B is for ♪♪ "Bobbin' Along on the Crest of a Wave ♪♪ . . . .

. . . . Shit! Whitewater! Hold on to yer'hat pardner!"

A funny one really, I was looking for something to break-up the FFL/Arab posts, and started scrolling through Picasa, hoping to find a near-ready 'quickie', found a couple of raft shots in another place and though "Funnny, they should be in the raft folder" . . . but then couldn't find the raft folder? I had intended to publish the raft post over Christmas, so I guessed I might have, searched the C:Drive and found it in the 'Waiting Sorting' folder on the desktop, where it would be, if I'd posted it.

However, there was no blurb Text.docx, and I hadn't finished cropping the images, so I checked the Blog . . . nothing! I must have picked it up accidentally with a finished post from the desktop (where it was last time I remember it!) and dropped it in 'waiting'? What else is in there though, because often when you do a boo-boo like that you collect several folders/files in the invisible net, I'll have to have a careful check?

So, with the extra images, now all cropped, and months (years) late, here's the 'Rafts & Log' portion of the 'Canoe Season' (which is still in the long queue, but it got more work tonight (3rd), it's going to be at least 14 posts?), a bit of a cheat, as more than two-thirds of the season has come from Brian Berke, while this is all from my stash, but it will all happen fairly in the end!

Britains' raft; the Flagship of Herald's fleet! If I recall correctly it wasn't a good floater, the raft being a chunky lump of polyethylene, you could get it to sit steady in still water, but any roughness and it tended to go over! the punter's pole is snapped short, but they are hard to find in one piece, so at least I have a longish piece

A young collection, my sample doesn't do justice to the variations of plastic and paint colour out there, you can find quite pale rafts, darker rafts, bright orange baggage &ct. Some (early versions?) had the spigots on the figures feet/knees and receiving holes in the raft which was - frankly - the better system, as these reverse locating ones tend to lose the studs as I have on the left-hand one, something which plagued the canoes of both Britains and Timpo.

Timpo's log raft; not much else one can say, compatible with 3rd/4th generation cowboys (?) and pretty common - several dealers have shop-stock to dip into - it's a nice, novelty plaything which also enhances a Wild West collection. I think it came with a wire keel/weight for floating like the canoes, but the boys always get their feet wet!

Timpo also did a more comprehensive raft, but of the 'daft raft race' type, cobbled together from logs, broken planks and barrels, it's the sort of thing Timmy, the two Wayne's and I nearly won with, in 1984 - there was a lot of cheating, involving bare-legs and a divers knife!

I've seen them with two standing, one standing and one squatting cowboy, or this one with a pair of kneeling cavalry legs, mine is a poor sample as the non-punting passenger is clearly panicking and needs pre-float, aversion therapy! Hold on! I think I can hear him . . .

"Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god!  It's the Plastic Warrior show in less than two weeks and we're still half-way up the Rio Grande! Punt harder! We're gonna' miss it!"

The people who do those one-cardboard-building-per-bag, swoppet piracies, also copied the Timpo raft! Here imported by Oto S.p.A. into Italy, but you find them as generics too. It comes with two sacks instead of the sack/trunk combo' of the original, and you also get a Timpo tree copy, albeit with rather sparse foliage! Note also that the top deck is parallel boughs, rather than planks, so they ex-kape a lawsuit!

Strangely most sets with this header-cad have crappy 3^rd/4^th generation copies of other Hong Kong knock-off swoppets, but the two job-specific figures in this set are quite good, being the keeling and squatting legs you don't often find in HK swoppet samples!

A is for Araber aus Deutschland

These used to be simple; "Manurba" would say the German collectors, then they became Dom-Manurba (or Manurba-Dom), now you usually find them listed as Dom-Manurba-Heinerle! I'm not even going to try to pin that down, but suffice to say they are slightly sub-scale at around 50mm and rather charming!

My sample, bringing something nice from the East, to the West! Carpets? Spice? The heads of their vanquished enemies? they are all unarmed so can be used with Nativity scenes as background population, and it's a small sample.

The full set includes mounted figures (some of whom are armed), horses, several different loads for the camels and other colours, and while usually from a brown/fawn/cream/white palette, I have seen them in red, orange and yellow I think.

That's it, that's them; my little handful of Manfred Urban . . . or Domplast . . . or Heinerle Wundertüten Arabs!

T is for Two - Pistoleros!

