Shite in Miniature II

[junkyarddog]

I bought several of these Matchbox knockoffs a while back at a boot sale.

No,I don't know why either!

[bunglebus]

Because it says GOOD and PICK UP BRAINS on it?

[Datsuncog]

5 hours ago, flat4alfa said:

It met up with the @Datsuncog Fiat Campagnola 

 

I still haven't given up on finding the bonnet and windshield for that!

[Jon]

I had this, as per @Spottedlaurel:

Sadly, it was only days old when it befell the fate of my Mum stepping on it in the night, as I was apparently having a nightmare. I kept the roof signs from memory but the rest was obliterated. Shame, as its slavishly realistic portrayal of such a banal subject matter would've been right up my alley.

And, like @Datsuncog, I also had the Hot Wheels construction layout, which although fun, wasn't a patch on the more relateable garage set-up, that belonged to my brother:

Great thing is, I found these both at my parent's house, when back on my UK trip a few months back! Bizarrely though, I took no photos...

I also only took one photo of this:

Which I remember buying from the Tesco up the road circa 1992, for something stupidly cheap like £5.

Here's an eBay listing of one in an earlier box - watch the videos in the listing for the quickly lacklustre novelty that single AA motive power provides!

https://www.ebay.com/itm/266082752737

[Jon]

But what I did document back from my childhood stash, was this, received in 1990 I reckon:

I think this holds the joint title of 'best ever and most eagerly anticipated Christmas present' with a load of Sikus I received in 1987 (which happily still exist): my folks weren't averse to letting us choose a Christmas present, when a good amount of cash was being spent.

Note all the exciting features!

 

Strangely, the air strip section doesn't integrate with the tool box bit.

For context, I was spending a night or two at my old family house, whilst Mrs_Jon was doing the same at hers, so I had a free reign at night to selfishly indulge in the nostalgia of past toys, without any time constraints. Thus, I did this:

With a muscle memory that returned after at least a 25 year break, I slotted all the bits back into place no problems. I can happily report that the one or two bits missing that the eagle-eyed may have noticed, were found in other sets. So it's fully complete!

This part of the set was my favourite space to play in and I remember piling up loads of cars in the showroom, out the front, on the car park above and even at the forecourt - I'd often remove the GAS sign, to fit in another car or two. Psychologists would no doubt see alarming parallels with my playtime habits 3 decades ago and my driveway and garage today...

Have another detail, since I took the photo. At this angle, the drawn perspective of the foreground roof is quite convincing! And you'll all be glad to know that the blank sticker sheet was still in the box!

It was that last detail that was one of the most alarming elements of rediscovering my stash of toys; quite the amount of absolute crap that I hoarded back in the day. Nothing was thrown away but it was quite catartic for 2022 me to take a second look and discard all the absolute nonsense (sorry @sierraman for the treasures added to your parcel from me!) and make a noticeable dent in the tidying process that will have to come at some point. My parents can't live in that house forever.

But yeah: of course I kept that blank sticker sheet....

Edit: oh yeah, I found this too. Didn't even open it! Though I vividly remember it came with a red Volvo 740 as the free car. I did smash and crash that a couple of times before feeling guilty to subjecting an undamaged car to that. 

[junkyarddog]

10 hours ago, bunglebus said:

Because it says GOOD and PICK UP BRAINS on it?

Zombie apocalypse edition. 😲

[flat4alfa]

12 hours ago, Spottedlaurel said:

Arghhhhhhhhhhhh!

Not another Corgi van livery I do not have

* breathes *

[sierraman]

My grandma bought me the Smash and Crash, think mine came with a Quattro and a Chevy Prostocker. Had the truck stop, which I’ve only got the roofsign left. The kids have the fold and stow garage - remember getting that from a car boot in Redruth in about 1994. I have the car wash, though all the rollers have perished, but again I remember playing with it one Easter on the pine table at my folks. The Container Port, I got with some birthday money at Beatties in town, I think mines the later one without the plastic shunter, it’s a flat carriage and a metal one. 

