Well, to be fair, a cheap one in good condition has eluded me for years.
But no more!
Last weekend I hit the flea market and found this beauty for eight bucks!
It was covered in (almost) literally an inch of dust. Which was a good sign: it had been shelved (not played with) for years and I surmised that if the seller was too lazy to clean it, he would take less than his asking price.
'How much?' I asked. The seller wanted ten. I offered him five. He came back with eight and wouldn't budge. I tried to look at it through the dust, and could tell it was complete and pretty damn 'clean' (you know, except for the freakin' dust!) So I took it.
I cleaned it off immediately once arriving home (now I know how Alfred feels.) I missed a scallop or two (or twenty) so I need to go over it again, but it's probably cleaner than it's been since 1986 or so. Seriously, whomever owned this couldn't have possibly ever have dusted it. Not once. I really should have taken a 'before' picture. Oh well.
Somewhere out there Jason Todd is drooling right now.
Cleaning an old toy can be tricky when decals are involved, so I went light on the interior. But the decals are all here and all complete, so that's just awesome.
Everything works too:
Battering Ram, headlights, criminal catcher. Check, check, check.
No broken levers in the cockpit. No broken anything! Woowoo!
SMASH!
GRAB!
Whatta toy!