Shite in Miniature II

[flat4alfa]

On 3/7/2021 at 8:36 PM, flat4alfa said:

doubles I didn't know I had were found

Arghhh

[flat4alfa]

Had a delivery

A non-working oddball custom box van arrived

Body is die-cast, no branding, says Made in Hong Kong.  Approx 1:36 if based on something real.  Any ideas?  

Got the motor working

Oiled up the AWD running gear

Gave it a new battery

It now does this !

The flickering head lamps are meant to do that too - it's part of the mechanism.

 

[andrew e]

That’s a VW LT all day long surely?

In other news this thread broke me and I bought some HotWheels whilst shopping 🥳

 

Then I remembered I sold the other 2 Land Rover 90’s I had last week!

[bunglebus]

52 minutes ago, flat4alfa said:

Arghhh

I too have two

Actually there was a third but I got rid of one of the identical ones (or put in the project box)

 

 

[155V6]

Just seen this lot on Facebook,if only we knew someone in Essex who liked this sort of thing 😉https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/265958025026780/?ref=facebook_story_share

[bunglebus]

36 minutes ago, flat4alfa said:

Had a delivery

A non-working oddball custom box van arrived

It's die-cast, no branding, says Made in China.  Approx 1:36 if based on something real.  Any ideas?  

Got the motor working

Oiled up the AWD running gear

Gave it a new battery

It now does this !

The flickering head lamps are meant to do that too - it's part of the mechanism.

 

VW LT. Got one the other week but I don't think mine does anything, Much prefer yours!

 

[bunglebus]

12 minutes ago, 155V6 said:

Just seen this lot on Facebook,if only we knew someone in Essex who liked this sort of thing 😉https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/item/265958025026780/?ref=facebook_story_share

I think I'll pass - even with that unusual Evel Knievel dragster

They're all just too broken - you'd probably make your money back on the Transit alone, even with a knackered side door

[flat4alfa]

Cor!  I must have missed that one.  Yours has opening rear doors.  What's inside?

I thought LT early first series too, but grille is too thin.  Just spent a bit of time looking up similar Spanish Ebros and Spanish Jeeps from the seventies but all come back to the LT.

Porthole window ....on just one side ...is interesting

[flat4alfa]

6 minutes ago, bunglebus said:

I think I'll pass - even with that unusual Evel Knievel dragster

They're all just too broken - you'd probably make your money back on the Transit alone, even with a knackered side door

I think the 'convertible' Green Hornet will get a fiver too.  Did you see all the other stuff she has too?

I like the TR7, Green Hornet, Transit and the big sucking thing missing from the Dinky road sweeper back here

[andrew e]

The Imp looks salvageable too (if anyone buckles, hit me up!)

[flat4alfa]

I asked on a deal on the trash along along with the Commer and Mini Marcos

[155V6]

The plastic LT? van reminds me of these

[flat4alfa]

35 minutes ago, 155V6 said:

The plastic LT? van reminds me of these

Body, suprisingly, is die-cast, not plastic.

Yes, that one too, which is why I went down the equivalent EBRO road after looking up early MB100, discounting the light units front and rear and wanting my life back

To be fair, the fella in Hong Kong back in 1983 charged with getting the model drawn very likely never saw any in real life and had a couple of photos to work from

[flat4alfa]

13 minutes ago, flat4alfa said:

I asked on a deal on the trash along along with the Commer and Mini Marcos

Deal offered has come back refused.

[sheffcortinacentre]

7 hours ago, EML said:

Unknown brand of Mercedes T1 tow truck, very high chance of Chinesium manufactured. Extra shite  points for a cracked front screen

Seem to recall being sold in cararama packages.

[flat4alfa]

Hong Kong like-LT Van was got for £7 offer.  Weak moment - but could see it had a mechanism to task and I don't have a pub to visit any more.

The seller seems to focus on much pricer Dinky and sixties-era Corgi, so asked about what else he might have similar, and this lot arrived in the box too ...FOC !

Which was generous.  Or maybe just felt sorry for me.

Dolly likes the Saico 1:32 wacky Renault Sport Clio despite its screen and the 'TT-101' 1:34 Beetle with opening things.  The Mercedes 1931 SSKL is plastic and marked 'SM' with a leaping deer logo ; The Lancer is Hongwell ; the Beetle roofless cabrio is Welly.

There was also a 1:43 R/C Aston Martin by Toy State in there too.  Will post on that later if can get it working.

[bunglebus]

I used to have that exact same red Beetle.

My LT is exactly the same body as yours, nothing opens. Blankest of blank base

Mine cost an eye-watering 99p as part of this lot

[Amishtat]

More unpacking.. 

[MarvinsMom]

5 minutes ago, Amishtat said:

More unpacking.. 

hmmmm, Princess, Rover 75, mark 2 Jaguar, Mini...........

[OM646]

So, i got this as a birthday surprise, a 1/87th scale Mercedes-Benz Citaro with some custom decals

[Datsuncog]

4 hours ago, flat4alfa said:

January 31, 2020.

The day Market Blokey sold that to you for £15 - I still can't believe it.

Doesn't it look fantastic!  Can I buy it for £20?

Sorry - this one's in the Not For Sale cabinet!

Unless a mint and boxed one shows up on the stall for £30...

Still a few replacement bits needed from Steve Flowers; one hook, one weight, the air horns, and door mirrors.

But it is magnificent.

[flat4alfa]

10 hours ago, Datsuncog said:

one hook, one weight, the air horns

Isn't that a line in a song?

It's a line in a song in my head now

[NorfolkNWeigh]

It’s Market Tat Friday for me.

