Shite in Miniature II

[Datsuncog]

On ‎8‎/‎19‎/‎2019 at 6:50 PM, sierraman said:

I was obviously quite a fan of the Super GTs... 

Cor, that's a cracking collection! Can't be far off a complete set there...

On ‎8‎/‎20‎/‎2019 at 9:07 AM, sierraman said:

I think from memory they came as a 2 pack 

They seemed to come in all manner of different permutations - I do remember seeing them in individual carded blister packs, usually in Woolworths where they were maybe 49p against the 'standard' Matchbox range at 79p: but I never bought them like that.

(Interesting to note they were sold as 'Super GT by Matchbox', just to put a bit of distance between these reheated toys with the 'proper' range)

The couple I owned (which are maybe now in the Sierraman Archive?) came either like this...

(I think I had this very pack, only my Alfa Carabo Super GT was in orange -  I really wanted the Volvo, but the Ikarus coach was nice too, if annoyingly out of scale with the others)

Or like this:

I seem to recall my wee brother going to a friend's birthday party with one of these Super Value Packs, then throwing a fit on the way in and having to be brought home - without handing over the present.

He got to keep the Chevrolet Camaro Special; I got the beige RS2000 Super GT...

Not a bad strategy.

[sierraman]

Later they were rebranded in the early 90’s as Neon Racers. Painted in an array of day glo colours with the launch pad things. 

[Datsuncog]

29 minutes ago, sierraman said:

Later they were rebranded in the early 90’s as Neon Racers. Painted in an array of day glo colours with the launch pad things. 

They absolutely got their money's worth out of those castings, didn't they?

I think I used to have a pair of shorts in the same colours. Probably around the same time, too.

[sierraman]

I have that set. Probably received it round about 92-93. The only castings that seemed to last longer were the ones loaned to the Bulgarians. 

[egg]

Satisfying new Norev arrival. Norev launched this in 62, and is probably an early one as it has no wiper blades in the windscreen moulding.

[flat4alfa]

On 8/16/2019 at 2:22 PM, flat4alfa said:

I was wrong

It's the side

 

DO NOT BELIEVE WHAT YOU READ ON THE TINTERWEBS

I've found my one out and it definitely attaches to the back. Silly sods 

[barrett]

That Badewanne is lovely! If I was flush I could be tempted by this one, too. Then I guess the Tekno and French Dinky versions too for the full fleet. Where can I buy a real one, btw?
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vintage-Minialuxe-France-plastic-issue-Ford-Taunus-17M-1-43-loose-model/183777287341?hash=item2ac9fadcad:g:sqsAAOSwH~Rbw1Qp

[egg]

Woah, the minialuxe version is great. Trying not to watchlist that.

[eddyramrod]

On 8/20/2019 at 6:29 PM, barrett said:

 

Where can I buy a real one, btw?
 

Ebay.de?  Leboncoin?  Ebay.nl?  They were a good looker, weren't they?  Anyone got a cheap scruffy Dinky or Atlas version for my resto pile?

[Datsuncog]

2 hours ago, eddyramrod said:

Anyone got a cheap scruffy Dinky or Atlas version for my resto pile?

I'll keep an eye out for you!

 

That Norev really is a lovely rendering; some very fine tat being procured of late.

Is it fair to say that the later Norevs with more opening bits tend to be more prone to the dreaded warping, or is it really just the luck of the draw - a bit like pre-war Dinkys and zinc pest?

[Split_Pin]

Luck of the draw I think. My Renault 6 has always been perfect but my 12 doors don't fit well at all. Both are boxed next to one another and from the same 'speedwheels' era.

[Datsuncog]

Here's something of a curio, which maybe some on here might be interested in.

In my 'nostalgia box' of childhood diecasts, I have this Matchbox Jeep:

I've owned it from new, to the very best of my recollection, as I can just about remember when it looked rather more like this, with a detachable hood:

The hood, I believe, had two posts which fitted into the square holes just behind the seats, and it never stayed on terribly well. So it's long gone.