Another quick box ticker, sees us down Meh'hi'co way, with a quick fly-by the Timpo and Britains Deetail Mexicans, some of whom are Banditos as well as Pistoleros! Although, it's technically T is for Three, as we're looking at two sets and a part set.

I don't have the sixth pose, except I have, but not in a photographable state! We actually looked at the various combinations a while ago but as a headless colour-issue/batch exercise. Two of mine seem to be on cowboy legs (black and pale blue) while I don't have the darker blue Mexican trousers yet, or a pale blue jacket, but they make a decent enough bunch!

I did spot the sixth pose in the spares bag, could have done a quick switch with one of the others, and don't know why I haven't in the past - probably just chucked him in the bag while sorting, without realising I needed him in the sample? It'll have to be next-time now as they're already back in storage, and note that only 'Mexican' bits go in the spares bag, all the 'cross-disciple' Timpo stuff (pistols, whips, knives) go elsewhere.

Britains Deetail Mexicans consist of a set of six foot (and six mounted; I don't have!) figures, but there is a seventh pose, who ran through most iterations of the ever-changing (or seemingly ever-changing) cowboy line-up, and he's the figure in the upper shot, I have no idea how many variation of these there are, because he ran for ages, but note he's the only one painted-up with a Hispanic/equatorial skin-tone.

The lower pairs are from the Mexican set 'proper' and betray their 1970's heritage with a liberal use of purple and orange! Every generation's movies, comics and toys bare the style of the age they are produced in! The comic guys used to talk of Gold, Silver and Bronze ages . . . what do they make of the current 'dark', MU and crossover stuff? The brass, aluminium and tin ages!

Did I say purple and orange, you can add natty yellow jump-suits to that list, these guys are so psychedelic, you think they might be a touring trick-shot troupe on the fringe at Woodstock! "Manolito and his Magnificent Musical Mexican Mustachioed Mariachi Muchachos!"

The earlier version share the wash-style paint of the earlier cowboys and Indians, and the two on the left here are actually quite sensibly decorated! I just looked the DSG ones up on Google and they are more subdued too - a bit too much white maybe, but altogether more believable than Britains original offerings!

Anyway, that's some o'me'Mexicans! Box ticked.

S is for Service in the Sahel!

My Britains Deetail Foreign Fighting Lot and a few wandering Dervish Berbers who were with them, I hope there's some more somewhere, but I'm not sure where, or if!

I don't know if the Gatling Gun officer has been put in the base by an owner, or if they were cleared like this (middle right) by Britains as the Roman charioteer was, and the assault-boat crew, who turn up on Khaki Infantry bases from time to time.

One is in a paler plastic (bottom left) and another has the unavoidable evidence of a stuck release-pin (top right) while I'm missing a pose . . . standing firing, so better put him on the mental shopping list for the 14th! You haven't forgotten? You have haven't you! Plastic Warrior Show - all day!

Close-up of the mould release-pin 'monopod', he's my 'elite' sniper! And the method by which the packs were casually attached with a dollop of Evostick!

I only found three poses of Arabian berserker, so whether I have the others somewhere in another tub or what I don't actually know, but I'm still hoping the missing Indian colonial infantry from Cherilea and Charbens might turn-up so there may be another of these boxes somewhere!

There are two versions of each with either a long-barreled Arab jezzail weapon (trio above), or a more Western musket (lower figures), and the fact that I'm missing all the swordsmen/any mounted figures also points to missing tubs/a missing box? Anyway, that's a box ticked for now.

B is for Brief Board-game Bonanza!

Another box which got shifted from the garage back to storage was this one, but it was jammed at the bottom, and while I like to carry-on like I'm still 25, the simple fact is - I'm not! So I had to break the tape and temporarily empty-out the horizontal games laying on the top, to make it light enough to jiggle about while lifting, 'cos it's a big box; it had a boiler in originally!

A mixed bunch, the Star Trek only has large 54/60mm card flats, and I think I picked-up a lose set a while ago, so this will probably go at some point, but there's a few treasures in here too, we saw the Formula 1 game ages ago, and the Belagerung with Marx figures (I can't remember if it was here or One Inch Warrior magazine though?) and we've seen the 3M Feudal figures, loose.

Tri-Tactics (Gibsons) is also card flats; beautiful old litho'd ones, we've seen the Show Jumping plastic flats once or twice I think and the Keys to the Kingdom figures? While there's so much on Axis and Allies now on-line I may never bother with a full post, but they're there for comparison shots and the A-Z!