This little care package of stuff @Datsuncoghas kindly accumulated and stored for me, arrived today.

The bigger SL is perfect and unmarked, it’ll make the others on the Corgi shelf jealous. The SD1 has a back window and the proportions look a bit better than the Dinky one I’ve got.

But the 240Z is the best, because I’d forgotten all about it.

I might dig out my R17 and dodgy Chines R15 to do a “ Who did it worst with that Renner.

All in all well chuffed, roll on Belfast Market coming back.

[flat4alfa]

[bunglebus]

40 minutes ago, NorfolkNWeigh said:

I might dig out my R17 and dodgy Chines R15 to do a “ Who did it worst with that Renner.

Is that the Lido Renault? I'll have to line mine up with the Majorette and Matchbox ones

[flat4alfa]

REVELL LOWRIDERS

What do we know?  They were around 1:64 and I assume at premium pricing.

Bought this 1964 Impala over ten years ago, no idea when or where.  It's in great condition because its been in a box much of the time.

Does this

And this 

No identity on base though.  Who really made them?

Do have a thing about the '64 Impalas, not least Cheech's car in Up In Smoke

Quote

(Cheech Marin) "Hey how am I driving, man?"
(Tommy Chong) ": I think we're parked."

 

[Amishtat]

4 hours ago, flat4alfa said:

It's Tat Friday here too. Just got back from town with lunch to find the post lady had brought me a box of delights from Belfast. Firstly the Dinky DeSoto in just the condition I like them. Obviously having been unpacking yesterday it wasn't long before my indifferently restored example showed up with its povo spec blackwalls. 

[Dick Cheeseburger]

1 hour ago, flat4alfa said:

REVELL LOWRIDERS

What do we know?  They were around 1:64 and I assume at premium pricing.

Bought this 1964 Impala over ten years ago, no idea when or where.  It's in great condition because its been in a box much of the time.

Does this

And this 

No identity on base though.  Who really made them?

Do have a thing about the '64 Impalas, not least Cheech's car in Up In Smoke

 

What a stunning model. Want.

[Amishtat]

The other item in the package is something I've had the major horn for ever since DC received it himself from the late lamented Junkman, though I didn't expect to end up with the actual same example. Must dig out my Zodiac for a comparison , that would make for an interesting exercise in wasting the afternoon. Many thanks Tim, you've brightened up a rainy Dumfries Friday. 

 

[Datsuncog]

19 hours ago, Amishtat said:

More unpacking.. 

Mmm, what's the backstory on this one? Someone producing Code 3 repaints to order?

Looks well done - something you commissioned, or just a lucky find?

 

Corgi's take on the Plaxton Paramount 3500 is a really nicely done toy - good weight to it, and the opening door and luggage compartments are very nicely engineered. I'm really pleased with the example that showed up last month from @jon.k.

The crimped-on axles are really free-running - this thing's better than a spirit level when it comes to detecting slight variations from the horizontal, and I've had a number of, shall we say, Italian Job moments when I've just managed to stop it rolling off a table and taking a lump out of the wooden floor...

The manufacturing process seems to have involved tampo-printing to each side, and then stickers and mask-sprayed paint on the rear panel.

No rivets either - it appears that the two-piece body is held together by a pair of lugs beneath the back window, and the grille then pushes through as a retaining peg at the front to keep both halves together.

Detail is rudimentary in places, but as a modern coach of its time, it still has a lot of appeal.

The casting started off in the 1985 Corgi catalogue as the C769 National Express Coach, wearing National Express Rapide colours, although the glazing appears clear in the booklet pic but is blue on Jon's example - not sure if it's a change from the prototype, or if it only later acquired a tint. The wheels also changed between the dished two-piece wheels on the prototype to the flat, one-piece wheels on the production version.

It also appeared the same year as the more generic 'Holiday Tours' Coach, as C770.

I'm not much up on buses, to be fair, but I know the Plaxton persisted in the range for a long, long time, wearing a range of different operator liveries - and this stepped up once Corgi management bought out the Collectables side  from Mattel, Corgi's one-time owner between 1989 and 1995.

 

Mattel kept the tooling for the Juniors-size cars (and marketed some of the castings under the Hot Wheels brand for quite some years), but had no use for the larger 1/36 and similar castings since they had no US market sector, so these reverted to Corgi Classics. But, the problem was that under the terms of the buyout deal, the new Corgi Classics Ltd was barred from competing with Mattel by selling toy vehicles - they could only market adult collectables.

Not to be outdone, a number of former Corgi Toys were suddenly promoted to the 'Collectables' line - with the Plaxton, Routemaster and Metrobus castings all repackaged with more detailed liveries added to the basic castings. Equally, some older Corgi castings from the 1970s and 80s found themselves repackaged along with a fairly cheap-looking plastic replica manufacturer badge, to apparently satisfy the 'adult collectables' requirement - the Jaguar XJS, Ford Sierra, Rolls Royce Corniche, Ferrari 308GTB and Peugeot 205 Mi16, to name but a few. This was in addition to the expanding 1/43 Classics line, and the 1/76 Original Omnibus Company buses.

For the new Corgi company, it was a win-win: they could sell better-finished models at a higher price point than just 'pocket money' toys, and they were able to reuse old tooling which had paid for itself decades ago  - which, along with a shift in production to the Far East, allowed bigger profit margins.

Unfortunately I divested myself of all my 1990s Corgi catalogues a few years back as I thought I was done with diecast, which was a bit of a mistake... but I can definitely remember the Plaxton wearing the beige Wallace Arnold livery, amongst others, together with rather better wheels.

A nice one to have!