But the base looks like this:

And it's this 'No.II Sleet-N-Snow' designation, as a cast insert, that interests me, since it seems to be a bit of a mystery.

 

First off, a recap - this Willys Jeep casting first appeared in model year 1971, styled as the MB02 Jeep Hot Rod.

In a lairy hot pink with a lime green base and huge protruding exhausts, this was one of several 'wild' vehicles appearing in the early-70s Matchbox line up, in an effort to compete with Hot Wheels for the attention of their young customers. It replaced the slightly less exciting MB02 Mercedes Trailer in the range.

Despite the eye-popping hue, detailing was excellent in typical Lesney fashion, with  crisp body detailing and a very accurate dashboard. Perhaps less conventionally though, the model came with a UK-spec steering wheel on the right hand side.

Matchbox already had a Jeep in the Superfast range, as it happens - No.72, the contemporary CJ-5 model, introduced on standard wheels in 1966 (and in LHD) and which bowed out in 1971, just as the Jeep Hot Rod arrived.

Now, I'm not really sure why Matchbox didn't modify this standard casting for their 'hot' variant, as they had done with many other older castings - the Ford Mustang gaining big rear wheels and a huge engine to become the Wildcat, for example - but instead they opted for an entirely new casting based on the older 1940s & 50s Willys CJ-2/CJ-3, a civilian version of the iconic WW2 era MB Jeep.

For subsequent model years, the Jeep Hot Rod appeared in pink and white, red and green, and finally red and white for its final year in the main lineup, 1976.

 

Unusually, this casting further bucked the trend by becoming more toned down for its next incarnation - a more realistic incarnation, in the style of the military Willys MB Jeep.

This showed up in 1976 as a Two-Pack, TP-11, usually paired with a hilariously out of scale Honda motorcycle:

The Two Packs range had some similarities with the later Super GT range, in that it included various older castings dropped from the mainline range which could be churned out in smaller numbers to get a few more years' worth out of the tooling. As per the pic below, 1960s castings such as the Alvis Stalwart and Ford Heavy Wrecker, not to mention the Mercedes ambulance and even the 300SE (now stickered as a Staff Car) were resurrected and sent to war.

Often the Two Pack castings were modified to make them cheaper to produce and more profitable, such as the deletion of opening features and even removing the silver paint from the wheels. In the case of the Jeep, the moulded hot rod engine was removed and a regular bonnet was cast. As it had been part of the mainline range for five years, it really was becoming somewhat long in the tooth and hence ready to be put out to pasture (or, indeed, to battle).

The same casting also appeared in the G-11 Strike Force Gift Set for 1976, but painted a slightly different shade of green and with a different sticker on the bonnet.

It seems that, during the crossover, some of the military jeeps were fitted with '(c) 1971 Jeep Hot Rod' base castings, before being replaced by updated castings with '(c) 1976 Jeep'.

What I'm not sure about, however, is exactly what else appeared on the base of these 1976 non-mainline Jeeps. With no counterpart in the main lineup, I'm curious whether a number was allocated to them.

Because, a year later, in 1977, a further modification was made and the casting returned to the main lineup as the MB38 Armoured Jeep, displacing the Stingeroo chopper-style trike in the range.

Yep, the casting was further modified to accommodate a movable floor-mounted cannon - which explained the cutaway modification to the windscreen surround, providing the muzzle with a locating point.

Although the official name was 'Armoured Jeep', the base castings appear to have continued to have just shown 'Jeep' along with the No.38 allocated number.

I'd be interested to learn whether the Armoured Jeep was supposed to be launched the year earlier as a mainline model, but was for some reason delayed (the replacement for the MB02 Hot Rod Jeep in 1976 was a metallic green hovercraft) - maybe due to the choking hazard presented by small parts, assuming that was a concern back then?

It's possible that the Two Pack/ Gift Set Jeeps with the flat rear floor wore a combination of No.2  Jeep Hot Rod and No.38 Jeep bases, depending on whether they'd used up the old base castings and took the newer castings produced for the upcoming mainline model.

So - if anyone happens to have a flat-floored green Jeep in their stash, I'd be interested to know what it says!

