Shite in Miniature II

[Datsuncog]

53 minutes ago, bunglebus said:

Cor. My favourite (to read in the child section of Shenfield library) was Gumdrop Finds a Ghost

In which Gumdrop locates a long lost Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost.

I'm sure that's probably part of the reason I find old, unloved cars so fascinating 

Heh, that was my favourite story in the series too!

I also remember one about a traction engine, called 'Gumdrop and the Farmer's Friend', and I seem to recall one where Gumdrop got scrapped by accident, but was ultimately rescued...

22 minutes ago, Split_Pin said:

I'd completely forgotten about Gumdrop as for some reason I thought it was an Austin 7 but that is of course the equally charming Brumm! Well played and a nice bit of nostalgia as I recall loving these books as a kid. My school library had at least one copy!

I'd completely forgotten too - but the rush of memory upon seeing the Oxford Diecast model was unreal!

Just goes to show how strong some buried memories can be...

48 minutes ago, MiniMinorMk3 said:

My bright orange DY-3B GT had yellow lamps

and my DY-19 V8 had a very slight tint as well

 

Ah, interesting!

I must have a closer look at my long-owned orange version later - I didn't think it had yellow lights, but who knows...

54 minutes ago, danthecapriman said:

Nice little start to the year there @Datsuncog. Bloody well done dragging yourself out into the grimness of dark cold and wet January morning’s too. I’d definitely be staying in bed!

Im glad @andrew e snapped up that big Rolls too, I was getting very tempted to make enquiries about it myself!

Cheers! Was dithering about whether it'd be worth my while going in, but I'm glad I did!

[junkyarddog]

My Taiyo Tinplate beetle with fashionable patina,here gracefully modeled by Smoll Eddy.

"Electric cars will never catch on M8"

[quicksilver]

11 minutes ago, Datsuncog said:

Heh, that was my favourite story in the series too!

I also remember one about a traction engine, called 'Gumdrop and the Farmer's Friend', and I seem to recall one where Gumdrop got scrapped by accident, but was ultimately rescued...

I'd completely forgotten too - but the rush of memory upon seeing the Oxford Diecast model was unreal!

Just goes to show how strong some buried memories can be...

Ah, interesting!

I must have a closer look at my long-owned orange version later - I didn't think it had yellow lights, but who knows...

Cheers! Was dithering about whether it'd be worth my while going in, but I'm glad I did!

I remember Gumdrop books too and have somehow dredged up the name of Gumdrop's owner from a dusty corner of my memory: Mr Josiah Oldcastle. Why can I remember that from 30 odd years ago but not what I had for breakfast this morning?

Wikipedia says there were 37 books and the one I have the clearest memory of involved Mr Oldcastle trying to enter Gumdrop in the London to Brighton run but being rejected for being too modern and creating his own run with a convoy of weird and wacky vehicles. Val Biro owned the real Gumdrop right up to his death in 2014 but where is it now?

[RoadworkUK]

I'd love to find my old Gumdrop story cassette, narrated by Richard Briers (because of course it was). 

I have a Gumdrop omnibus three-books-in-one volume in my office. Gets a wistful thumbing surprisingly frequently.

Tim, if you ever decide that Gumdrop needs a home, please bear me in mind.

[andrew e]

How long is the Roller @Datsuncog intrigued what scale it is! Many thanks for picking it up 👍👍👍

[eddyramrod]

@Datsuncog Land Rover SWB, you say?  Yes please, tuck it in with my Crossley.  Speaking of which, you did right.  The box is just something else to store, so thank you, the one you've bought is ideal.

[bunglebus]

From gumdrop.org

Val died in 2014, but at the age of 92 was still working for the sheer pleasure of it on his next publishing project, and his latest Treasury of Fairy Tales was published last Christmas.  As Trustees of his Estate, his daughter Melissa and stepson Phil are committed to keeping his books in print, and Phil's son Chris, is the proud keeper of Gumdrop today, so expect to see them at future motoring events.

And a 2022 pic from Retro Rides at an event celebrating 100 years of the Austin 12

[FakeConcern]

3 hours ago, bunglebus said:

I got the Matchbox E30 cab finished too. There's a bit of a back story, my best mate for the last 30+ years had a bad motorbike crash in 2018 when a woman turned right across his path, he was pretty smashed up and had to be airlifted to hospital. He's been through multiple surgeries and although he's kept his left leg, he won't be driving manuals again. 

Having eventually got a payout, he bought himself this

He's had a handful of E30s and E21s but never a cabrio.

Started with this tired Matchbox Baur

I'm not ashamed to say I really pushed myself on this one, converted it to a normal cabrio including cutting the door shut lines into the body where the pillars used to be and sourcing a set of BBS wheels (Creative 164 - highly recommended).

