R is for Recent Purchases

Although I checked the image dates and one of them's from over two years ago, while another is over a year old now, but, sometimes I purchase a mixed lot, or a few parcels end-up being delivered on the same day and I shoot them for 'posterity'!

These were a few of the highlights of a big mixed lot I grabbed, for a single figure I think, or because it was going cheap? Anyway, I know there were more of the Weston's Mexicans, a lot more, but mostly the same poses, so presumably the ones the seller hadn't liked, used or wanted!

We saw the ex-flocked Womble when I posted the renovation/conversion, while the three Charbens African are useful, the Butch from Kellogg's Sooty set (probably by Crescent) is a slightly chewed box-ticker; I can never remember which figures I've got in which colours!

An LB cartoon American Indian is a bonus, the Palitoy (and others) kicking footballer is always fun, while the Imperial version of an Impro Triceratops is my first, I have all bar the Plesiosaur in the UK iteration, but Imperial's are harder to find this side of the pond! I think the Dylan is Corgi, but he's not the guitar one?

Seven parcels? French Albator boxing of Space Captain Harlock from Atlantic, and colour variations of - I think - the Goldrake Vega set, which I have on the runner in bright apple green (Brian Berke as sent shots of them in this sand shade, but they're still in queue, with 90% of everything!), above which is a bagged set of the Humber 1-Ton's with all six fire engine bodies, one of which is shared with the military versions (ambulance) but here in silver.

We saw the pair of die-cast Play-Me and 11resin pirates on ITLAPD, while the Hussar got sent to Plastic Warrior as a follow-up to Chris Smiths excellent article on Kwong Wah Industrial.

I can't remember if I've blogged the larger vehicles, but I'm not blogging that country's stuff if I can help it, at the moment, I was right to call out those promoting the wrong side of the Donbas line's products (earned me more opprobrium from the Morlocks and Yahoos at the time) when I did, and I try to keep to my own standards/principles!

So many ironies; Dave over at PSR has also stopped promoting/reporting on that nation's products for the duration (?) while some of the producers on the Ukrainian side are still operating - if they're not in the actual combat zones, they're desperate to keep their economy running as normal, while if we end-up in a nuclear exchange with Putler, you can guess the choice words - for some in our hobby - my last 'I told you so' post will contain, even if it never gets out to the ether!

These were a cheap 'small scale' mixed lot, which were about half-and-half non-Giant Cowboys & Indians I really didn't need, and other items, which I'll look at now:

I suspect these are probably accessories for a die-cast or plastic vehicle or play set of some kind, very similar to the sets on the back of the box of the space set we saw here, but a rival line - we've seen the firefighters and mechanics from the same line before, and they are a dense PVC to the other generic's 'styrene, with key-slots rather than peg-holes in the bases to lock them onto the cards. Obviously, yet more Monogram copies! 

Miscellaneous 'civi' types, most already in the collection, but again - from a plastic-colours point of view - you can't find too many of the Märklin HO track-gang, copies, nor the Dinky road-gang clones! The Matchbox hunter, on the other hand, is just boring now, he came with at least two 1-75 vehicles and I have a bag-full, one day I might paint a squad up as ACW Confederate volunteers!

These were what the bid/BIN went-in for. The Romans are poor quality Giant copies, but tracking them down is a slow process so finding seven at once is useful, and they came with a genuine Giant tower roof and flag which I know I need, a probably Giant medieval/Mongol horse and two yellow 2nd type Giant knights.

The Mongols only ever seem to appear in red or yellow, and I've never seen a 2nd version Knight in red, but alongside the common black & silver ones, these yellow versions do turn-up occasionally, where they're from the Helen of Toy 'Gold Crown' game/comic-offer with paper board, not Giant at all!

The other items of interest in the lot were the Airfix animal knock-offs, the farm have been pretty-much nailed now on the relevant blog page, with two or three generations and various pack types, but the zoo copies are still more of a mystery, with at least two generations, the flat colours and the washier, cream-coloured ones with the eyes dotted-in, or red-lips &etc.