I photographed the contents of the other box back in the summer of 2020, and a couple of those posts are still in the queue (although I don't think Shogun has turned up yet?), but I'm going to quickly look at three of these, which have already been sealed back-up again and gone-on to the store.

Waddington's Camelot, we have seen the pieces here already, they have been in one or two mixed lots, but we may return to them here, to compare with some black & white ones I think I have somewhere.

Dean's second - bi-lingual - version of the Peter Rabbit Race Game, original sets had hollow-cast lead figures, fully painted and supplied by Timpo, the tool for which these polyethylene plastic ones were moulded from, a third 'heritage' version was issued a few years ago with 'antiqued' chrome-finished mazak-alloy pieces. I think the lead ones have been seen here? Squirrel Nutkin is the odd one out, with a full/all-over coat of paint, on cream-white plastic.

This came from Matt Thier of White Tower Miniatures, who saw it and saved it for me nearly 20 years ago, and he let me have it at his cost, which was car-booty pennies I seem to recall, so many thanks to Matt, for that!

An Italian-language (Noris toys or games) one or two-player game, you are Ivanhoe (or Roger Moore; even if he looks like Tony Curtis!), fighting the baddies of King Prince John!

Figures are semi-flat, in the European premium style, about 25mm and hard polystyrene. The TV series was actually an early ITV joint UK/US co-production and Roger Moore hated doing it apparently!

O is for Out in the Sand!

A box-ticking quickie looking at Cherilea's unquestionably small set of Arab warriors and Foreign Legion figures in 54mm plastic, with two of each 'side', the conclusion must be that they were either testing the water, or designed them for a specific reason/client, maybe 'Beau Geste' cake decorations?

I had totally forgotten I had these, I think the painted originals were in the 'big purchase' from Portsmouth, but the re-issues must have been one of those last Birmingham shows (2010/11) or a PW show of around the same time? This is reaching-with-dagger bloke; the reissue is a bit flashy, while the paint's survived well on the original.

Running-forward chap has had an accident! Again the reissue is flashy and the original's paint means I will try to save him, but I know from past experience - trying to fix these old chalky figures is often more trouble than it's worth.

I actually photographed him first, then did both sides of all the others, so returned to him, them couldn't decide which was the better shot, so used both! Mr. casually-watching-the-manic-hysteria-of-the-other-three guy!

He's a really nice figure and only highlights the lack of a half-dozen other poses! Maybe they had two tools and one was damaged beyond repair before production commenced?

Because I'd forgotten I had these, I was today-years-old (actually yesterday!) when I learnt, or re-learnt that when they were re-issued, they produced a third legionnaire, an officer, from the chap obviously fighting-off the first Arab!

And looking at the bases, they copied the clubbing guy, and gave the copy a heavier base, then re-cut the original tool cavity to produce the officer - who is on the old base?

N is for New-Old Find!

I was moving stuff up to the storage unit yesterday and was looking for a couple of small boxes in the garage to make up a load when I spotted a rather crushed bankers box under something else and though "What the hell's in that?", dug it out and found it was a bunch of missing tubs, split between 'colonial era' and wild west . . . most of which I'd totally forgotten, and a lot of which has now been duplicated over the last few years!

Two of the tubs on the bottom had been deformed by the weight, which had pushed the end of the box over a hard edge, and there was some damage to the contents, but more due to age and three or four moves rather than what's happened to the box!

Anyway I shot a few for some box-ticking posts, and we'll look at a some in a sec', but you can see one of two tubs of Timpo Arabs (top left, the other - underneath - is the grey/white/pale blue poses), the Supreme (as supplied to various others) Wild West (middle bottom), which will make for an interesting comparison post at some point in the future, as it was only last year - I think - that I Blogged the newer versions and noted at the time there were colour variants out there.

We're about to look at two of the others, but bottom right is the 'early British' FFL and Arabs, something I know has been added-to over the years, and which requires a bit of research to get right, so only a glimpse today! Although we did look at some back at the start of the Blog I think.

Altogether there were 25 tubs, and I put them in a 35-litre Really Useful 'Euro' box last night, where there was room for five more, so for now, they got the Polish lollipop-figures (from Chris Smith) and three other's that were hanging around waiting for a home, but the Wild West and Colonial 'master' collections both have other boxes; already in storage, so this lot will be broken down in the near future and sorted into them.