I even did the BMW roundel on the bonnet for additional eye strain.

Only things I'm not happy with are the yellow windscreen, which I'll change when I find a clear replacement, and the tonneau cover being the wrong colour - which is his fault for only sending me a pic after I'd painted it and forgotten which colour I'd used for the interior!

 

I have no idea how you manage that amount of detail at Matchbox scale, it's super impressive!

I can't do it as well with Corgi scale toys.

Please do keep sharing your work, I love it.

[morrisoxide]

12 hours ago, Datsuncog said:

As is this ECTO-1:

Small print shows it's a 2021 reissue; I was kinda tempted as Cog Minor got one of these for Christmas in about 1990 or so, but I think he might look at me a bit weird if I presented him with a box-fresh one.

That brings back memories, I had that as a kid (I think it was my Brothers) it had removable fins. We had the yellow Beetle convert that you could flip over to be a ghouly ghosty lizard thing. I'm sure I still have the engine somewhere. The VW is probably worth a fortune now.

[Noel Tidybeard]

4 hours ago, Datsuncog said:

This one?

Looks tidy enough, but based on this particular stallholder's previous pricing strategies, I'd expect an asking price of about £30.

Not even joking...

[Datsuncog]

Aye. Same fella was looking £25+ for fairly playworn Lesney King Size stuff earlier in the year; the sort of stuff that I'd baulk at handing over a fiver for. Cracked glazing and missing tyres:

I don't tend to talk to him much as he seems a bit prickly and doesn't much care for me taking photos; but from a distance I observed a few potential buyers today picking up the Mod Tractor and trailer, having a brief conversation with the stallholder, and then setting it back down again and walking away...

So safe to say, it ain't gonna be much of a bargain.

[Datsuncog]

4 hours ago, andrew e said:

How long is the Roller @Datsuncog intrigued what scale it is! Many thanks for picking it up 👍👍👍

Now that MrsDC has retired for the evening...

It measures up at 28cm in length, though no doubt you could add another centimeter or two if the bumpers were still in place... say 12"/ 30cm, for the sake of argument?

It's a big model of a big car; I'd estimate maybe about 1/20 scale?

[ETCHY]

How  can I have got to 53 & never heard of Gumdrop ? As a car obsessed kid who liked reading it's most odd.

[Spottedlaurel]

28 minutes ago, ETCHY said:

How  can I have got to 53 & never heard of Gumdrop ? As a car obsessed kid who liked reading it's most odd.

Ditto on all counts - must be something to do with our age, I'm the same. Maybe heard of it in more recent years from discussions here, but certainly don't recall if from when I was young.

[sierraman]

9 hours ago, Datsuncog said:

Aye. Same fella was looking £25+ for fairly playworn Lesney King Size stuff earlier in the year; the sort of stuff that I'd baulk at handing over a fiver for. Cracked glazing and missing tyres:

I don't tend to talk to him much as he seems a bit prickly and doesn't much care for me taking photos; but from a distance I observed a few potential buyers today picking up the Mod Tractor and trailer, having a brief conversation with the stallholder, and then setting it back down again and walking away...

So safe to say, it ain't gonna be much of a bargain.

I don’t understand where his pricing comes from, either he’s very naive or he’s actually just trying to rip people off?

[flat4alfa]

9 hours ago, Datsuncog said:

It measures up at 28cm in length, though no doubt you could add another centimeter or two if the bumpers were still in place... say 12"/ 30cm, for the sake of argument?

It's a big model of a big car; I'd estimate maybe about 1/20 scale?

You guessed right on the first day you saw it 🙂

Just on that length measurement, against the real thing, it works to be 1:18

Looking (squinting on a phone) at your original photos of the underside, the big UM1 (D Series today) cells would have been in the remote control handheld battery unit on a line

I wonder if the motor is still in there. Likely 6v max, so what I've done in the past is open these sort of things up, free-off the motor, fit (bodge) modern cells tucked into a corner, wire switch directly, lock the front wheels turned in one direction.  Then watch it go around in circles on the floor, providing an overwhelming sense of pride and achievement, until the wife yells at me to turn the damn thing off.  Then it goes into a box with all the others 

[andrew e]

That might just happen…. Slightly under size for my 1/14 Tamiya RC trucks but close enough to be a scale load. It’s wether  you can get proportional (ie not all or nothing) drive to the wheels. I know it’s battered but weathered Gaffer/Withnail style it might just come out smiling 😉

Apprecite the measuring @Datsuncog now hide it back in the loft 😂

[flat4alfa]

I remember going to the library as a young child and getting the Gumdrop books too

Had no idea there was a Oxford Diecast model of it.  Brum, yes, got one or two plastic efforts, but not a Gumdrop.  I wonder if there was ever a release in near 1:32...