And there's a few of each here, although one of the gazelles has been converted into a short-eared Llama . . or Alpaca, or whatever the other ones are called; Vicarious Guanos?

These only came in the other day, and were going unloved, again I have most of them already but as with the stuff Chris or Peter sends, it's the odd one you don't have which makes all the difference!

Here it's the HK copy of the Gem diver (top left), the runner, mid-left, the chap top right and the PVC Flintstone in brown - I have a few, but again - colour variations! The bloke who looks like a composition pirate in maroon coat is just a cut-about Spencer Smith AWI gunner!

Back to the chap top right - in the late 1990's/early 2000's, a company or companies unknown (there may be a brand on the die-cast forums) was producing these flesh/sand figures in various iterations and scales (at last four sizes?), which were sold as generics and home-branded to various volume sellers; supermarkets (Tesco, Sainsbury's), Woolworths/Chad Valley and etcetera, as well as other branding elsewhere

The only way to tell them all apart is by the base-markings which vary greatly between issuers, and must have reflected contract data, and the base shape. One day we'll look at them all properly, the commonest is probably the German firefighter (in fritz helmet) who seems to have been in everyone's range and every size! I annotated some of them at the time, which should help make sense of them, but I only bought them when they were on clearance! Smaller sets usually had one vehicle, but often with useful accessories like wheelie-bins, street-furniture, skips (dumpsters), recycling bins, etc . . .

There were also three of these Hong Kong flat railway figures, and this shot which I took a while back reveals that I needed the green lady with umbrella and red case, loose, to complete the line-up, now I have her!

I'd actually bought two lots of these mixed/vehicle accessory lots a few days apart and this is the other one, and while - again - not only do I have most of them, we've seen most of them in the mini-seasons onMatchbox and Corgi I did about ten years ago (still waiting for shouty-man's corrections?!!) 

These are the new, the better examples or the not sures. For instance I know I have the chap with the hose from Matchbox's airport fire tender, but I'm not sure about the chap with the axe, while to his right is one who matches the Monogram guys above. Can't remember if I have the green clown (Corgi), and there are about four versions of the Dinky Moon Rover/Chariot crew, so he may be needed.

Another of the believed to be Hornby rail staff/loco-crew, but in a new, lighter blue, with the boy from the late Corgi straw-stack next to him. The little black figure (probably a bomber pilot) is sculpted similar to the Kleeware/Tudor Rose Space Clipper or X-400 crews, so might be early 'something'!

The middle of the right is a cartoony character from something modern I suspect, but I don't know who or what and the skeleton will be one of those Mattel motorcycles, or a similar knock-off! It's all good stuff, which fills the holes in the story of 'Toy and Model Figures'. Lots more to come . . .

News, Views Etc . . . U is for Update - Giant or What?

Quick look at the Giant Mongol Cannon has gone-up over on that Blog.

F is for Follow-up . . . to the Previous Posts

A few bits of relevance to the stuff Chris Smith sent to the Blog last October, and which have 'come out of the wash' in the last 48-hours, and in the order in which they appeared!

The Daktyl Perterrohsaw went in a block-rock but had been divorced from it by Royal Fail shaking the parcel to see if it was worth nicking! I made that last bit up. You can just see it in the first photo' on that post and, as you can see, it's not showing much compatibility with Lego's Kiddybrick rip-off, which had been my suggestion. The Bird'o'saur's gone to storage.

The clown with a giant bow, was also a pencil-top, so he has more in common with the tripple-headed Kaiju in the following 'military' post. The sculpt might be a Brabo rip-off?

Yesterday, Chris's mum suggested the fairy might be Titania, Queen of the Fairies, and subsequent image Googling by both Chris and I revealed a veritable cornucopia of sexy, alluring or even scantily clad Titania's so we were definitely on to something, but the truth (and the previously mentioned familiarity) is a little more pedestrian . . . Marx's Blue Fairy from Disney!