 

The following year, 1978, the Jeep casting put in a further appearance in bright yellow, this time as part of the '900 Range' - the new name for the Two Packs - and finally making use of its towbar by pulling a matching glider trailer (TP7).

You can maybe see that the casting had been lightly modified, with the bench seats in the rear of the vehicle now cast in metal and painted the same body colour, rather than moulded in plastic as they had previously been all the way back to 1971.

Whether the original tooling had been modified to accommodate the cannon mount for the MB38 Armoured Jeep, and Lesney now had to make another casting mould for this more basic version, I'm not quite sure. But a change there was.

 

So where does my No.II Sleet-N-Snow fit into all this?

Well, it seems that the Roman Numerals range was a notable effort by Lesney to (belatedly) break free from a business model which tied them to a single global range.

The internationally marketed 1-75 range had always tried to find a balance of different toys that would all sell worldwide, but it wasn't always all that successful.

Maybe in the 50s and 60s this hadn't been such a big deal, when Lesney's little pocket money toys were making them huge amounts of money and by-and-large kids seemed happy with whatever toys they could get.

Competition from Mattel's Hot Wheels and their emphasis on speed and action, rather than realism, had initially blindsided Lesney at the tail end of the 60s, but they had come back strongly with their appealing Superfast range while diversifying into dolls, board games and pre-school toys, and had largely consolidated their position again.

But with an ever-greater variety of items appearing on toyshop shelves in the late 1970s, the diecast car market shrank in the face of new competition such as Atari's gaming console system and small collectable figures such as the era-defining Star Wars toys. Toy cars weren't the sales successes they once were.

Lesney needed to do something, especially as the kids in America seemed to have less and less interest in spending their dimes and quarters on cars like the Citroen CX estate and Ford Cortina MkIV, which meant very little outside of Europe.

And that something was to let their US office choose ten castings, redesign them, and market them exclusively for the American market.

This wasn't quite  a new idea - Lesney had allowed its Japanese branch to produce locally specific versions of a few models to help it compete with Tomica, such as Tokyo-livery police cars - but this was a further leap, with a much bigger market.

Accordingly, in 1978 12,000 examples of each of the ten chosen models were produced in London, and shipped to the US where they were packed in regular Superfast carded blister packs - though labelled with a Roman numeral - and sold through major retailers such as K-Mart and Toys 'R' Us.

There was innovation in the form of the Silver Streak (formerly the MB01 Mod Rod) and the Golden X (MB33 Datsun 126X), each of which were finished in very eye-catching polished chrome-effect metal.

There was the welcome return of castings which had been big sellers in the USA, such as the former MB26 Big Banger and MB48 Pi-Eyed Piper, now Brown Sugar and White Lightning respectively.

Of particular interest was the Hot Smoker, last seen as the neon-pink MB70 Dodge Dragster - and once the biggest selling Matchbox model in the US. I'm sure that hadn't escaped the notice of the team.

The sales team added in not one but two customised Volkswagen Beetle based models - the Flying Beetle, a recoloured version of the MB11 Flying Bug; and the Lady Bug, an updating of the MB31 Volks Dragon (and also, apparently, the first Matchbox model to be offered in black paint).

Further fantasy cars were offered in the form of the Flamin' Manta, last seen as the MB07 Hairy Hustler, and the Black Widow, based on the MB41 Siva Spyder (ok, so this was a real car - but with only 12 ever built, using Beetle floorpans in an industrial estate in Bournemouth, it's not one that many kids stateside were likely to be familiar with).

The Black Widow and Golden X also came with fully opaque black windows, perhaps foreshadowing - or even inspiring? - these castings' future destiny in the Super GT range.

So what of the last of the ten? The Sleet-N-Snow? My battered little Jeep?

Well, this was unique in the Roman Numerals range as it was a fairly true-to-life rendition of a familiar service vehicle, the US Mail DJ3-A Jeep - a two-wheel-drive light duty version of the CJ, also known as the Dispatcher.

Apparently, US collectors had long since expressed an interest in such a model being made, and here it was.

