Shite in Miniature II

[eddyramrod]

1 hour ago, Christine said:

Airfix MotoRace  sets , mostly returns without cars as my dad worked in a model shop..i had tons of track

Me too, except it was my dad's mate Matt, who owned the model shop.

Also Batmobile, FAB1, Bond's DB5 (the gold one), the Express Service Ford artic, Commer Constructor set and a couple of car transporters: I think one was the TK and one the Scammell.  One of the last was the Mack rejig of the Express Service truck.  Sadly I didn't really look after any of them...

[bunglebus]

My memorable ones were remote controlled cars, one of those clicky controller ones that either went forwards or backwards while turning, a monster truck that I think I've posted on here and the smaller version of the Monster Beetle

[neil72]

Batmobile and Batboat gift set, 007 Aston in silver, huge tinplate VW that smoked, crappy Airfix Flight Deck game that was already second hand from an Auntie!

I also remember getting a Shado 2 and nearly taking my eye out with the rocket......

 

[bunglebus]

On 18/02/2021 at 21:39, bunglebus said:

 One of my Christmas presents, a Nikko Mighty Ranger, which seems to have been sold under various names

Here we go

[RoadworkUK]

I went Xmas shopping last weekend. Never ends well.

Popped into the special "vintage" branch of our local hospice group charity shop network, St Helena. By far and away my favourite of the chazza outlets around here. There are two branches in Frinton-on-sea: a bookshop and a "music" shop that also has an Aladdin's cave of old camera gear (masses of worthless manual lenses, ranks of 35mm SLR cameras – a mix of nice and not so – and forgotten APS stuff) from which I've plucked the odd gem over the years. 

Anyway, the "Vintage" outlet now has a car bucket. But not a cheap one: £3 a pop. Still, Christmas is a time for daft purchases and putting common sense on hold, so I went fishing.

Happily, it seemed that somebody of advancing years had liquidated their toy car collection. And several bits of it came home with me.

(photos not great, apols)

:

First up, I have never owned any of these pre-"Matchbox" tiny Lesney releases.

I think it's rather lovely, and not in terrible condition for its sixty-odd years of existence.

Paint has a very Withnail and I patina to it, but the glazing is intact and it's not been trodden upon, so that's nice.

The rest of the haul is from the early Matchbox era.

MG 1100 has lots of charm to it.

Doggo in the back and determined-looking person up front. It's like bringing a piece of late '60s mundane daily life into a current-day setting.

Fiat 1500 is sans its roof load, sadly, but a delightfully crisp little thing. Again, the glazing has survived nicely.

Pontiac GPs have been quite fashionable on these pages of late, so it was nice for this one to show up. Not sure whether the stance on this one is a bit more lowrider than usual, though:

Opening doors add play value, but the towbar seems to have been nibbled off at some point. At any rate, just to hold it in my hand... well... it feels like history or something.

Final two are a tad more recent.

Fairly tidy Europa, again with opening doors. Actually this is a fabulously solid feeling thing, with the bright metal chassis with all that bobbly casting. The first car in this haul to bear a date – 1969, which is commensurate with the reg SAR857G.

And finally:

Vauxhall Guildsman in a shade of pink that my phone has absolutely no idea what to do with. We're into the modern logo Matchbox era now, plus the "Rolling wheel" Superfast logo. Date 1971, so still a decade older than me. This one's actually tidier than the above terrible pic suggests.

Interesting car, in as much as there was never a full-scale Guildsman. From what I can see, it was part of a programme of 1/12 scale concepts produced by Vauxhall staff, and the Guildsman was taken up by Matchbox. Or something like that. 

So there probably isn't £18 worth in that lot, but still, the nostalgic git in me loves the idea that generations of little hands might have pushed these around the carpet (although, more realistic is that they've been shut up in somebody's cupboard for 40 years). 

Merry Christmas, folks.

[Tenmil Socket]

1 hour ago, bunglebus said:

Here we go

I had that too. Not long after Christmas I took with me when we went to Blockbuster’s and I drove it off a big kerb and the wishbone snapped ☹️

[bunglebus]

3 hours ago, RoadworkUK said:

Not sure whether the stance on this one is a bit more lowrider than usual, though:

They all do that, plastic  part of the interior that forms the suspension curves up over time. Easily sorted with a bit of hot water or hairdryer, but it does mean taking it apart.