And she is a bit blue, or pert, yes I think 'Pert' is the word required here! She's a softish PVC though, so not from the chalky 'classic characters' range we've seen here before, and while the material was used for the painted 40mm Circus figures back in the day, it was also used on the reissue dancers I picked-up a while ago?

The sack turned out to be from the Dinky TK (civilian transport ancestor of the military MK) coal-delivery truck! They have been reproduced, in recent times, usually in black, but with the Dinky name now just a traded brand handled by several companies in the last twenty years (Universal and Atlas Editions for a start) the yellow ones may be for a modern-made greengrocer's truck; potato's, or miller's/baker's vehicle - corn? Seen above with an imported, rival, Spot On coalman.

From this morning's post, the line-up as it currently stands; the new Guardia Civil is a tad taller than the others, and you can see marked differences in say, the jacket flaps, but a general pattern is followed in the various potteries, look at the short, fat, round boots with their chunky soles, or the eyes!

H is for How They Come In - Chris - October 2021 - Military & Sci-Fi Stuff

So, the other half of Chris Smith's Autumn donation to the Blog last year finds us with the helmets and guns, mostly in khaki! But there is a couple of red-coats, some spacey stuff and an Esquimaux!

Always, always, always! They all get carefully sorted into bags of identical figures to eventually get matched-up to branded items or set titles . . . like the firefighters, the paratrooper page is another thing which is lagging, but the work goes on in the background - I found a nice novelty variant of the Trojan red-devil the other day!

ABC and 'probably' ABC; Chris returned the two sand ones I'd sent him, not out of churlishness, but because he found better ones! He sent me the - frankly better sculpted - green ones at the same time (which we have now looked at) and he sent me two - believed to be ABC - in colonial line-infantry uniforms (from Britains hollow-cast) and a variant of the standing sentry with a new arm and new colouring.

The sentry's pose is not a recognised drill movement. but is close to a left-handed "Raise weapon for inspection"! That 'colonial' era spiked infantry helmet still survives in bands, but with No.1 Dress 'Blues' not scarlet! I picked-up three more the other day from the legendary Joe Bellis, and a third pose is blowing on the instrument I get in to trouble for . . . an oboe/clarinet'y thing!

A nice selection of mixed figures, the crossbowman is Exin (seen here - fourteen years ago!), the guardsmen are the denizens of crackers/lucky-bags (seen here four years ago!), while the flat/semi-falt cavalryman with carbine may be Plástico Osul from Portugal?

The Argentine Oklahoma figure looks like the advancing pose also sent to the Blog by Chris, but it's a single pole he's holding, so I fancy he's a standard bearer missing a flag? Something I will sort with a print-out at some point!

Another Spanish Civil Guard in terracotta takes that sample three, the blue knight is similar to some capsule toys marked Saban, but he is unmarked, while the white plastic Britains copy knight is very interesting . . .  

. . . for being clearly marked Petrel. Now; it happens I have several rack-toys marked up/overprinted to Petrel (one or two seen here now), and would have happily accepted they were a phantom brand for someone like 1960's Woolworth's or the Dutch Hagemeyer, but here he is, claiming a factory-tool as his own! How many were there in the set, are they all Britains inspired, do you know? Damaged - but a first here!

Khaki types; The sandy one will be Revell, Aurora, Renwall or someone like that, early box-scale or 1:48/50th kit figure, possibly from one of the missile sets. The diver below him is a lot like the Chap Mai ones, but softer and equipped with a mean dart-tip, he's hunting Moskva!

The two 'army men' at the top are both uncommon, one channeling the Lido pod-feet chaps, but as a unique sculpt, the other seemingly a khaki copy of Deluxe Reading's white one, but without the slot in the base, I must assume therefore another DR piece, from a similar big-box toy?

The large chap in the middle will be for a 1:18th German AFV, but I couldn't tell you who's or which, I haven't followed the phenomena, except to be very impressed with a  mixed battle-group of 1:18th, 1:12th and 1:6th (action man sized!) AFv's running around at Beltring hop-farm!