Real-life US Mail versions of the Jeep Dispatcher were fitted with right-hand-drive steering, to make life easier for postal workers. Thus, an adaptation of the existing MB38 casting with its RHD steering wheel would have a high degree of accuracy. 

This was the only current casting from the MB1-75 range to be featured in the Roman Numerals range.

Having said that, I'm not sure it would have been all that much harder to adapt the obsolete MB72 Standard Jeep CJ-5 casting - which would have had the benefit of being a more modern version of the Jeep, and mirroring those still in use in US cities. Maybe there were crossed wires. Who knows?

But a reworking of the Armoured Jeep is what was produced, with a removable plastic roof, and still including the cut-out to the windscreen frame for the cannon.

The Roman Numerals range was a success, quickly selling out - and paved the way for Lesney's programme to tailor the 1-75 range to local markets.

That same year, Matchbox Japan produced some exclusive castings such as the Toyota Celica GT and Mitsubishi Galant Eterna. These had an entirely different 'look' to them, compared to the UK-designed Lesneys - much more like Tomica models, and included plastic bases and bumpers.

A further trial occurred in the US in 1980, when a second 'Limited Edition' range was launched consisting of more largely redundant UK castings, as well as the four new Japanese-designed castings (but now made in China, contracted out to Universal Toys):

The concept was proven, and Lesney agreed to let local sales teams decide what would sell in their area.  As such, the 1981/82 model year brought substantial differences between the catalogues for the UK and US ranges.

The US range from here on in featured more in the way of pick-up trucks, off-road vehicles, US trucks and NASCAR racers, leaving the European sales range to cover passenger cars, service vehicles and the like. Hence the MB07 VW Golf continued to be sold as a plain silver and green hatchback in the UK, but in the USA, MB07 was produced as the Rompin' Rabbit - a jacked-up Golf on a monster-truck style chassis with tampo print graphics. Call it a cultural difference - although, to your average eight-year-old, the Rabbit might have offered a little more play value.

However, the high demand for the little US Mail Truck made Lesney take notice, and for the 1980 model year it joined the 1-75 Mainline series, as MB05:

Around this time, the base insert was amended to read 'No.5 US Mail Truck'.

Although the Mail Truck was deleted in 1982, and replaced by a jacked-up off-road version with a roll cage and bull bars, this same basic casting remained in the Matchbox line-up well into the 2000s to bulk out multipacks and playsets, making it one of the most enduring Matchbox models produced.

 

So then - my little Jeep is a super-rare OMG limited edition, worth $$$$?

Well, probably not. In fact, almost certainly not.

I'd thought it was right up to this morning, when some light googling revealed that Lesney were a little careless with their castings.

As with the military version of the Jeep which initially appeared with 'Jeep Hot Rod' stamped on its base, it seems that quite a lot of the early mainline MB05 run still came with incorrect Roman Numeral bases calling it a No.II Sleet-N-Snow - including those sold in the UK.

Additionally, the verified Roman Numerals Jeeps seem to have plastic seats in the back - like the 1976/77 release 'flat floor' military Jeeps. Mine, however, has cast metal seats like the 1978-on yellow 900 Series car.

So it may be the case that the way of telling genuine limited-edition No.II Sleet-N-Snows apart from incorrectly based MB05 mainline US Mail Trucks is the rear seating.

Plastic = genuine US limited edition.

Metal = mislabelled mainline

So that seems to clear up the mystery, after all these years.

If anyone else has one of these, I'd be interested to see what your baseplate says - especially as I've yet to find a pic of a 'proper' MB05 US Mail Truck base.

 

Of course, product diversification across territories came a little too late for Lesney, but Universal Toys were swift to apply those principles when they bought the Matchbox brand and tooling from bankruptcy in 1982.

It also explains some of the more baffling Matchbox models I've encountered from time to time, such as this:

Yep, the real-life Mitsubishi Galant was sold in the USA badged as the Dodge Challenger - and Matchbox followed suit, sending the Japanese-designed Galant over to be sold as a USA mainline. The models were never sold in the UK.

