F is for Follow-up - Khaki Runnings!

I managed to grab the Battle Space, at the weekend after all, so managed a quick shoot of the closest Model Power  'twins' and took one of the military locomotive pool while I was at it!

Mobile missiles; both utilising their maker's flat-car, both spring-loaded and both having the large elevation tap-wheels, but otherwise quite different, the Model Power is err . . . underpowered, but as it's a polystyrene model, it would break quickly under the power of the Tri-Ang launcher which packs a serious, pre-H&S punch!

To which end, the Triang-Hornby missile is a rubber-tipped affair in softer polyethylene to take the strain, it also looks more like a Tallboy or Grand Slam (aerial bombs) than the Model Power's Honest John lines. "It'll 'av someone's eye out"!

Tank transporters; the earlier British one being a bogie well-wagon (that is a lower cargo 'well' between the raised twin-bogie (truck)-mountings) which reduces the height of the center of gravity, while Model Power utilise a clip-on set of chocks with a standard flat-car.

In fact, in the West, tanks are chained down with between four and eight chains which are screw-tightened, you only have to watch a few 'funny' tank-fail videos to understand the current Russian failings in Ukraine; while we winch-on and tie down, they rev-up and mount like dogs on heat and drive off, losing the thing at the next roundabout if it didn't fall-off on loading, or crush its own lorry!

Exploding cars; mechanisms were actually quite different (I didn't have time or space for more detailed shots this time, and while both have the look of North American 'reefer' wagons, Model Power go with a 50ft one, we Brits matched our road wagon limit with a  40-footer! Rememeber also HO is also scaled smaller (1:86/90) than OO (1:76/72), so the British model looks a bit 'chunkier'!

I have an old 1970's Walther's or two, and among the pages and pages of transfers for home-builders, mostly for reefers or passenger stock, are quite a few military ones, so you could with the two Q-Cars, this pair and a few kits, build a long, but visually rather boring (if more realistic) logistics train, but you'd need to glue these two shut first!

The loco's; we've seen the two main brands before, but of interest is the one down the front left, which is a clockwork 'cheapie' from Playcraft via Jouef of France. not specifically military, it happens to be the right colour, and adds variety to my fleet!

We loved our 'starter set' clockwork's when we were kids, and used to run them on a figure-eight inside our electrified double-oval, if we were quick we could get four trains moving at once without a crash . . . we weren't always lucky - figure-8's have a crossroad!

It's one of those quirks of toy history that at one point you had OO-guage train sets/lines from/branded-to Tri-Ang, Rovex and Mettoy Playcraft . . . all ultimately Lines Brothers! I should also mention the track, which happens to still be around despite having long lost its usefulness.

It's a sort of resinated or 'Bakelite' treated card (like the ties in old plugs which hold the cable tight), obviously for power-insulation, with the shiny (non-ferrous) rail fasteners (chairs or tie-plates) riveted through the card every forth sleeper (tie), I did have a brand name for it, well . . . it's somewhere in the archive, Hammant & Morgan maybe (our transformer was theirs), Hamblings, or early Hannants? One of the mail-order catalogues in the archive has/lists something which fits the description anyway!

It was the home-fitted rail on our train-set which was bought 2nd hand by Mum at Persons Auctions here in Fleet (long-gone, along with County Tractors and First Inertia), and somehow she managed to hide it (about 6ft x 8ft) from us until Christmas morning, I'm hoping, when I lift the boards in the loft, in the next few weeks, that I may find it's still there with its household gloss 'landscaping', but it may have gone years ago? It was old, crumbly, early (1960's) chipboard.

K is for Kicking and Screaming . . .

Hard to believe that a modern set of such poor overall (paint and fine detail) quality could feature on the Blog for a forth or fifth time, but that is what is happening here and a follow-up to various follow-up's, found in The Range, Aldershot (looking for hose connectors - always check the toy section!) and branded to the previously seen PME, but with a new header-card, it's those footballers' again!

Although, if you're a racist, this isn't a set for you, oh, no-no-no, you go and sit in your so wrong, white-right zone and leave the rest of us to enjoy the fact that a set that's been around for over a decade now has finally decided to represent what's happening on the pitch!