The construction site I had as a kid, had all the bits of girders etc to build with, I think the airport was the first one I had, very very vague recollections of playing with it as a kid on my 5th birthday with my mum, she’d got me an Aer Lingus 747 to play with it. There will have been more but it’ll come to me. 

[warch]

17 hours ago, Datsuncog said:

 

 

It was great. I still have a couple of the plastic girders and cement sacks from this set.

 

I spent about five minutes looking at this wistfully. I got mine for Christmas in the mid 80s, absolutely loved it, kept it for years. I can still remember applying all the stickers. Fantastic play value.

 

[sierraman]

Also had the rapid slam set as well which would have been maybe 1997 ish. I cannot find this anywhere so I’m assuming my mum threw it away. Basically it was a cross between the streak set and the gauntlet. They did do one that if my memory serves me right had a sheet of ice that the car shot through. 

[Tenmil Socket]

13 hours ago, flat4alfa said:

Yes that's from the Stunt Set

Completely different to the Rainbow Toys die-cast effort!

 

Looks like an Austin Ambassador 

[andrew e]

There’s a Cinquecento on the box too 😉

[bunglebus]

2 hours ago, flat4alfa said:

Arghhhhhhhhhhhh!

Not another Corgi van livery I do not have

* breathes *

Y'know I might have as many Chevrolet/US Vans as I do Regals and Sierras. I will dig them all out when work quietens down

[Bren]

This arrived today.

Another I never had as a child - I thought it was a bit meh as I preferred cars.

As you age your tastes change.

[junkyarddog]

34 minutes ago, Bren said:

As you age your tastes change

Yours certainly have if that's your shoe behind!😲😉😂

[MiniMinorMk3]

Had a delivery from @danthecapriman today.

I gave them a quick wash off, the Mini was a bit dusty and the Metro just needed a freshen up

The later Mini Police car decided to show up for a comparison, but an Auto Mini Minor is no match for a Cooper S.

Then a couple of Clubman Pandas turned up...

and thought they'd face off with the Cooper and the Minor.

Fortunately the Corgi dog vans turned up before it got too nasty.

 

[flat4alfa]

5 hours ago, Tenmil Socket said:

Looks more like Pauline Calf

[Datsuncog]

Few diecast oddments that I've sifted out over the past few weeks, now up for grabs on the sales forum - if anyone here fancies any of them, let me know!

 

[sierraman]

Local Entertainer doesn’t stock Matchbox and the Tesco and Morrisons have no stock. Unbelievably they’ve managed to make the supply chain worse...

[danthecapriman]

Last handful of sales are up now if anyone is interested.

Plus unsold stuff from past updates now at half price!

 

[flat4alfa]

Anyone got a spare white Matchbox Plymouth Saveloy?

Jeepers, at that angle, don't those wheels need thinning down 

[Dick Cheeseburger]

My parents are getting on in age now and I've been given instructions to pop around tomorrow with an empty boot. The plan is to offload my remaining childhood bits and pieces which are still in their attic. I'm pretty sure I picked most of my original  collection a couple of years back; however there's definitely a few Bburago remaining including my 1/18 Mercedes 300SL which I repainted in Snapdragon yellow almost thirty years ago! I have a feeling I started stripping the paint again for another paint job, but can't quite remember. It'll be interesting to see them all again after almost three decades anyway.

[eddyramrod]

Time to show off some purchases, I think.  I've been on ebay...

 

I had one of those Humber police cars, for years, but it's disappeared.  I suppose I might have sold it.  Austin taxi will, as the Humber, be getting stripped and resprayed.

And then a job lot arrived, today in fact...

...with another taxi!  That's fine, I don't mind having two.  Viva will be getting restored, as will the Ford truck (but without the remains of the snowplough on the front).  The rest are in my Diecast Sale thread.

I was at a toyfair at Bolton on Sunday and spent a bit more than I intended; again, see my Sale thread!

These Bel Air sedans from the Bond partwork series are lovely.  I only have a couple unfortunately.

And I already have these two, but I wanted these to paint.  They've appeared on screen in other colours outside the franchise.

As has the Mazda pickup.  RR would actually make a companion for it, but I have a different project in mind for that one.