The Superfast version uses a plastic part rivetted to the base but the interior is identical, with redundant suspension tabs included

[bunglebus]

Various parcels have made their way here this afternoon. The first was bought after recent Super GT discussions 

The others are all boxed, starting with this Polistil Golf

Hot Wheels Hare Splitter from a few years ago

The rest are brand new from AliExpress, and this time they didn't get destroyed on the way

I always free these as I can glue the box shut again if I chose

It's actually got a bit of completely inappropriate glitter in the paint, doesn't really show thankfully as a solid colour suits it better

[bunglebus]

Looks like this one is going back to bare metal, the top coat has crazed in some sort of reaction with the primer, plus there are lots of areas I couldn't sand after getting the strange rough finish from that same primer.

I'll try one of the other cans, failing that I'll be changing brand and throwing a lot of paint in the bin!

[sierraman]

I’ve discovered Vinted. I’m not trawling for clothes but I’m trawling for diecast. Purchase made already for a K33 trailer to match a Scammell Constructor I purchased about 30 years ago. 

[bunglebus]

Early Christmas present from the FIL, I remember having this poster and drooling over the Sun Burner, I did eventually get one

Going to have to be quick to get my card headers sent in before the deadline

[sierraman]

I missed the deadline because I wasn’t even conceived let alone born 🤣

[danthecapriman]

Merry Christmas miniature shite fans!🥳 Hope your all having a great day.

Apparently I’m a nightmare to buy models for as I’m weirdly specific about what I want so no new stuff for me, but did get some nice new tools to replace a few of my old ones, which is always good. 
Anyone else get anything??

 

Yesterday between doing other Christmas things I got that MAN truck I’m building painted up and assembled loose to see how it’s looking.

Cab isn’t fully painted yet, I’m thinking of adding a beige stripe or maybe roof to lessen the brown a bit. Possibly the bumper painted beige too. More UK looking wheels added and the rear bulk tipper is a heavily modified leftover from a previous project, that’s been cut down and a new end & details made for behind the cab.

[Lord Sterling]

Finally got one:

I thought I'd compare the Corgi Jag against my rendition of Arthur Daley's silver XJ6.

Also, what came with the Screen Stars set was a free VW camper van:

Compared against the 1/18 Solido one I have.

[Bren]

I stopped buying cars as they are generally too expensive nowadays- I gave my other half some suggestions for Christmas- 

Had the copper coloured one as a kid.

Had this one as well. I remember cutting up bits of the window box and pretending they were parcels and putting them in  the back.

Sadly it's not a patch on the corgi offering - it's obvious Dinky was on it's arse at the time. I didn't have Dinky cars generally unless as a gift - they were expensive and I preferred the sci fi offerings - Star Trek / Space 1999 / UFO etc.

Original issue Diamonds are forever moon buggy. Looks rock all like Sean Connery.

Corgi popeye paddle wagon. This was a bargain and much less than they generally are advertised for.

VW hot rod.

Matchbox streakers Vauxhall Guildsman. I have the pink superfast example.

Hercules mobile crane. Never had this as a child. It's very heavy!

Majorette caravan. To replace a mint loose example that my eldest unintentionally destroyed recently.

[bunglebus]

Nice scores there, the Wedge must have been a few quid alone.

I agree on the Dinky SD1, feels cheap compared to the earlier efforts but there's something quite fascinating about that and the Big Cat, being the last gasp efforts before they went bust. I wish the Big Cat had also been copied/borrowed by the Hong Kong lot, as it's fun finding all the Sunnyside versions

[FakeConcern]

My kids got me this Vanguards XR3i

My crap phone pics don't really show how good it is

It makes a great model of the one I had when Daughter No1 was little

We called it Errol for some reason

I might change the number plate...

Everything else is pretty much exactly the same

Following on from the what did you get for Christmas as a kid, one I remember having either for Christmas or my birthday (which is just after Christmas) and was probably 1968 as it was released in December that year and I would have been 10 that birthday

@bunglebus kindly got this for me and Mrs Concern gave it to me as a present

I really loved opening a new one all these years later and it's just as good as I hoped it would be. I do still have my original, but it has been re painted and is missing some parts.

Also supplied by @bunglebus I gave this to Mrs Concern

and this

I do still have other toys from Christmas presents as a child such as the Corgi Ford Transporter Gift Set 48 still in pretty good condition and only recently lost the horns and still has the mirrors. I still have the Rover, two Minis (repainted) and the Cortina Estate. I think that would have been a "Christmas & Birthday" present!

 

 

[AndyW201]

Hope everyone had a good Christmas. Finally got a bit of time to myself. The family are all tired out and off to bed and Dog_201 is also finally spark out after the excitement of her first Christmas.