Marx reissue generals (names and solid bases), and copy (? names removed, hollowed-bases) Wild West Characters, nothing special, they were common a while back, and you still see the odd lots' of them on evilBay, I think Marksmen imported the blue ones, not sure about the brown, but I have the WWII Generals/Admirals somewhere in green, blue and brown, so I guess it was all from Ri Toys?

Quick box-ticker of the Crescent Wild West, they are really quite nice figures, anatomically, somewhere between the quality of all the early Swoppets and the hyper-realistic late Timpo set, six of each pose and mounted versions available on the three standard Crescent horses, they fall down on the limited plastic-colour range.

A small lot of mixed Arabian/North African types with two French bazaar copies of Reamsa French (or Spanish) Foreign Legion, a colonial cavalryman (Pech/Reamsa) and two Marx Arabs, one of whom will require the superglue! The chap on his camel (and the camel) are a vulcanised rubber and may also be French, he looks a bit like Quiralu/Wend-Al FFL, could he be from a aluminium mould, anyone know? Next day - JIM or JIM-copy? See comments - following post.

Anyway, that's a taster, there's a few more quickies to come, and when they are all sorted back together we'll look at the rest one day!

News, Views Etc . . . Herald Toys & Models

Latest press release from Barney's site;

"...this week we are delighted to offer for sale the Langley Collection of plastic model toy soldiers, including the most complete collection of Britains/Herald English Civil War figures we have had, together with a number of American Civil War figures and Wild West Swoppets, including a number of boxed sets."

H is for How They Come In - Francophone Lot

I was round a mate's a while ago, John Begg, who many of you will know as PTS52 on feebleBay, and he talked me into a junk lot, well, he sort of shoved it at me and I accepted it with an unbecoming over-eagerness . . . I'm addicted to this stuff, but you've probably worked that out for yourselves by now!

Four 'SINGAPORE' marked animals; without the box, or a bit of research I can't say whether they are Blue Box or Redbox, but Tai Sang owned all three (? see the Blog passim) factories, so it's all a bit academic! Along with a Jean Höfler one-humped Arabian camel; with that factory paint - I think an earlier version.

A charming polystyrene cockerel which I suspect might be French, or Danish? Pretty little thing either way and new to me, new to the collection  . . . and now - new to the Blog! Can you tell I had no blurb for this? It's factory-painted!

Interesting but damaged solid copy of a Britains Swoppet Indian, again, possibly French (hard plastic) rather than a Hong Kong knock-off, a nice Wagoneer, who is Hong Kong, but a cut above the usual pirated swoppet crud, with a separate vinyl jerkin and PVC whip. He's not rare, but it's nice to get him with the whip.

While the loose 'styrene flats, are downscaled copies of the Gibb's ones, and finding a few more loose justifies my not de-bagging the set we saw here, and nice to find a couple of the teepee/tipi's, but still waiting for the cavalry to turn up? They are also Hong Kong.

I have quite a few of these, they have a distinctive 'drum' of plastic, usually around the feet or on the base, which might be a mould-release pin-mark, or something more technical, and I assume French 'bazaar' or Spanish late-production?

This sample increased my pose-count and revealed that they come in two sizes, or were themselves copied - the bright, fluorescent-yellow chief could be younger as well as smaller! Remember the Hugonett beretted combat figures had a saluting chap in a smaller size too? Lifted poses are a mix of Britains and French figures I think?

These are mostly Cofalu and include my first mounted Indian from them. I'm not sure about the hard-plastic chap, he's similar to my 60mm swivel waist Cofalu French infantry, but he is glued and doesn't have the swivel head, if neither Cofalu nor another French producer; might he be an Italian make?

Medievals; again, I think mostly French and a fair-bit of home-paint, but the important one (bottom left - Cyrnos) is still in his factory finish. The figure next to him could be Hong Kong or French bazaar and is clearly a copy of Timpo's early swoppet line, the two top right are Cofalu again I think, while the Elastolin siege-engine crew copies are more (home-painted) bazaar output.

Combat infantry; a Reisler wire-cutter from Denmark leys alongside two 'multipose' kit figures, and while the DAK MG38 operator may be Airfix Multipose, I suspect the Italian is Italeri (or Italaerei as the name probably was when the kit was first issued!), or even Heller?