Sticking with one of the previously seen colour schemes, shirt wise, we now have 50% of the players showing obvious ethnicity and the knowledge that the Ref' might be a gay Scotsman, or even that one of the players might be gay, means inclusivity finally comes to the hallowed turf -  provided it's icing - as it has in real life! And it's Pride month - go Justin; you've got the ball ('Forest strip!), score goals on a green cake!

T is for Triffic' Train Set for the Troops!

Here's a book which needs to be written . . . a look at all the military train sets and the relationships between them? As we'll see, this set bears a lot in common with the old Tri-Ang/Hornby 'Battle Space' sets for instance, and while the modern Model Power branded, seems to be from older AHM tooling, so could be Japanese in origin as AHM worked with a lot of Japanese firms, or Rivarossi from Italy?

Anyway, I haven't got time to do it but I hope someone does, with the O-guage stuff as well as the HO/OO . . . but I might make a start in a while, after getting today's post's star!

I bought this HO rated set at Sandown Park for 30-quid which I thought was a bargain, and although I knew it was a modern (still in production?) set, I was right as Googling has revealed prices from $40-loose or incomplete to $250+ for sets, so £30 for a loose train, with no evilBay global rip-off charges, seems - indeed - to be a bargain.

The locomotive is what I - as a non American - consider to be a typical, even 'iconic' mid-late 20th century diesel unit and the caboose (brake van) is equally typical/iconic of its type, here marked-up as a troop carrier. We'll look at the other two in closer detail.

An Honest John lookie-likee, which rests on a launcher that bears a resemblance to the Tri-Ang one; but all in plastic and with a simpler push-&-click loading action. The real link is the winding wheel, which mirrors the Battle Space (and earlier non-Battle Space) Tri-Ang one.

A nice rendition of an M47 which apparently never saw combat service in US hands, but gave true birth to the M48/60 family, and here on a flat-car. The chocks are a clip-in single moulding, so could be put on civil-coloured (oxide-red) rolling stock, but it would probably have to be the same AHM/Model Power stuff?

In these though we get both closer to the older British models with an exploding box-car and further away with the huge rail-gun, while the one in the middle is a Q-car, hiding a nasty, if rather anachronistic surprise!

I think the mechanism is similar to the UK one, but mine are in storage, so I can't check them, but I'll try and dig them out over the weekend, if memory serves this is harder to get and keep together, but then it doesn't work when you trip the switch! Only falling apart when you pick it up to reset it . . . doh! And obviously because I only got the rolling stock, I don't have the track-side trigger, but the Tri-Ang trigger may work, or be made to work?

The 'Q-Car' has two Flak 18/36 German 88mm guns hidden it it! The Tri-Ang version had a twin rocket launcher, but employed the exploding car mechanism/body, while the Model Power one has simple (and preferable) click-shut, manually-operated, drop-down side panels.

While this beast has no comparison in the Battle Space range! It would benefit from a bit of detailing (stowed stores, hand-rails/guard rails, a breech of some sort, I've stuck a shell on the loading chute which was kicking around (Airfix or Lone Star SLR bullet?) in one shot. It could also use some more obvious support wagons than a cabose!

These are fun things and when I'm settled I'll try to track down some of the other obvious ones (Tyco, Bachmann, even Jakks Pacific) and we'll compare and contrast, one of them does a loaded Honest John on a articulated lorry trailer, there's a pricy three-coach Ambulance train from another and some more realistic ones from Lima, but they are top dollar!

News, Views Etc . . . Passing of Clive Smithers

Very sad news, and I don't know how I missed it, but Clive Smithers passed away last year. I didn't know him personally, but I think I'm still linked to all his Blogs: Hinton Hunter, The Lone S Ranger and Vintage Wargaming, and either he, or another of the party invited me to join a non-public Blog where attempts were made to ID old lead figures, where all were friendly and polite - I wasn't much help on that front (I think a few early metal posts had given a false impression of my knowlage in that field!), and I quietly excluded myself after a year or two when it had gone quite.