[flat4alfa]

David Soul died this week, RIP. 

5 wives, 6 children, 7 grand children, 1 Suzuki Liana. Lived his last 20 years in Hampstead, London, married to a lady 30 years his junior and became a British Citizen (which seems to been left off the news reports) 

So what of that iconic 1975/76 Ford Gran Torino 2-door coupe that he stated drove badly 

Hornby's Scalextric slot car alongside Corgi diecast effort we grew up with

Rough scale calculation

Cor, what a bloater in real life.  However, that was David Starsky's car... 

The Kenneth Hutchinson character car was a '73 Galaxie 500, dressed to look older and shabbier.  Stunt cars used to wreck were similar LTD and Custom 500.  Having the 460ci, it would have been quicker off the line compared to 351ci Torino. The Hutch character said in the show it was faster

Must get a model of one of those now

But what about the car Hutchinson replaced it with after his last Galaxie (he had two, looking identical - one rolled down a cliff, the other was blown up).  It was a '54 Nash Metropolitan named 'Belle' 

So that makes two cars to find models of.  Then Huggy's car..  Slope slippery. 

[Datsuncog]

51 minutes ago, flat4alfa said:

I wonder if the motor is still in there.

I believe it is...

 

1 hour ago, sierraman said:

I don’t understand where his pricing comes from, either he’s very naive or he’s actually just trying to rip people off?

Probably naivity and wishful thinking rather than actual gouging - I'd put him alongside many of the other retiree stallholders on Giffer Alley, in that they usually have a couple of bashed up toybox-grade Dinky, Lesney or Corgi items amidst all their other rubbish like horse brasses, old glass bottles and musty football programmes. I learned early on that any attempt to get a better look results in a chorus of "That's rare, that is, that's a Dinky..."  Even if it isn't actually a Dinky.

I tend to not bother my arse trying to photograph them anymore, it's not worth the fuss and clucking. They're generally always enthusiastically played-with racing cars or else military vehicles; I'd stop for a closer look at say a Ford Corsair, but it never is.

Basically these lads are still living in 1988 where that spiv who ran Mint & Boxed managed to convince a lot of people that old diecast was the Next Big Thing for smart investors; at best the market giffers might check eBay and somehow decide that if a nice boxed example's going for £50, then their scratched-up version with broken glazing and a missing wheel must be worth at least half that...

"I'll do it for twenty."

Will you, now?

[danthecapriman]

18 minutes ago, flat4alfa said:

David Soul died this week, RIP. 

5 wives, 6 children, 1 Suzuki Liana. Lived his last 20 years in Hampstead, London, married to a lady 30 years his junior and became a British Citizen (which seems to been left off the news reports) 

So what of that iconic 1975/76 Ford Gran Torino 2-door coupe that he stated drove badly 

Hornby's Scalextric slot car alongside Corgi's diecast effort we grew up with

Rough scale calculation

Cor, what a bloater in real life.  However, that was David Starsky's car... 

The Kenneth Hutchinson character car was a '73 Galaxie 500, dressed to look older and shabbier.  Stunt cars used to wreck were LTD and Custom 500.  Having the 460ci, it would have been quicker off the line compared to 351ci Torino. The Hutch character said in the show it was faster

Must get a model of one of those now

But what about the car Hutchinson replaced it with after his last Galaxie (he had two, looking identical) one rolled down a cliff, the other was blown up.  It was a '54 Nash Metropolitan named 'Belle' 

He was one of the rookie traffic cops in Magnum Force with Clint Eastwood too. 
Him and his cohorts got themselves clapped by Harry at the end on the scrap aircraft carrier.

[MiniMinorMk3]

3 hours ago, ETCHY said:

How  can I have got to 53 & never heard of Gumdrop ? As a car obsessed kid who liked reading it's most odd.

 

2 hours ago, Spottedlaurel said:

Ditto on all counts - must be something to do with our age, I'm the same. Maybe heard of it in more recent years from discussions here, but certainly don't recall if from when I was young.

Gumdrop has passed me by aswell. It is odd as teh first one was written in 1966, with a new book coming out every year until 1971. At that time I was reading the original Thomas the Tank Engines from the library, and some of the Ladybird Janet and John stuff.

[bunglebus]

Thought I'd dig out a stock MB 323 for some comparison shots with my custom one

And found one I didn't know I had

Seems like there are quite a few colour and tampo variations to find, as well as with/without towbar (anyone notice I'd removed that from the gold one?)

