Datsuncog

Some further research has confirmed that these oddities were from the Super Chargers series (also sold as Super Trucks, and as Mud Racers), available from 1986 to roughly 1994. SC-1 was the Ford F100-derived 'Mini 4x4' casting, painted in Bigfoot colours and mated to a huge base, available as part of the original Super Chargers range from 1986 on. SC-6 was the less venerable Ford Flareside Pickup casting, styled as 'Awesome Kong II' and fitted to a similar base as Bigfoot from 1986 on. SC-15 was the Peterbilt Dump Truck, 'Big Pete', from a later 1988 release series and on a longer base - and it seems that the plated silver plastic rear tipper is the crucial component missing from my Friday find. Fitted with accurate-looking chunky rubber tyres and in the midst of the mid-80s Monster Trucks fad, these were no doubt popular toys - but can be hard to find now, for some reason. Were most of them played with to destruction?

Yeah, the Irish Gifts Stall only really buys and sells at retail price - unlike the Tat Stall where stuff comes from auctions and house clearances so the prices drop til they're gone, stuff here can remain for decades (he was still carting round his Days Gone stuff from the early 1990s right up until 2020). So I'd say it's unlikely there'll be much of a price drop on the Cosworths anytime soon. I'm annoyed that I missed out on the mint/boxed Manta a few weeks back, for £5 - Got distracted by some 1960s Corgi being set out on the stall, and the next thing I knew it had been yoinked from under me. But I'll continue to keep an eye out!

That's lush. I was always intrigued by the American LaFrance aerial ladder in my early 1980s Corgi catalogues - but never had one until I found one at the market a year or two back. It's a tremendous model; and £5.50 is an excellent price! Well bought!

Actual prices - £9.99 each. I really didn't think they'd be on the stall for more than an hour or two, but this is the third week they've been there. Unless he has a few dozen of each colour and just keeps replenishing...

Home again - and today's finds stashed away in respective tat boxes. A varied selection, but I'm well pleased with them! The Cougar and Toronado are great, but the Impala is unquestionably the star of the show. Just goes to show, you never know what might turn up... Happy Friday, kids.

Fiver for the Matchbox Dinky Mini Cooper seems very reasonable - the box doesn't even appear UV damaged. I already have one, but I would have lifted it at that price too!

Marlin was the first one I picked up, funnily enough - but a poor repaint with both pillars cracked and messily glued, a roughly drilled base, and missing a door. I put it back... Can do! Or just the Bigfoot Ford, if you prefer. Looks ideal - there's some light cracking to the glass, but it's otherwise complete and should respond well to another repaint. Will add it to your box! Sure thing! It's really quite nice. The Nemesis took that one too - it was by Tekno. Missing glazing, and with the baseplate strangely bent out. A Dinky France 230SL did show up on the stall a few years back - needed a full resto, but I think it was in the 50p box. Can't remember who ended up with it, but it was someone on here! Sorry, I'm already away! Did think hard about this, being a red-spot and all, but bust spoiler and missing hatch made me think twice. Maybe next week... There was both a blue Elan and a white Avengers Elan in there - minus windscreens, of course. The Nemesis took both of them - he had quite the big bag of stuff! Twingo did indeed come back with me - will add that in with the Corsair for you!

Also quite surprised to find these on the Charity Stall: 1980s Matchbox monster trucks, in reasonable nick. Ford F150 Flareside. Ultra-long-running Ford F100 (with the original cab casting dating back to 1968) Peterbilt, possibly missing a rear accessory like a cement drum? Will have to check the catalogues... Also a blackwalls Hot Wheels emergency fire appliance, and a delightful little Majorette Twingo in excellent nick. All available at 50p a pop. **MOSTLY ALL TAKEN** - Hot Wheels still to be claimed! Now - sadly I gotta run!

...but expression of interest noted!

Ah, I'm afraid The Nemesis took it. It was a poor repaint, priced at a fiver. Everything in the crate seemed to be a fiver. The maroon Matchbox Dinky one? Ehhh... probably not worth it - missing headlight, paint damage and a crack to the glass. The Nemesis also took the Cresta in his haul, annoyingly...

I got these. Dinky Cougar (repaint) and Corgi Golden Jacks Toronado. Olds is missing a wheel and the headlight pop-up doesn't, but it's not bad at a fiver. Both available. **BOTH TAKEN!!** But here's the payoff. Corgi A60 Driving School car is worn but nice... But the Israeli-made Gamda Koor Sabra Chevrolet Impala is what had my eyes out on stalks. Obviously. Never, ever, seen one of these in the metal before. The bootlid feels a little flimsy, but it's still there. Condition-wise it's a bit worn, with the chrome-plate nearly all gone from the plastic base, but it's still a very well-proportioned model. The Nemesis was rather keen on it too; once he clocked what I was gripping like there was no tomorrow, he asked if I'd consider letting him buy it instead. I had to decline, as gracefully as I could. It wasn't like he was short on diecast, and this is one of those unicorn models (like the Lone Star Vauxhall Firenza) that I'm always looking out for, even if I'm very unlikely to find one. Slightly ruefully, he congratulated me, "Well found." Wow. Just wow. Amazing what turns up in this out-of-the-way corner of Belfast, sometimes. I think I'll hold on to this one for a bit.

The other stalls hadn't all that much of note this week - nowt to excite on Alan's Emporium (unless you're thrilled by two boxless Days Gone at a fiver a throw), and not so much to see on the Irish Gifts stall, which was uncommonly slow to open up today... When the curtains finally came off, it was mostly the same Hot Wheels and Matchbox we've seen before, less the Convoys and Working Rigs. These Escorts Cosworths I thought would have sold quickly... But apparently not. Surprisingly, the Charity Stall seems to be gearing up again with assorted kiddy-focused tat. Lots of rubbish, obviously... Some of which were wheeled, and old. But I'll cut to the chase here...