Behind them two Starlux 35mm's which from the state of the paint (cursory flesh on one, none on t'other) I suspect are 'for' Solido (Belgian) die-cast model vehicle accessories.

While towering over everyone is other Belgian, a WWII/Post War infantryman, in his British inspired beret and battle-dress (poor Belgians!), who's base is thinner than the Durso one's I thought were here somewhere, but I think they must be on the languishing composition page, so he maybe by someone else?

These are interesting, in that I've not seen them before (but did see a lot again the other day!), and they are based on the larger Silver Knights by Supreme, but without the moving arms, and some of the poses of the smaller Supreme figures we've seen here before, and my suspicion is that they probably are Supreme, but possibly a specific contract for someone else, maybe even a generic?

Soft PVC in black and chocolate brown, the reborn Starlux 'brand' had a similar set in silver/black a while ago (Le Chateau Noir), which was a partial re-badgeing of a Simba set (also Supreme contents) and given the French/European nature of most of the contents of this tray, it may be a rival product from that market? I think the painting has had 'help' at someone's home!

Everything else! Three flat lead, horse-race, game-playing pieces, two Giant horses and a cowboy, Matchbox Adventure 2000 (boy, were they a few decades out!) spaceman, early British intermediate-scale horse (Rocco Household cavalry), Minie Mouse (Combex or Heimo?) and a Supreme pirate who is a color variation of those previously seen here, I think?

Which leaves the chap all tied-up. Now I was sure I should know who he was, and searched quite hard, but I'm stumped, he's similar to the Domplast/Heinerle/Manurba one, but his chaps are far more flared, Jean's is moulded integral to the tree, while I have a similar one somewhere, tied to the tree with little button-thread ropes, but I think he's smaller (storage!) and possibly Timpo, so, I'm out of ideas - he could be French bazaar (given the rest of the lot), and I wondered if he may be from a helicopter toy's casualty basket (with flared jeans - very 1970's!), but I would like to know for sure!

Anyway, all useful grist to the mill and many thanks to John for saving them.

V is for Very Sad News

Nuno, over at Soldiers in Miniature has posted on yet more appalling news from Ukraine;

http://soldadosminiatura.blogspot.com/2022/04/valeriy-grygorenko-ilustrador-da-roden.html

S is for Some Shots from Sandown Show

While I was at Sandown Park back in February I took the opportunity to shoot a few things on Adrian's Mercator Trading stall, some of which may still be available if you want to eMail them via the website.

Mentioned in the previous post; these are 8 of 10 sculpts from the Quaker cereal premium ship set. I have most of the colours seen here in my small sample, but I don't think I've found a yellow one yet.

Sticking with ships, this is confirmation of the 'believed' Zang for Timpo composition vessels we looked at a while back. An actual Timpo box, the label a bit faded and the set is submarine-heavy with a carrier, battleship/cruiser and two destroyer types, all painted in the same dark grey-brown and green camouflage scheme we saw with the loose set last time.

He also had this loose card (which may originally have had a smaller matching box- see thoughts below), however, this time they are all one colour, and the Battleship seems to have utilised an old slush-casting lead-mould?

A close-up of the carrier, which - with that heavy mast/tower - could be trying to depict the inter-war/early-war carriers Hermes or Eagle (both lost in the war to enemy action), and the rather scratched and faded Timpo labels on both sets. the simpler paint on the smaller one and corner label may hint at a 'budget' set, available from a counter-display box with multiple cards?

Bill & Ben, the flowerpot men! And Weeeeeeeeed! Hollow-cast figurines of the early 'Watch with Mother' TV characters, made by Sacul, there are repro's out there now, but these are oldies! I never really liked them, they were a little too close to those weird Eastern European TV-puppets, we used to import, for my taste and consequently it was years before I realised Weed was actually a sun-flower - Slava Ukraine!

This is a bit of fun, Adrian knows someone who makes fun figures from the remains of old, bashed, hollow-casts, and here we have a Pirate (or Gypsy - there were a few Gypsy wagon sets, camp-fires, knife-sharpeners and the like, back in the hollow-cast days?) playing a squeezebox, married to a farm foal!

Clearly a set of board game counters, but who or what I don't know, the figures and bases have a look of Crescent hollow-cast production about them, but what do I know about hollow-cast? Very little!

All nice things, and thanks to Adrian for letting me shoot them.