But that's a whole 'nuther story...

[Split_Pin]

Fantastic write up as always, really interesting piece. I have a very battered Jeep Hot Rod in the loft that my Cousins gave to me about 35 years ago now. I'll give it a bit of study now!

[sierraman]

I have a Jeep with the Sleet n Snow base. But then I’ve also got a Stretcha Fetcha Viper Van and the Orange Field Car. I’ve absolutely no idea how they ended up in the U.K., I found them in a box at a market. 

[Burnside]

Hope you all don't mind, but thought I'd give people a heads up. I'll be selling a few 1:43 vehicles due to some unexpected money problems. I'll post them on a separate thread shortly so as not to clog this one up and before enduring the misery of Ebay etc. 

Quick pic of the main items though.

[eddyramrod]

8 hours ago, Datsuncog said:

I'll keep an eye out for you!

While they're peeled.... I could also stand some battered Vanguards,  A 100e saloon, mk1 Granada, A35 saloon and van and Hillman Minx would be nice.  I can't afford to pay much for them so I'm prepared to do some restoration work.  Tbf I'll consider almost anything in the way of a Vanguards project car, as I can make use of some spare parts such as wheels and tyres.

[barrett]

That Matchbox Jeep stuff is great content, thanks for making the effort @Datsuncog. Although my interest in toy cars is pretty marginal, this is virtually the only thread on AS where I actually get to learn something new. That's actually a little disheartening, but in any case this is now always the second thread I check after ebay tat. Ho hum.

 

Anyway,  we're finally on the right page to reveal the latest addition to my cars-wot-I-have-owned shelf.

Considering its the most common, modern vehicle I've ever owned, this is one of the most difficult models to find in 1:43. It's a Norev / Hachette partwork jobby and on the rare occasions it comes up on ebay often sells for upwards of £30, which is way too rich for me. This slightly playworn example was much more reasonable even with postage from France. Although it's a facelift car, it's otherwise a dead ringer for my old one down to colour and wheels so I'm pleased to finally have one.

[Datsuncog]

16 hours ago, eddyramrod said:

While they're peeled.... I could also stand some battered Vanguards,  A 100e saloon, mk1 Granada, A35 saloon and van and Hillman Minx would be nice.  I can't afford to pay much for them so I'm prepared to do some restoration work.  Tbf I'll consider almost anything in the way of a Vanguards project car, as I can make use of some spare parts such as wheels and tyres.

I shall keep an eye out at the market tat stall, and also any charity shops - they do turn up now and again!

 

19 hours ago, sierraman said:

I have a Jeep with the Sleet n Snow base. But then I’ve also got a Stretcha Fetcha Viper Van and the Orange Field Car. I’ve absolutely no idea how they ended up in the U.K., I found them in a box at a market. 

Fantastic... mebbe someone local's holiday purchases? Uncommon finds though, and I've never seen any of the real US Limited Editions over here (assuming my misnamed Sleet-N-Snow is basically a factory error on a large scale) - well found!

 

16 hours ago, barrett said:

It's a Norev / Hachette partwork jobby and on the rare occasions it comes up on ebay often sells for upwards of £30, which is way too rich for me.

Nice going - and yeah, it's funny how some models are nigh-on impossible to find. I've hardly any models of my real cars owned over the years - either not made at all, or way too dear to contemplate.

Glad you enjoy my blatherings; basically I just find a thing, do some digging (looking through old catalogues, collector books and online searching), then witter on about it for a while... it's funny, I disposed of nearly all my toy cars last year in favour of only collecting 'serious' 1/43 models by Minichamps, Vanguards, Oxford and the like... and now I'm back raking through boxes of old battered toys again.

I'll never learn.

[egg]

42 minutes ago, Datsuncog said:

I'll never learn.

That's why you're here chap, we'll never learn.

[155V6]

17 hours ago, barrett said:

That Matchbox Jeep stuff is great content, thanks for making the effort @Datsuncog. Although my interest in toy cars is pretty marginal, this is virtually the only thread on AS where I actually get to learn something new. That's actually a little disheartening, but in any case this is now always the second thread I check after ebay tat. Ho hum.