So, as is usual, I got permission to buy some diecast, which the Mrs wrapped up for me...

Already much seen and reviewed on here, I had this on pre-order, but at last I've been able to play with it.

Been waiting for years for a decent model Mk2 Fiesta at a reasonable-ish price and at last there is one.

A very evocative view. Back in 1993 when I had my 1.4 S, a pair of spotties and red bumper stripes were essential kit for the Ford-owning likely lad around town...

Pleasing interior detail includes the rainbow interior fabric and the proper XR2 steering wheel,

Great stuff!

I always missed out on any Vanguards Cosworth releases, so far I've only ever mangaged to get the tiger-striped Turbosystems Sapphire from the Boy Racers series. That and the red and black GLSi versions. But for a while, I've wanted a late 4X4 Sapphire, with the later cross-spoke wheels, and the colour on this recent release clinched it, even though my phone camera doesn't really do it justice.

The car modelled was the last Cosworth off the production line, and the only one in Mallard green, which was IIRC, one of the colours brought out for the launch of the Mondeo? Always been one of my favourite Ford colours of the period, along with Tourmaline green.

Lots of nice minor detailing on this one,

A late entry this one, which came about through the recent Corgi Cyber Monday sale, with a third off, plus with another 10% off code (helpfully posted on the FB Vanguards site), and cashing in my hobby reward points, saved SanTat quite a bit!

I didn't bother at first with this release. A look through the loft revealed that I already have 10 Vanguards Mk3 Capris including the Professionalmania ones, so I didn't really need another one. Plus, as seen above, there is a bit of a factory error on this one, in that the headlight bezels are colour coded whereas they should be black, as on the real car.

But I can overlook it, as I got this one fairly cheap, and it's a little unusual in that this one is a fairly lowly 2.0 as opposed to all the other V6 variants. Plus, Serck-font plates!

The first time the later S "strobe" fabric seats have been done on a Vanguards Mk3 too.

Another plus-point with this version is the Imperial Red colour. It's stunning, again the pictures don't do it justice. The RS 4-spokes look great and as usual, the S decals are superbly done.

Nice to have a (fairly) low certificate number too,

[Tenmil Socket]

On 24/12/2025 at 21:46, bunglebus said:

Early Christmas present from the FIL, I remember having this poster and drooling over the Sun Burner, I did eventually get one

Going to have to be quick to get my card headers sent in before the deadline

I always wanted the torch for some reason 🤷🏽‍♂️

[bunglebus]

4 minutes ago, Tenmil Socket said:

I always wanted the torch for some reason 🤷🏽‍♂️

That's the worst thing on there 🤣

Delivery from @155V6 via @andrew e at the pub this morning 

[AndyW201]

Another recent delivery, by our local Evri driver though, not Santa.

Part of a new-ish Matchbox European cars collection, I've gone the AliExpress route as I haven't got a hope in hell of finding anything like this round here.

Despite having been launched in 2018, and having several releases done of it, this is the first Matchbox Healey I've got. Obviously, a standard one would have been nice, but the retro style racing livery on this one is pretty well done.

This, though was the one out of the 5 that I really wanted. So far, I've only managed to get the white/yellow GT/E and the orange base model mainline versions. This one though, being a kind-of MB version of a Hot Wheels Silver Series, has both side tampos and front & rear detailing. The lime green on this version is similar to that used on one of the previous mainlines.

Love this casting, sadly it's not the best job on the tampos that they've ever done.

But it's still a Kadett, so I'll live with it!

[Spottedlaurel]

Never seen that series before, Kadett is nice although some more period wheels would have been good.

[stuboy]

Present from the missus, 1/18 scale great model, 

[bunglebus]

A few toy fair pics from today 

 

[danthecapriman]

Nice stuff there @bunglebus

I had one of those robot toys as a kid!

They were little rocket launchers in the top of its head. 

[junkyarddog]

Any idea how much this was?

I have a similar one,so curious!🤔

[Christine]

Five shillings  , sixpence ha'penny..

[bunglebus]

24 minutes ago, junkyarddog said:

Any idea how much this was?

I have a similar one,so curious!🤔

I didn't dare ask in case I could afford it. Here's what I ended up with

[Tenmil Socket]

8 minutes ago, bunglebus said:

I didn't dare ask in case I could afford it. Here's what I ended up with

Spent all your Christmas money? 😁

What’s the Police Polo?

I've never seen those metallic futuristic things near the centre in real life, I’ve forgot what they were called.

[andrew e]

Its better than a police polo 😉 Second lap spot that one, I hardly bought anything!