Shite in Miniature II

[Amishtat]

1 minute ago, Tenmil Socket said:

That transporter was a bargain!

My thought process exactly! 

[RoadworkUK]

1 hour ago, Amishtat said:

This is only on the outskirts of Colchester so maybe not that far from you? 

Shhhhhhhh. I NEED this house.

Also, that Transporter is a cracker.

[flat4alfa]

50 minutes ago, Amishtat said:

 Dinky Impala is marginally worse, but I could see it looking good in a nice gold or something. 

How much did you give for that and would it become available?

[DoctorRetro]

@Amishtat, Dominic would live that Sd1 if available? 

[Lord Sterling]

Interested also in the Jag @Amishtat please.

[flat4alfa]

1 hour ago, Amishtat said:

I probably overpaid on the XJ given the rear bumper is missing but it's a nice enough thing. I gave a tenner so if anybody fancies it just say..

ahhh...  oh.  a tenner you say?   I still have a spare Lucky Toys 1:24 rear bumper that could* be asked to pop round for a trial-fit

[RoadworkUK]

Couple of months ago, before illness and misery swept the nation, I went to Ironbridge. The visiting of a tat shop and the expenditure of £4 saw this happen.

The vendor actually had two available; this one in its rather generic make-believe livery, and an SAS (the airline, not the elite military force) liveried one. I probably should have bought the latter but for the fact that its rear lights weren't so distinctive as they are here.

It's an interestingly singular model for an '80s Corgi, this. The way it's put together, with its flat metal chassis, and axles that hang beneath, recalls practice from decades before. I reckon that makes it kind of charming. 

Of course, being quite definitely A Toy means opening features. The door works on a plug hinge, and the luggage doors on both sides open just like the real thing (TM).

This one is presented in the typical late '80s packaging that we all know and love, its target market clearly being the sticky-fingered child with magpie "want it" mentality and pocket money to spare. It's interesting, then (to me, anyway) to see how this casting came to be whored out in pursuit of a more discerning audience in later years.

Same casting, with opening features, but significantly gussied-up livery.. It says much for the fundamental rightness of the underlying model that a splash of well-applied paint should make such a difference. Various genuine local liveries were offered, often on a limited-edition basis. Soon enough, its "definitely a toy" origins would be left farther behind when the window box was abandoned for something of a more adult-oriented nature:

Dunno what the the process was that determined whether your bus company would get to be represented in 1:68ish scale by the Corgi "maximum product life out of minimum possible investment" concern, but the same casting was dressed up in all manner of liveries, marketed on a limited edition basis, much in the same way as would become the case with Corgi's contemporary Original Omnibus Company series.

In fact, truly, this humble Paramount casting would be the one product that truly bridged the two eras, as the below amply demonstrates.

Same casting again, same "definitely not 1:76" scale (in fact, taking the Paramount to be an 11m type, as the short first bay after the "feature" window suggests, the model's 17.5cm length suggests a scale of 1:62.8), and same slightly clunky plastichrome moulding for the headlights and grille.

Check those wheels out, though! In what was presumably a final outing for this casting before the OOC era got properly into its stride, the good Corgi mandarins had rewarded its humble Paramount with a set of properly modelled wheels, rather than the generic items that had kept it rolling across living room carpets for so many years. 

A last-ditch decision before this Blackpool gift set went to market? Presumably so, based on the box art, which shows the Seagull liveried Paramount wearing the very same wheels as my £4 Ironbridge purchase.

[Amishtat]

58 minutes ago, TheDoctor said:

@Amishtat, Dominic would live that Sd1 if available? 

Yours for a fiver! (You even know where to come and get it) 

[Amishtat]

56 minutes ago, Lord Sterling said:

Interested also in the Jag @Amishtat please.

You only just beat flat4alfa! 

[Amishtat]

1 hour ago, flat4alfa said:

How much did you give for that and would it become available?

Sorry, Lord S beat you to the Jag.. Fiver for the Impala? It's not that bad under a shaving brush repaint. No more pictures until later I'm afraid, still at work and haven’t got much battery left. 

[Lord Sterling]

5 hours ago, RoadworkUK said:

Couple of months ago, before illness and misery swept the nation, I went to Ironbridge....

Should have messaged me man. I live about 20-odd miles south of Ironbridge.

The above bus is one I'm considering buying as its a Tellus bus from Telford (which is incidently next to Ironbridge) and I am originally from Telford. I nearly pressed the B.I.N button on one, but despite the Telford connection, I really wasn't convinced of its displayability. It really doesn't convince me of being of the 'Tellus' fleet, its too generic and wheels really spoil it for me sadly.