Finally - another 'army man', who must be from some sort of interactive zip-wire/death-slide, or helicopter (with hook) toy/set; I can't imagine he'd be auctioning a bow-saw to the highest-bidder in the middle of a battle?

Very useful Blue Box stretcher-case in white, I knew it was out there as I have it in a boxed-set somewhere, but I didn't have a lose one, now I do! Posed with the WAAC nurse, also from Blue Box.

These two will be from a modern gaming system, which are similar to but not Bolt Action from Warlord Games, I will endeavor to ID them, to which aim I have ruled out Wizards of the Coast and Flames of War . . . so might be looking for a stand-alone boxed game? they are quite nice though, factory painted PVC, and they've gone to storage in a TBS box, so I can't for the life of me remember if they had base-marks? Same Day - Heroscape! Thank you Daniel - see comments!

I think this chap was on Moonbase, not that long ago, but I'm damned if I can find it, obviously a target for a shooting game, I think it was a little rack-toy pistol? With the Azco/Hassenfeld, Ideal/Kleeware, Kellogg's, Kwong Ming, Lion, Lone Star and May May ones, I'm building quite a pile of targets - with help! We'll have to have a target page here?

Going off-world; there's a probably Kinder (or similar Italian pocket-money toy) space ship, a Micro-Machines command module, some capsule toys, one as a pencil-top (three-headed Kaiju) and one as a charm (green robot).

Robin's lost his head; probably at the sight of the pink block-man . . . is he Roblox or Minecraft? He might be a Minecraft 'hex-fusion' figure whatever the hell one of those is! One day I'll do something with the damaged dime-store/Tudor Rose pulp figure, like graft a small propeller to the wrist?

While we've looked at the two rack-toy Power-Ranger knock-offs before. The blue fellah is a Pokémon I think, and I have no suggestions for the 25mm action figure with moving arms and legs?

Mentioned in passing the other day - this completed my MPC XL5 character line-up, Steve Zodiac I think a reissue in this grey and he was a bit shredded, but a very quick pass with a cigarette-lighter removed most of the jiggits, but it didn't restore his nose! I would never recommend the lighter-technique, it's something you have to be practiced in (or confident of carrying out), before you start, and practice makes casualties! But done right it disappears all those little 'tails' of a worn, sanded or badly-fettled plastic item.

Probably could have been in yesterday's post, a small collection of Kinder figure parts, which will go with all the others, if I ever find the big box, which is still somewhere in the garage! And the Attic stuff has long-gone to storage, so that's a job for next-home now! I think blue-top is an ice-hockey player, there's half a fantasy barbarian, the blue legs go with the Esquimaux, and the horses had those chunky brass-look knights riding them.

"Now you've sorted everything into their little bags and spread them all over OUR nest, can Teddy and I have our Cheesy Dreamies please? We're starving here and it's well-past our bedtime!"

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Found it! FBI Shooting Practice, by Day Fran so now I need to find the Captain Scarlet ones - Doh!

H is for How They Come In - Chris - October 2021 - Mixed Stuff

I think! I have another lot from Chris Smith which is in a folder marked December, so it was further down the list of catch-up 'H is for...' posts, but then I realised I had a sorting picture dated the end of November, so it had come in earlier, and yet these are dated the middle of October, so they too may have been put to one side and photographed a while after they'd come in?

It was all a bit hectic in the autumn . . . still is, just had four days in the garden trying to sort the stuff from the sheds, greenhouse and garage, but don't seem to have got far despite working till dark! Anyway, another 'junk' lot kindly donated to the Blog by Chris, with a view to sharing the highlights with the rest of you and seeing what I highlight!

Starting the sort, and you can see a lot which won't be in the two posts this time, and there's no rhyme or reason for what gets shot and what doesn't, and something which won't get included in one post, might make another.

The things which stand out on the day get photographed, it's all got a place in the collection, and things ignored on the day, might 'make' a thematic or maker post, years from now or provide the only example on an A-Z page entry - when they gather pace!