 

Anyway,  we're finally on the right page to reveal the latest addition to my cars-wot-I-have-owned shelf.

Considering its the most common, modern vehicle I've ever owned, this is one of the most difficult models to find in 1:43. It's a Norev / Hachette partwork jobby and on the rare occasions it comes up on ebay often sells for upwards of £30, which is way too rich for me. This slightly playworn example was much more reasonable even with postage from France. Although it's a facelift car, it's otherwise a dead ringer for my old one down to colour and wheels so I'm pleased to finally have one.

There's also the 1/43 Onyx BTCC car,the 1/64 Majorette,& the 1/32 SCX slot car.

[bunglebus]

Who was after the Matchbox Victor? Try eBay 174005745011

[Datsuncog]

Friday tat, peoples?

Well, let's go...

Lots of new stuff in today - whether there's people using the summer to have a clearout, or he just has a lot of stock to turn over, either way it's a whole new stall from last week, pretty much...

Lesneys are £3; Hongwell Cararamas are £2. Corgi and Matchbox Transits (boxed) also £3.

I'm not sure how much is on the Matchbox Super Value Pack; odd to encounter one just after mentioning it upthread.

1/18 F40 looks to be a Polistil, maybe?

More unboxed Models of Yesteryear, some early 80s Superfasts, and more Hongwells… again, around the £2-3 mark.

Buses. Lots of buses. These aren't tip-top, sadly - few marks and chips to them.

Unboxed Maisto 1/18 maybe a bit optimistic at £10. Boxed Corgi Classics commercials at £15.

And a few other odds and sods; Maisto, New Ray, 2000s-era Corgi. I didn't ask how much were on these. You can see the rest of the stall tat encroaching...

No 50p tat box today; maybe never again? Instead, the pasting table out the front boasted a fine array of £2 MIB Models of Yesteryear, no doubt once someone's idea of a nest-egg.

I did my usual dance of picking them up, putting them down, picking them up again...

...they're so damn cheap and yet while I'm attracted on one hand, I just can't connect with them...

The cars interest me more than the commercials, but even the late 70s era Y-1 Jaguar SS100 in pale green couldn't tempt me enough to lay down two measly pound coins...

Confused, I returned to the main stall. While there's some quite nice stuff, nothing really grabbed me.

Oh, hang on...

Those Vanguards weren't there a minute ago.

A quick check reveals a £10 price tag on each of them. Oh, and it turns out there's more:

Hnnng...

The XJ6 interested me in particular - I've been looking for one of these - but opening the box brought disappointment.

Yes, the fecking mirrors.

Indulge me for a second while I rant at whichever imbecile at Lledo decided that it was a good idea to sell detailed scale models with the mirrors provided separately, on a sprue, leaving the collector with two options:

1) Leave the mirrors 'as factory' attached the sprue, so your display model looks crap and incomplete with pointless holes in the doors or wings where they're meant to attach. Feel annoyed.

2) Try to attach the tiny mirrors, getting blobs of superglue all over the paintwork of your lovely new model (so it looks crap on display), and then realise that it'll never go back in the box again without either breaking or fatally bending both mirrors and packaging. Feel really annoyed.

Turns out the previous owner of the Jaaaaag had gone for option two. So glue dribble all down the doors, the passenger mirror snapped off, and the driver mirror horribly bent back.

I dithered, I moaned, I put it back. Bollocks.

Also, while I'm ranting, I'd be interested to know why Vanguards come in a variety of packaging, seemingly at random. The acrylic display boxes - with mirrors supplied attached - are clearly the best, but I still don't know why some of them appear in slidey-in cardboard boxes, while others come in opening-flap cardboard boxes. A few more recent ones do come with spaces in the packaging for mirrors once they've been attached, but again not all of them. Maddening.

I dithered a lot over these - the red Triumph 2500 was stunning (and, weirdly, had no holes for wingmirrors in it) but I already have three Vanguards 2500s, so a fourth seemed like overkill.

