horses and figures, 'styrene accessories and 'ethylene plants.

Not up to the overall quality of the Britains sets/figures, it holds-up well against the Parker-Palitoy set and the less common Thomas Salter set with it's Hong Kong copies of the Britains, add the three Corgi figures from the alternate offerings of Horse Box and with all the above you can mount quite the equestrian event these days . . . Pony in my Pocket also had various obstacles for show-jumping.

E is for Ephemera - New Ray Catalogue

Don't know when exactly this catalogue dates from, but I believe it to be slightly earlier than the 1996 sets we looked at this morning, so maybe 1989-01'ish? These are high-resolution scans, but the catalogue was a low level three-colour dot-matrix printing, so a lot of it is not as clear as we would like, but seems to be a pretty comprehensive listing of their sets before the graphics change to the sets in the previous post.

 

These day's it's all online http://www.new-ray.com/html/products_catalog.php?id=1 but mostly larger-scales and mostly die-cast stand-alone models, rather than the range of polymer play sets seen above!

MOC is for New Ray Play Town

Apologies for the large number of small-scale posts this RTM, as I recognise that if, in a hobby of - for arguments sake - 1000 fans, there are probably only 40-odd aficionados of the smaller scales to the same level of seriousness, it just so happens that one of the boxes in the garage that had to go up to the storage-unit was wedged-in and I could only get it out by tipping it, which required emptying it first, so with piles of stuff everywhere, it made sense to photograph them and they were mostly from my old small-scale exclusive collecting days!

And it gives those who don't rate 'plastic smalls' another day-off from studying my Blog!

These two have been in the collection since I don't know when and I bought them I can't remember where! But it says 1996 on the back, so possibly a cheapie store in Camberley around-about then . . . or Woolies'? Before they folded!

Both from New Ray, they are scaled pretty accurately between 00-gauge (1:76^th) or European HO (1:86/87^th scales), although described as 1:72^nd scale and - I'm guessing here - there must have been a selection (two of one and three of the other, according to the card backs?), from which I took one from the farm series and one construction, both from the overarching Play Town lines.

Backs of the cards give an idea of other items in the range, and the next post, following, will have more of this stuff from a slightly older catalogue.

Close-up of the contents; there was a lot of this stuff around in the mid-1990's, all or near-all plastic, there's a move back to die-cast vehicles these days, in the cheap toy field, I suspect due to the breakability of plastics? Meanwhile, the more highly-detailed European plastic makers have been consolidated under a few larger parent brands; same things happened with HO/OO railway makers/brands.

Best thing in the farm set is the greenhouse! Figures are showing heritage in Elastolin and Preiser I think and we have seen another of these little trays at some point on the blog . . . I'm not sure if it's in this post, or somewhere else; still to be sorted into New Ray's box?

Some of the lose examples include another figure insert-tray, complete and two more of the Elastolin rip-off 'land army' girl in her dungarees with a few other bits. I know I have some more in the TBS box, so we will probably return to these at some point, but maybe only on the A-Z pages, when I finally tackle that project probably.

There aren't many missing though, I think there were three sets of four civilians and one set of four emergency personnel, with a few more animals, only horses and cows?

A few of the just mentioned farm animals and the 'cowboy' from the other side - the ID clues are softish PVC in white, with thickish bases, ovoid for large items/animals, penny-round for figures.

While New Ray's 1:32^nd scale range included a large military series, the HO range was exclusively civilian, with some large sets including ports and battery-operated trains, cranes and suck-like, which will be along here at small scale world shortly!