There was a nice selection of Dinosaurs, which varied from the poor, mono-coloured, multi-sub-generational copies of old US sculpts to the very realistically painted ones top-right and bottom-left (I do like a Dimetrodon or two!), and the two top left, who were fantastic!

Gotta'be a highlight of the whole box! Plug-together, articulated dino's in an HO-OO compatible size . . . bargain! Rather generic 'meat-eaters' and I suspect a cereal premium, or cheap carded rack-toy, mid-1970's maybe? But absolutely delightful - anybody know anything else about them, how many were there, who issued them?

This is interesting, the locating stud/perching spigot on the underside is (I believe) compatible with Lego technical stuff, now years ago I had some chrome-plated jeep stores (jerry can and spare tyre), probably Hong Kong, which went-on as they were beyond the scope of the collection, but they were useable with Lego, so it may be that this pterosaur is a Mega-Bloks, Tomy or other, more minor Kiddycraft-clone's 'playability' accessory?

Other wildlife! Another of those Indian plaster, wire and wood birds, a lovely 'styrene pig who's beautifully marbled and I love the fake netsuke monkey, while I had a scruffy example of the small (35mm) bendy-chimp, but I didn't know he came with a larger bendy-parent!

I think the red horse is from the R&L/Kellogg's horse box (can't remember if it was in two parts or what plastic it was now, and it's away, sorted!), while the flat pair of Dachshunds are a wishy-washy white plastic, so probably Christmas Cracker or gum-ball capsule machine prize, rather than a creamy-white Euro-'margarine premium'? All good stuff!

Chris sent the yellow ones in the lot we're looking at here, and I photographed them with some I'd already put on the side, which may also have come from him or Peter Evans, but may have come in one of a couple of real cheapo' HK-junk lots I'd purchased last year for one or two figures? Point is, solid piracies of Hong Kong swoppet copies (of the Star Toys type), of Timpo - that standard bearer is not bearing Timpo anatomy!

More annoying, I know I have now found a brand-mark for one of the two types (deep, hollowed or shallow, smooth bases), but I can't find the reference just now (the reason I had the others on the side!), so we'll have to return to them at some point when it turns-up.

An eclectic bunch, the Household cavalryman would seem to be a HK-copy of Britains Herald, but with a solid (clumsy) right-arm, the damaged figure is very interesting (one assumes die-cast or plastic vehicle accessory), as he's a scale-up (40mm'ish) in polystyrene of the Matchbox 25mm hunter from the 1-75 range.

Love the angel, she's a bit sexy for a nativity set, and looks vaguely familiar but I can't nail down the memory? The guy in the floppy-hat may be a cuckoo-clock barometer/weather-vane person?

Top left I think I've seen on an LRG forum described as a gum-ball copy of some better Japanese Kaiju/Anime character? Top right also looks very capsule-machine, while the broken gymnast finds a home here due to the number of different versions of them out there and plethora of sizes and colours;  - any sample is better than no sample!

Not quite in focus, sorry! I was going to do a whole page of firefighter figures (and various people; Chris, Brain B and Theo V-de-W helped with shots), and I will, but not as soon as I'd hoped, and when I do; these will all be there! In the meantime; obviously two large-scale vehicle accessories and a more 'army-man' rack-toy type who had a painted helmet when new.

There's a lot to ponder here! Love the 'Cleatus' teeth, because they're designed to give an over-pronounced 'toothy' over-bite, they have teeth-grips instead of being designed to slip behind the gums, or go-over the wearers teeth, consequently I haven't been spotted trying them on, as I don't know where they've been!

Two cracker/gum-ball pistols will join the growing bag of such novelty items and the sack of corn is another thing which I can't place but which looks familiar? Don’t know what the cow's head is from (orange blob), maybe one of the Mattel custom 'chopper' motorcycles?

The 'Tardis' is probably a European call-box, police or breakdown, and an accessory from someone like Majorette or Solido? The well is a nice piece, we had a bit of a mini season on them a while back (back in the early lock-downs?) with help from both Chris and Barney Brown, and this is a colour variant of the Barrat one. Chris actually sent me another well (in the Nov/Dec. lot) and I have in the meantime combined all mine - as they went to storage, so we will return to wells in a year or two!