[MiniMinorMk3]

A bit more done on the R5 transfer project.

First up today was the sun strip.

Then I tackled teh rear lamps. I trimmed the left one in both length and width, the right side I cut in half so the trapezoidal shape could be addressed. getting those decals to fit the curve was difficult. They just kept wanting to lay flat. I will probably give them another go later when I have finished the rest.

Then it was on with the left side. Two problems here with the actual decals, the Valeo should be green and is too large and the Michelin on the front wing is too large and will not sit on the edge of the arch. I have done the best compromise by sitting it on the wing.

Just the right side to do after a bit of drying time for the left. The eagle eyed will notice that the fuel cap is already in place.

[MiniMinorMk3]

18 hours ago, Datsuncog said:

And, most unexpectedly (since vintage stuff isn't really my thing), this Oxford Diecast...

Which lifelong car nuts of a certain age will no doubt find it hard to look at without hearing a blast of the words 'Austin Clifton Heavy Twelve-Four, vintage 1926'.

Yep, it's Gumdrop - the star of nearly forty children's books written by Val Biro between 1966 and 2004, the fictional adventures of which were based on his own real-life Austin 12.

I loved these books when I was a kid, and luckily our local library had quite a few of the titles for me to borrow again and again. 

Correct down to the number plate, I'd no idea Oxford had produced a model of this splendid car.

 

I've had quite a few of those Oxford Austins, but there is no reference to Gumdrop on the box, it just says Austin Heavy Twelve Airways Blue. Maybe a licencing issue.

 

[bunglebus]

Yet it has the correct registration 

[flat4alfa]

Must be a problem with publisher Hodder & Stoughton and/or the Biro estate.  Perhaps the son, or H&S, wanted too much money.  SATURDAY UNFOUNDED SPECULATION, here on AS

[155V6]

23 hours ago, MiniMinorMk3 said:

 

I've had a few of the MiniChamps versions including the Dealer Issues.

Silver Dealer

Grey Metallic Dealer. 

Regular MiniChamps with chavtastic black rims.

As the model number ends in a 6 there must be at least 7 different colour variations by MiniChamps.

 

I haven't got any in dealer packaging,although some of mine have the cardboard sleeve missing so they might have been dealer editions originally.The colours I have are silver,blue,red with silver wheels,,red with black wheels,grey,black,& green.There's a purple version too,but I haven't got that one yet.I've also got the racing version,which comes in a blue Ford branded sleeve

[Datsuncog]

Yes, I'd been looking on the Oxford Diecast website and wondered why there was no mention of Gumdrop... a failure to agree licencing terms seems to be the most likely explanation, in the same way the Bodie & Doyle Capris made by Vanguards couldn't be sold using the trademarked Professionals name or logos. For collectors, it was just a case of 'if you know, you know' - understanding what the body colours and registrations represented.

In fact, I think Oxford pulled a similar move not that long ago with the 'Only Fools And Horses' Crayford Cortina MkII - no reference to the show anywhere on the website or packaging (although, given the vast amount of OFAH tat clogging up Home Bargains, I don't think it would have been all that difficult to licence the name) but a readily identifiable car all the same, based on registration and paintwork.

I guess if you own a classic or vintage car and it's regularly displayed at shows, as Biro's Austin 12 was, there's no reason a manufacturer couldn't view photographs and decide to make a model of it - indeed, I don't think you'd be able to stop anyone making and selling a model of your car, so long as there were no trademark infringement issues.

Must ask Cog Minor, he's the one who works in IP law...

[sierraman]

1 hour ago, Datsuncog said:

I believe it is...

 

Probably naivity and wishful thinking rather than actual gouging - I'd put him alongside many of the other retiree stallholders on Giffer Alley, in that they usually have a couple of bashed up toybox-grade Dinky, Lesney or Corgi items amidst all their other rubbish like horse brasses, old glass bottles and musty football programmes. I learned early on that any attempt to get a better look results in a chorus of "That's rare, that is, that's a Dinky..."  Even if it isn't actually a Dinky.

I tend to not bother my arse trying to photograph them anymore, it's not worth the fuss and clucking. They're generally always enthusiastically played-with racing cars or else military vehicles; I'd stop for a closer look at say a Ford Corsair, but it never is.

Basically these lads are still living in 1988 where that spiv who ran Mint & Boxed managed to convince a lot of people that old diecast was the Next Big Thing for smart investors; at best the market giffers might check eBay and somehow decide that if a nice boxed example's going for £50, then their scratched-up version with broken glazing and a missing wheel must be worth at least half that...

"I'll do it for twenty."

Will you, now?

20p sounds reasonable 😂