[AndyW201]

4 hours ago, Amishtat said:

As luck would have it.. The box is coming apart a bit at the seams but it's all there.

Ooh, colour me interested please!

[bunglebus]

4 hours ago, bunglebus said:

Yatming Beetle looks very similar to the Corgi from the same era

Oh yes

 

20200617_200944 by RS, on Flickr

20200617_201004 by RS, on Flickr

20200617_200954 by RS, on Flickr

 

I also stuck the Corgi and not-Corgi R5 Turbos together

 

20200617_201521 by RS, on Flickr

20200617_201511 by RS, on Flickr

20200617_201532 by RS, on Flickr

 

If it wasn't for it having the identical colour scheme originally, I would have said two manufacturers models of the same (real) car

[RoadworkUK]

2 hours ago, Lord Sterling said:

Should have messaged me man. I live about 20-odd miles south of Ironbridge.

Ah! Maybe next time we head up to visit. We were there for a wedding. 

Yeah, turning that Corgi Paramount into a collector's piece was always going to be a bit of a stretch... I'm gradually building up a 1:76 representation of the bus fleets that were contracted to my school in year 7.

[Amishtat]

Filthy, but only lightly chipped on closer inspection. The battery compartment seems clean but I don't have a battery handy. 

[Amishtat]

And this isn't terrible under the paint. Front bumper beaten to shit and a corner of the rear missing altogether but nothing that couldn't be filled/otherwise bodged. 

[Amishtat]

This is quite something now I've got time to look at it. A bit crude in places but it's a pretty good effort really. 

[Noel Tidybeard]

i had the police version of the jaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaag- staffordshire number plates for extra win

[flat4alfa]

4 hours ago, Amishtat said:

Sorry, Lord S beat you to the Jag.. Fiver for the Impala? It's not that bad under a shaving brush repaint. No more pictures until later I'm afraid, still at work and haven’t got much battery left. 

How did that happen...   I went off to try and find the bumper, so I could post a photo....    While I was gone, it went!   Hopefully Mo Stirling will sell it on, one day.

Hmm yes I'd better say yes to the dreadfully beaten and painted 60s Dinky Impala

[BL Bloke]

As non essential shops have reopened I went to my local model shop yesterday for some essentials in the shape of three Tamiya spray cans and a non essential Toyota Celica.

DSCF1466 by timothy jones, on Flickr

[Tenmil Socket]

7 hours ago, Amishtat said:

Filthy, but only lightly chipped on closer inspection. The battery compartment seems clean but I don't have a battery handy. 

@Amishtat I’ll take it please. I’ll pm you!

[Spottedlaurel]

6 hours ago, BL Bloke said:

As non essential shops have reopened I went to my local model shop yesterday for some essentials in the shape of three Tamiya spray cans and a non essential Toyota Celica.

Nice one Tim, I have that kit in my stash and it looks good.

I'm thinking of doing the same thing when I go into town at the weekend - lockdown model building has seen some of my paint supplies get depleted.

[Amishtat]

Ran out of battery and arsed last night before I could show you the last thing I picked up yesterday, this Dinky Atlantean which is going to my dad on Sunday. 

[Jon]

17 hours ago, RoadworkUK said:

Couple of months ago, before illness and misery swept the nation, I went to Ironbridge. The visiting of a tat shop and the expenditure of £4 saw this happen.

The vendor actually had two available; this one in its rather generic make-believe livery, and an SAS (the airline, not the elite military force) liveried one. I probably should have bought the latter but for the fact that its rear lights weren't so distinctive as they are here.

It's an interestingly singular model for an '80s Corgi, this. The way it's put together, with its flat metal chassis, and axles that hang beneath, recalls practice from decades before. I reckon that makes it kind of charming. 

Of course, being quite definitely A Toy means opening features. The door works on a plug hinge, and the luggage doors on both sides open just like the real thing (TM).

 

 

 

Spurred on by your post here Mr. Works, I whipped out a somewhat similar-ish steed today, which I bought a couple of years ago:

 

Here it is back then, fresh from arriving in the post. Rather like the blue 'whacky roadsigns' Corgi packaging, this era of Rainbow Siku boxing with frail purple plastic insert is pure nostalgic correctness to me.

 

One thing which lets the whole side down is the comedy oversized suitcases on a sprue; they're actually open there, so are double thickness when folded shut!

 

Here it is today and it's a hefty old unit! You can see it sinking in to my rudimentary studio, AKA Mrs_Jon's yoga mat.

 

All 3 side lockers open up on the driver's side and the two do here, along with the side door exit/dunnie. I do enjoy the stripes and the blue part of the paint job, though the silver is not that great; think the level of lustre achieved from a cheap spray can, in places. Note the interior is constructed of 3 different colours of plastic, if you count the steering wheel.