Finally a nice late Giant-copy wagon, dog-kennel (or z-gauge locomotive shed!), and a standard Hong Kong army-man flag, but with an unusual design on the flag!

This is an amazing survivor; a very delicate, polystyrene, novelty 'plane, which I seem to recall makes a dive-bomber's wailing noise (or bee's hum?)  if you blow or suck on the large engine, but as with the Cleatus teeth, I don't know who sucked it last, so I gave that test a miss, but one day I'll give it a clean and have a go!

Many thanks to Chris as always, and part two will be the military!

B is for Bunnies - 3 - Chocolate Bunnies and Bits!

As I was replying to Brain's eMails last night it crossed my mind I hadn't checked Picasa for any 'Easter' tagged folder/s waiting patiently for their day, so I did and found one with two images, to which I added a third later, this is the crumbs of Easter, at the end of a nusy weekend on the Blog!

A Cadbury's mini 'super-bunny' compared with two sizes of the famous Lindt gold bunny, I think this was my edible haul at Easter 2019, when the world was still sane'ish! And - to be honest - I think most of them are supposed to be hares (Osterhase), but we ran with a Bunny trope this year!

Brian sent these last May and while the aim was a Wind in the Willows post, I felt they were eggy enough for an Esater post, I think they are Ceramic gift-shop ware, but they could be chalkware and I don't know who the maker/branding is?

Downloaded these from an eBay lot a while back, couldn't resist them! They are by Goula (who's wooden station with plastic flats (nice book-ending to the days posts!) we saw on the Blog here - fourth image down), and they too are all wood . . . and wire.

That's about it for today, Happy what's left of Easter!

P is for Polish Roundup - 3 - WWII / Cold War

The third lot of PZG that's come-in recently was this little lot (plus the two figures from 'Four Tanker's & a Dog' we saw a few days ago here in other mixed post) and consists mostly of British production knock-off's, but there are some original Polish sculpts too.

Two ex-Airfix WWII Soviet Infantry, one compared with his donor (grey), all seven Airfix poses were copied, and the clones are a little smaller than the figures they're aping.

Also a pair of US Infantry, again; ex-Airfix doppelgangers, again all seven poses were lifted, and they are painted to match the Soviets, whether this means they were sold as a set of 14 from the same side or two sets of seven I don't know, but the PZG website separates them.

A Polish copy of a Trojan / BR Moulds rendition of an older Crescent hollow-cast figure, painting is quite (six-colour-) colourful on this chap, almost as if the painter liked the figure as much as I do!

Timpo also got the pirated treatment, with the 10 of their larger GI set joining two other (ex-French - Mokarex - production?) figures for a 12-count, these yellow bases can be shared with the previous Airfix clones, as can the paler green paint job on the other crawling chap. From the fact that some of the poses weren't copied by the British plagiarists, suggests PZG took these straight from the hollow-cast originals.

Original sculpts of Soviet-era stuff here, and while the No.2 on the bazooka is missing, they still make a nice vignette of an anti-tank crew or 'brick'. Technically post war/cold war Polish infantry, they can pass for WWII Soviet infantry.

Compatible with the previous set and including the same bazooka, these are painted as Paratroopers, but you can find them with black, blue (UN), green or khaki (above) berets. Both sets are quite large so I have a ways to go, but I've made a start!

B is for Bunnies - 2 - Scully & Scully Ceramics

More from Brian B; more from Scully & Scully's window - they don't have the level of exquisiteness we saw in the sea-creatures a year or two ago, but nevertheless, they are from the same school (possibly the same maker) and are both very fine, and rather fun!

Bank-holiday derby? I guess he's 'City' in that blue"

Awwwwe! A rather crestfallen one in the background . . . what's occurring there? An egg count has revealed filching, I'll bet!

The gold 'paint' is probably real gold leaf, fired-on! Cheers Brian, charming and a little more apt to the season than killer alien Xenomorphs!