Clive did a lot of important work ID'ing the old Alberken 'S' Range (precursors of Minifigs) and tracking down the more esoteric Hinton Hunt's, he also kept the early Lamming sculpts in the news, so will be sorely missed by the War Gaming hobby.

His collection is currently being sold by his brother, and there is more here;

https://www.thisisoxfordshire.co.uk/news/20175401.toy-soldiers-get-thousands-pounds-auction/

And a lovely tribute here which I seem to have missed at the time;

http://prometheusinaspic.blogspot.com/2021/08/the-old-metal-detector-personal.html

Off to the great board-game in the sky huh? Rest in peace Clive.

S is for Sandown Park - May 2022 - 3 of 3

The final part of the show report; not so exciting, mostly small scale, but the stat's seem to indicate that both these show reports and the 'H is for How...' posts are popular, so I tend to photograph everything, rather than just the highlights, these days!

The chap I bought the Airfix SAM-2 Guideline from in February, had said he's bring a better one (a detail I left out of that show report!), and he had, but he'd put it out for anyone to buy which was worrying, but it's a fine line when people make such agreements - I know from past experience - that the one or other party either forgets or doesn't attend, leading to wasted time/journey or a cheated feeling in the other!

If as a seller, you say you'll bring something to the 'next show', you have to write it down and make the effort to take it, and if someone says they will do so, you, as the buyer have to turn-up and at least look at it with willingness!

Contents were minter than a minty thing which grew-up as a mint, got picked by the mint harvester and taken to the mint works to be turned-into minty-mints! So I will make-up the February one at some point in the future, and keep this as the sample.

The lid is probably slightly better that February's more common version, but the tray was a mess of tape, some of which has been extended to the skirt of the lid, so I will do the hair-dryer trick before deciding which to retain with the contents, as I know the corner-dinks on both will iron-out as well as each others? And - to be honest - I prefer the extended artwork of the latter boxing!

The Slater's box of 'Huminiatures' was a present from Adrian Little, when I first opened it and saw the chap with two cases I had a wobble on the Trojan theory, but it was just bad, or yellow lighting in that far hall! It actually contains the expected Wardie/Merit/PPP figures, but painted, they later issued them unpainted on wheel runners, alongside the Merit ones.

The others came in from various quarters and include an unpainted Mastermodels casting (right) some Merit versions (centre) an Airfix farm dog and what I suspect is an airliner civilian (left) with more Wardie Mastermodels metals' in the little bag.

The only way to tell if they are Slater's or Merit are the European-style thin, clear-plastic, sheet bases on the Slater's (some merit have none (early?), other latter ones got heavier oval bases with a chamfered edge) and the more subdued painting of the Slater's figures - the yellow lady might be a latter Merit make-up-the-numbers addition? You can't really tell the difference between Merit and Modelscene (fourth branding of the sculpts) at all!

Charming Christmas cracker charms, as I bought them; two matching 'sets' of six, missing one shoe. I suspect though, that they are home-threaded, and came one per mini 'tree' cracker, as per similar items we've seen here before. They are an early 'styrene or late, stable'ish fenolic/cellulose type polymer and the little pony is still around in the very cheap crackers.

The rabbit actually came with the FG Taylor's in the first post, but is a Hong Kong example, who usually comes on a mini runner with two other poses. I have a good white-plastic Policeman, but wasn't sure on the black one (I think I have shades of blue) so as they came together, I ended-up with a  headless horseman! Metal sheep-dog is Timpo I think and a Merten/Preiser (?) horse.

A larger version of Merit's barrel (as copied by Marx), but I think there was a larger one in one of the earlier, larger 'load' sets? While the windmill is lovely, probably a tourist item from Holland, it's early I think, and polystyrene with an aluminium rivet.

Odds and sods and out of focus, so we'll move swiftly along - cereal premium, Phidal superhero and pencil topper!

I meant to grab these at the PW show, as I knew they were getting cheap, but it wasn't until Michael M-S grabbed most of them that I remembered, so took the dregs with a three-part Plesiosaur (who'll glue OK) and a woolly Mammoth!

Another Remco firefighter closes the shoot, although I did also buy a whole train-set which will get a separate post!