 

See what I mean about the silver? And those blue tabs at the back are a little irksome, too. I do like the blocky painted on tail lights though. Nice to see there's a cup, knife, fork and coat hanger on board.

 

Anyway, it sounds like I've slightly dissed it but really, I think it's great! I had many of these era Sikus as a kid, when living in Germany a while but I'd have never entertained saving up for a bus! Yes, I know it's a coach but it's safe to say I was very car orientated at the time. 

Therefore, I like to think that spending disposable income on a needless toy in my late 30's that I would have shunned aged 7 is a glowing example of my matured, open minded outlook on life. Anyway, I'm off to write down this example for my next job interview.

[Split_Pin]

Siku commercials have great play value. Their articulated trucks are great with their working 5th wheels and winding trailer legs, perfect for a bit of desktop shunting.

[Amishtat]

I've got that one somewhere, it weighed a ton when I was seven! 

[Datsuncog]

Well, aren't you lot a bad influence...

Couldn't resist the Monza and Rekord for the price, and adding in a Tigra for another fiver seemed too good a bargain to miss.

Haven't owned any Schuco before; the finish is excellent, although the alloys on the older two are possibly a little on the large side.

Also, I'm not sure if the Monza's bonnetline is a smidge steep - wasn't the front end basically the same as the Rekord?

The seatbelt detailing - extending to the tiny red release buttons on the belt clips - is truly a thing of wonder.

With every year that passes, the Mk1 Tigra looks more and more like a bonkers 1990s motor show concept, rather than an actual car made by a volume manufacturer which sold in fairly respectable quanitities.

Where did they all go?

(I do know - the scrappy, for the most part).

 

And here's something a bit older to tickle your fancy - I bought this 1/36 Corgi Supra last year, but never managed to post anything better than some smudgy low-light pics.

Tri-colour paint masking was a trifle ambitious for Corgi, and this one suffers from quite a few blemishes where wet paint has been transferred to other parts of the car during manufacture.

While the casting isn't as rough as many coming out of the Swansea factory at the time, there's a lot of paint bubbles and blemishes spoiling what's otherwise a very commendable crack at Toyota's big six cylinder coupé. The deep sunstrip is slightly cockamamie too, irritatingly.

As something of a party trick, the headlights retract and then pop-up when you press down on the front wheels. Nifty. 

Interior detail is... present. Not quite as detailed a dashboard as the Sierra - and none of the fancy digital gear that its real-life counterpart boasted - but the tip-up seats are well-moulded and even the generic Corgi steering wheel doesn't look too out of place here.

Unusual that this a left-hooker; I've yet to find a reason why so many Corgis of this era were LHD; even stuff you'd expect to be UK spec.

Big boot and lift-up rear shelf are present though, as is the usual oversize tow hitch.

Base is plastic, but incorporates a reasonable amount of drivetrain and exhaust detail.

Since this model arrived in 1985, the same year that Toyota stopped building this generation of Supra, I'd hazard a guess that it was already in development from about 1982, but paused during Mettoy's financial diffs in '83/'84. The catalogue pics seem to show fairly crude wooden prototypes for both the road and racing car variants.

I'd speculate that this one was launched just to get something new out the door and encourage retailers to place orders again, after the whole management buy-out thing was sorted.

I need to get some more of the 1980s Corgi catalogues, as I don't know how long this one lasted - all I can say is that it wasn't listed in the 1988 catalogue, so it didn't have a long run. I don't ever remember seeing it on the toyshop shelves, either.

I have the 'crazy signs' box for this one too, but it's upstairs.

Anyone else remember this at the time?

[Jon]

Yes, I have memories!

 

My brother had a silver one, as seen next to the far, far more impressive red and black ones with red interiors! I think they captured the palate of current Japanese coupes of the time pretty accurately there, unless someone's personalised these; I note no tow bar on any of the rear ends in sight. I remember there being a little nub underneath to flip the lights - don't remember the front suspension press trick!

My brother swapped the standard wheel centres like your has for 4 spoke efforts, which looked MUCH better. Rather like the Honda Prelude Corgi, presumably also launched late into the real model's production run, it does seem strange they were such short lived. Shame.

[junkyarddog]

That Tigra you got MrDC looks like it's painted Apache Orange!

[AndyW201]

Top bombing DC. The selection of GM models from that seller is staggering. I keep finding myself looking on there, and am tempted by the newer style Tigra Twintop they have for sale. The metal roof actually lowers and raises like the real thing and being a Minichamps model, the interior detail with the roof lowered is stunning.

Got 1/36 Corgis distracting me at the mo though. This thread, dammit...