Okay, so it's gonna be a quick run-through this week, and I don't think I'll be back later - but it was worth getting up for! Treated myself to a parking spot just outside the market, rather than walking five blocks... Despite getting in early, it seems the stall is even busier at 7.45 than it is whenever the market officially opens at 8. Go figure. Initial impressions were... disappointing. Just the dregs of last week's Lesneys and Huskys really, plus MoYs and Cameos that we've already seen before too many times. And that horrid nicotine-stained Solido. Indeed, that seemed to be about it for wheeled items - and though I tried, I couldn't get all that excited about a wooden ferry... Or a plush bomber. Although then I twigged The Nemesis had shown up, standing to my left - and suddenly I became aware of a fresh heap of diecast that had been dumped on the stall while I was taking snaps, further up. Daaah. The Nemesis had snagged a very decent Corgi Land Rover SIII wagon in that early 2000s 'mud effect' finish, to my chagrin; but the rest weren't really worth having: Bashed-up Brumm. Slightly plasticky mid-90s Corgi Commercials. Still-boxed Teamsters Mitsubishi Shogun SWB a bit more toy-like than model-like: I think a rough one of these has shown up on the stall before. Early release Corgi Classics Minor, in a crispy cracked box. God-bothering Vee-Dub. Hmm. I was just about to write the whole thing off as one of those weeks, when... Oof. A crate appeared. A good sort of crate. A very good sort of crate. Blokey had started putting some of them out on the stall, before The Nemesis and I both descended on the crate simultaneously - at which point he walked off and let us tear each other's throats out... Nah, not really. It was perfectly civilised, and we actually got talking. There's always gonna be a rivalry, of course, but he's quite nice. He restores the items he finds, and Budgies are kinda his thing. So he was especially pleased with the Budgie Albion grain hopper set aside in his haul, and also a Leyland Hippo articulated tanker which was unfamiliar to me. Also in his pile was the shell only of a Lion Daf (seen atop the Land Rover), plus a Tekno Mercedes SL. He also took the paint-free Dinky AA Transit, the Oxford CA ice cream van, the Whitebox (?) Austin FX4 taxi, and the two-tone Vauxhall Cresta PA just visible on the other side of the Land Rover - plus a pair of Corgi Elans not pictured here. All in all, there were a lot of interesting diecast to be found this morning - though many were repaints, and most were damaged in one way or another (mostly a-pillars missing or broken). Hey, I couldn't get 'em all... But - I got a few. [TBC!]

Breakfast of champions. Great anticipations for this one! Chodspeed indeed.

The showroom in question:

As far as I can recall it was an entertaining read, though no doubt you'd get more hard facts and information from a Wikipedia article or the BLARG enthusiast site these days... Also, thirty years ago now. Crumbs.

Found 'em. This is apparently still on SORN, having last been MOTd in 2008. Reminded me of one of these, a bit.

Yup, that'll be Issue 11 - from April 1993. What never fails to set my tiny mind a-boggle is that at the time of publication, the cover star SD1 wasn't long past its 6th birthday (date of first registration - October 1986).

There have been some optimistic prices of late...

Used to be one of those parked up by the side of the road in Hove. Never saw it move in the two years I lived nearby; and the aftermarket BMW badge confused me at the time until I found out what it was. I've some pics somewhere...

I've just had a look through the Tat Archive, and it seems that I've actually owned two of the buggers. The pale blue one went to @bunglebus all the way back in December 2019... While the darker blue metallic version with missing tyres went to @flat4alfa in January 2021. The repro's staying with me!

Aside from pissing about in the flowerbeds... further arrivals happened today. Mmm-hmm. The eagerly-awaited next instalment in the Corgi Model Club collection - the #245 Buick Riviera. Very yes. Such a nice model, and with the wire wheels fitted too (also seen on the E-Type 2+2). Metallic blue paintwork on this one seems especially lustrous... And you'll be relieved to learn the Trans-o-lite system works very nicely, at both ends. Phew! What a cracker! Trans-o-lite instructions included in the box: And the usual blurb. The towhitch is quite a big lump of a thing, but it doesn't spoil it for all that. I owned a slightly more careworn original example a couple of years back, but passed it on a while ago to someone here. I thought mine was a paler blue, funnily enough, but I think it's the same mid-blue shade as the repro version. I have to admit, I'd been thinking of cancelling my membership but I couldn't pass this one up...

Just to further tank @barefoot's investment strategy, some downloadable scans in PDF format are available here: I absolutely loved Jalopy magazine - definitely a formative influence on my early-teen self, though erratic publication schedules made it hard to track down. I did manage to eventually buy up the odd copies I didn't find at the time of printing, read through them all again - then sold the complete set of issues 1-31 to someone on here a few years back, @500tops maybe? I've still a few duplicates left over in my box of nostalgia - I guess that's sufficient to bring back the memories. Some great writing, and great stories in there.

DanBox touched down yesterday morning. Huzzah! Very, very well packaged. And inside are... Many wonderful things from the 1960s Lesney King Size range. Cheers for that, dude! Very pleased with this lot - more detailed perusal to follow. Of course, as luck would have it, only MrsDC was at home to receive parcels yesterday, since I was away out attending a transport planning meeting. She hasn't mentioned it. Yet. I guess I could say it's gardening equipment? Given the absolute state of the back garden in the new place, regular Matchbox aren't gonna be up to the job this time round - it's gonna take King Size heft to get it all done... (Flashback to three years ago: Ah, 2020. What a weird old year you were.)