S is for Sandown Park - May 2022 - 2 of 3

Part two of the Sandown plunder posts, and while it wasn't a particularly memorable show for nice things, I did get a pretty eclectic mix of bits and bobs, so let's have a look at a few more . . .

I think these were two separate purchases as I went round the tables, on the left a late, but still marked, Lik Be (LB) robot fitted with a key-chain loop and in soft polyethylene with a few stabs of silver paint. On the right a variation of the bath diver, this paler than usual, and unmarked so might be British rather than Hong Kong in origin, but not the - often overpriced - Tresco one! We looked at a few here.

Some more hollow-cast, lead 'gap-fillers' from Adrian, another red-legged Lone Star legionary (from Steve Vickers, who thinks it's a repaint . . . I don't mind!), and a bag of Pic-a-Pac (Prison Industries/Pridus?) Charbens Guards, who we have to assume are Scots Guards, from both the lack of a plume and the inclusion of a kilted piper - not rare, the seller had a box-full!

The price was taped to the catapult and was quite expensive - for a catapult, the rest were spread about the shelf a bit, so I asked it it was for the catapult or the whole lot and he said the whole lot, at which point the unit-price became very reasonable, so I bought them - the second 40mm Elastolin lot in two weeks!

Four crew and a wheelwright/blacksmith's assistant but take his spare/mended wheel away and he makes an excellent extra crew-member!

This bunch were in the lot too, various archery shield-works/screens for laying siege, wicker and timber mantlets with wheels to push about the place, and a more substantial wall, with modular construction.

Poor photo I'm  afraid, there's a couple of them as I was shooting against Boysey-Boy's freshly laundered fleece and it's so soft and fluffy (he loves it) that the camera didn't know what/where solid was! But yeah - Blue Box Russians, another HK radio-operator Adrian found in his post-PW Show sort-out and another Aurora kit figure Russian.

Two Marx 60mm sports figures, coincidentally the two most usually broken (I think I have the golfer WITH super-glue!), both have their flesh coloured-in which I think was an end-used addition? And a reissue (?) of the 54mm female jungle explorer

Box-ticking with the lead civilians! Charbens (or copy?) farmer - Crescent mechanic -Unknown (penny toy?) - Johillco milkmaid? I'll check them all against the books at some point! I love the farmer's matching neck-tie and handkerchief in polka-dots!

Seen before here, courtesy of Chris Smith, as 'unknown, a bit like Arco', now known as Pikit Toys 'Battle of the Bi-Trons' with a better post coming, probably in RTM?

A well! Since the two or three posts/follow-ups on these a year or so ago, Chris has sent me one or two, I've bought one or two, so the whole sample/side-collection has grown somewhat but is currently in several places, most of them buried in a shipping container, so it will be a while before we return to them, but we will and with a better picture than last time, and they told a reasonable tale then! This is the all lead version of the Barratt piece we looked at here, produced after Taylor had 'won' the T&B tool in the divvy-up!

Another one that's not quite in focus, we saw them years ago when I shot them on [I think?] Phil's table at Sandown Park, now I have a set, a nice box ticked. A bit pricy, and not as rare as some would have you believe, they found a load when the Elastolin factory closed about 15/20-years ago, so all the interested parties got a set at the time!

From the rears, the red one is quite a traditional, if portly 'crab-man', and the spaceman is very good if a bit uninspired, the other two however came from the fevered minds of a surrealist on drugs! The blue one is both inventive and wacky, but the monkey-faced, horned, flat-chested, ostrich-knickered, hoofed, rubber-stretchy hula-lady is the stuff of nightmares!

I wonder if there is a Perry Rodan connection with these figures; there isn't an 'overt' one as far as I am aware, but I thought maybe some of the paperback artworks might have inspired the sculptor/s?

S is for Sandown Park - May 2022 - 1 of 3

Following the pattern of the Plastic Warrior show posts, I've just shot these in a random order and they happen to have worked out - after a few collages - to eleven shots per post, three posts!

I bought this in the stand-scrum which occurs outside, before setting-up, although it wasn't much of a scrum this time; only four or five dealers set up on the terraces last Saturday. This is unmarked but probably British, and would have a rubber-band to twist/wind, for motive power.