The black Granada Ghia also tickled me, only the alloy wheel mouldings were rather crude, with no holes in them at all. It made them look like cheap wheeltrims. I have the pale green 2.0L MkII in my display case at the moment, so again I turned it down. At least the mirrors were still unattached.

The two Sierras - XR4i and Cosworth - also appealed to me, but on taking them out and having a proper look, the overall shape of both looked wrong - the flanks seemed too tall and slab-sided, while the wheels looked really small. The box pictures look bob-on, but in the metal, I couldn't quite warm to them.

Obviously, this was a mistake as a quick eBay search indicates they're apparently worth more than my house. Well, nearly. £30-£40 each seems to be the going rate.

The Victor F-series was nice, but 50s cars aren't so much my bag - and I sold one of these last year, anyway. Ditto the early P6 Rover - I've the 3500 version in Avocado Green, and that'll probably do me.

So!

If you've any interest yourselves... well, you know the drill.

Of course, there's also plenty of other tat going...

Tin of DDT powder anyone, guaranteed to de-louse your kids?

Or how about a household cleaner that's an invigorating blend of asbestos, uranium and arsenic (probably)?

This place has it all!

[Split_Pin]

I might have missed the price but I'd be interested in the blue Dinky Ford Zodiac MK4 depending on the price!

[Datsuncog]

Mind you, I didn't leave empty handed.

Unboxed Minichamps Ford Scorpio, in not-too-bad condition, for £3.

I already have the estate version of this - which I was in fact looking at only last night - so the saloon makes a nice companion piece.

It's a nicely proportioned thing, and the alloys look much better than the Vanguards Granada.

The detailed dash is a nice touch, with the nasty plastic wood faithfully rendered.

That'll do nicely.

[Datsuncog]

2 minutes ago, Split_Pin said:

I might have missed the price but I'd be interested in the blue Dinky Ford Zodiac MK4 depending on the price!

Think he's looking £3 for that, which is maybe a bit steep as the glazing is cracked and the spare wheel is missing from under the bonnet...

[Split_Pin]

5 minutes ago, Datsuncog said:

Think he's looking £3 for that, which is maybe a bit steep as the glazing is cracked and the spare wheel is missing from under the bonnet...

Cheers Tim, yeah I agree with you.

[egg]

Well done on resisting the lure* of MoY

If that matchbox milkfloat really is £3 then it looks in good nick - yes please....

[eddyramrod]

If the two lorries (yellow, and blue/brown) in front of the Value Pack are at £3 each, I'm definitely in for those!  I'd also like the red Triumph and the black Granada, but I'm not willing to pay his price.  Have to wait for them to come down, I think...

[eddyramrod]

On 8/23/2019 at 1:22 PM, Split_Pin said:

I might have missed the price but I'd be interested in the blue Dinky Ford Zodiac MK4 depending on the price!

Sure that's not a Matchbox?  I suspect it might be...

[Datsuncog]

Well - I came, I saw...

...I R DISAPPOINT. On your behalf.

All the Lesneys had gone, bar a Mk2 Zodiac with a bashed roof. So no Commer Milk Float (sorry!) and no MkIV Zod either (which was indeed a Lesney).

The Dinky yellow lorry had also gone - and I'm afraid its companion, the blue one, was priced at a fiver rather than £3. With some casting damage and bent axles, this was also maybe a bit hopeful.

I'd been vaguely interested in the Matchbox Citroen CX ambulance for myself - but no, also goneski.

Lots of buses had found new homes, too. Clearly, Market Blokey had a helluva good morning...

But the biggest shock was this:

Nearly all the Models of Yesteryear were gone!

Thirty-eight of the buggers had sold since 9 o'clock, leaving only three unloved Talbot vans and a bunch of Shell promo Maistos, plus some Days Gone Vanguards.

Well, knock me down with a feather.

Obviously, I don't know if he sold them as a job lot, or whether one of the many French school trips en visite had descended on the stall and stripped it near-bare.

Crikey.

Well, at least they won't be there to test my willpower next week, hey?

So apologies to all, and if it's any consolation - anyone for tennis?