More film/TV cars.  I already have a red XJS for The New Avengers; see if you can guess what these will be painted as!

These two will be getting painted to resemble cars from my own history.

And this one... I couldn't leave it behind really.  It's gone in my American cars cabinet.

There were some others too but I forgot to photograph them today, I'll try and remember tomorrow.

[Split_Pin]

Nice haul Eddie.

I have lost track with all the diecast for sale now, mainly because I can't keep up with who has claimed what.

Nevertheless I have a DanBox©️ in the post.

[bunglebus]

I was obviously bored recently, came home to half a dozen eBay packages yesterday, as well as one from@Cookiesouwest

Majorette ovloV seems to have been in the news on this thread a lot recently. Very nice it is too.

@155V6gave me the heads up on a larger scale Welly Lupo on FB

Mrs BB very pleased about that one

Entirely stupid but endearing, this VW T3 is another Welly sold as an official VW product 

On the subject of yellow VW vans, this was something I'd never got my mitts on before - Gama. Appears to represent a late 60s vehicle with larger rear lights and tailgate window. Tyres are o-rings as it had none

Anyone know why the front axle has a little rubber disc poking through the base?

Next up, a Zylmex Ford Pinto van - slightly more broken in the bumper dept. than I would have preferred but it was a chance purchase buried in a job lot

This Hot Wheels Chevy Stocker is fitted with the Screamers wheels than make a god-awful racket when you run them down a track. Only sold as part of sets apparently 

I snap up this series of HW just so I can steal the lovely co-mold wheels off them

Matchbox 300 ZX with subtle paint

Last, but by no mean least, is THIS

This has been a total nightmare to source. Ordered one off Aliexpress. Seller cancelled. Ordered another from a different seller (in November). Sat at the shipping centre for two months and took endless messages to get them to refund me. Saw two at the toy fair and decided to have a look round and come back as I didn't want to risk not having enough money on me. Came back - both sold.

This one then came back into stock at Rhyno's Die Cast for less than any of the others!

[MiniMinorMk3]

2 hours ago, bunglebus said:

 

On the subject of yellow VW vans, this was something I'd never got my mitts on before - Gama. Appears to represent a late 60s vehicle with larger rear lights and tailgate window. Tyres are o-rings as it had none

Anyone know why the front axle has a little rubber disc poking through the base?

 

That's an early '60s van, pointy front indicators. No idea on the rubber ring, but being a Mini-Mod means it's from the 1960's. They changed to just Gama Mini in the 1970's.

[Datsuncog]

Messing around with some older Matchbox at the recently acquired fast-fit centre last night...

Luckily, there's full compatibility offered for ancient toys from the Superfast range. Phew. I'd worried it might have been one of those garages that doesn't do old cars m8.

Swapping a Rover V8 lump into a Golf? Brave.

A-series wrecker looks right at home out front.

Nice.

[bunglebus]

10 minutes ago, MiniMinorMk3 said:

That's an early '60s van, pointy front indicators

Maybe it's earlier than I thought - those rear lights changed after 61, indicators in 63 and the large back window is 64 on

[Datsuncog]

Also - as well as the past, I've been exploring THE FUTURE.

All this talk of phone apps to maximise diecast uptake has led me to spend this week developing TatPredictr™ - a multimodal, algorithmic, chewproof and virtually non-radioactive native application harnessing cutting edge AI technology to sift billions of data points to not only forecast, but accurately image, whatever knackered old toys are most likely to show up on any given freezing Friday morning in a fish-scented shed in central Belfast.

After crunching the numbers for tomorrow, TatPredictr™ reckons there'll be an influx of Lesney and Husky to be found, plus some random Minix, Cararama and Lone Star locos mixed in. And some inevitable MoYs with their seats missing.

But also that they won't be especially cheap.

Obviously such white-hot tech is still at a beta stage of testing, so 100% accuracy can't yet be guaranteed - but if there's anything in particular that you think you'd be keen to have, do sing up and I'll do my best when tomorrow comes...

 

[bunglebus]

Skoda buggy..? 😐