Four mini-cars; another colour variation of those Quaker premiums, the green one is unmarked but identical to a Beeju example I have (I think!) and the driver is very Beeju, so it must be one of theirs! The yellow-one is very simple and reminiscent of the educational bulk-lots, but thinner-walled plastic and the grey one might be Minic or Joef, but from a rail-wagon car-carrier I suspect - it's not got the chrome underside or Minic mark, but some marks have been blanked-off the tool?

F.G.Taylor's rabbit burrow and pair of rabbits! Aren't they delightful? The sitting one has a carrot and the other is rushing back to share it!

Tin-plate pieces; I think I have a better version of the tree, and the garden fence seems to go with it, set wise, both are probably ciggaret-pack premiums, while the guardsman is a bit older I suspect, a penny toy (?) in two peieces - the guardsman and the base he's pinned-to, the others make their own bases with a quick bend!

Before and after cleaning; this is interesting, it's a bath toy, it floats, we've seen 'em, had 'em in the past. It's marked 'Made in England', could be any one of a number of makers, all the 'usual suspects'; Airfix, Tudor Rose/Kleeware, Thomas/Poplar, Bell, Merit . . . but, I would like it to be - Fraser & Glass! The upper (deck and superstructure) is beginning to curl-up with age and has the properties and colour of F&G's Crazy Clowns . . . nothing empirical, just a hunch/wish! Some of the six side fenders are damaged.

Couple more Captain Video's who are probably Winco Condar! Both in a heavy 'styrene of a a dark silver or gunmetal shade.

Starting to track down a few of the real rarities! Playland Products (M. G. Southall)'s pulp fiction figures of Sir Hubert Guest in a green spacesuit and the eponymous Dan Dare in the yellow.

Now, having never been happy with the Thomas/Poplar attribution for the origins of the Frog Bloodhound Missile kit's crew figures, something I have gone on record saying, more than once, I have to say, there are a few similarities here. The baseless feet in heavy shoes, the size, the casual poses (four out of the five in this set are just standing around - like the RAF geezers, only Digby's active; waving weapons around like a reckless redneck!), even - to a lesser extent - the sculpting, so I wouldn't be surprised if it were found that Southall were behind those contracted buy-ins?

I got eight key-rings in three purchases, but they have gone-on to the various posts in the medium-to-long-term queue, so you only get a glimpse here, but what can you make out; I had the skeleton as a teenager, it ended-up on my denim 'cut-off', Xandria,  Henson's Muppets, the cannon is nice, and another Highlander!

Now these are interesting, six sexy Manga babes, to compete with the Marx Misses we saw here recently! They are actually a limited (50 sets apparently?) edition, in resin, of plastic 'Pit Babe' figures issued with Scalextric Japan for a limited time - quote from Worthpoint (so eBay!):

"The 2004 JGTC [Japan Grand Touring Car (Championship)] series of cars released by QuattroX (Japanese Scalextric) were a hit with kids all over Japan but later shunned by parents due to the seductive anime style "Pit Babe" . Such a controversial outcry provoked Quattrox to promptly remove the cars from the shelves, later re-releasing them minus the race Pit Girl."

A mixed lot of metal and composition from Adrien's rummage trays on the Mecator Trading stall, metal for reference in the future, composition because I can't pass on it! The three pilots I've probably got, but I grabbed them to make sure I could produce the next image, what with all mine in storage!

Combined with the stuff from the PW show, two weeks ago now, we have a shot of all known - to this author - versions of composition pilot; 20, 54 and near-60mm. I think Dave Scrivener sent me a shot of his before he left us, which I should have somewhere, so we may well return to the subject again in the future?

The new, brown one, is similar in execution, but has a better base, and, more importantly; a different arrangement of harness-straps, so a second maker is likely, as Zang/Timpo/Timpolin stuck with the same pose and uniform for all the other versions. The new one doesn't have gauntlets either.

H is for Hedge Pig

Mentioned earlier, those hedgehogs in full . . . first shot was taken in April, of a quite ginger one, although the camera flash rather hides it, and I think it's in the trio a week or two later, they liked the uneaten cat-food, but then, round here that's sliced ham!