S is for Seen elswhere - Siberian Tigers

Well, some of them were, which was useful as Taos managed to ID one for me! Not an overview, there are dozens and dozens when you know what to look for, not all mine, a few more have come in, and some were still / are still in storage, and no real narrative of any consequence making itself obvious, so enjoy the eye candy!

 

It's huge!

 

Nayab from both sides.

 

About 1:10th scale? Too big for Action man?

 

Chasing tails!

 

Needs a meal too!

 

Unknown recent addition?

A bit bigger than the Schleich cub. 

E is for Eye Candy - Sort Of!

I think we've seen this before, in passing, but I took it apart and cleaned it of a lifetime's kitchen grime, a while ago and seem to have taken far too many photographs, which need to be out of Picasa and on the Wibbly Wobbly Way!

 

 

Obviously you need a kettle with the right kind/diameter of spout, and when the water starts to boil, the inner sliding component moves and the bird starts whistling! Before modern automatic cut-offs (which work the same way - pressure, try getting one to work if you haven't closed the lid properly, it'll boil dry!), this was an ingenious solution, to a minor problem!

P is for Perfect Plastic!

I don't, as a rule, 'rate' Timpo, Britains, Airfix, Marx, MPC, Starlux or Elastolin, nor the tranche of smaller companies immediately at their heels, simply because they were huge, popular and ran for a while, churning out millions of figures, from, often, ever-changing line-ups.

 

This is not to say I don't enjoy them, or appreciate them, just that it's box-ticking stuff which is all over the internet, in all the books, and the first things to be waded-through on Blogs or forums! Tables often groan under the weight of them at shows!

 

But, I do have a soft spot for the smaller-scale output of Elastolin, Merten and Starlux, so it's always nice to add a few to the master 'samples', and I bought this little lot at Sandown Park the other week, all Elastolin, and all 'clean', with no damage, little or no play-wear, and the correct weapons.

 

Romans

 

Huns versus Rus!

 

 Normans / Anglo-Saxons

 

Medieval

The sculpting of the plastics was a high-point of toy soldier production, although the price of Elastolin was always at a point where the use of the word 'toy' was a moot point! I do have a reasonable sample, indeed, a Journalist, sent to my home many years ago, went through it, and talked me out of one of the better Normans! But they are regularly added to, and one day they'll probably be used to illustrate the A-Z blog-entry, when I get round to it?

K is for Khaki Kattle-truck!

There is a tendency, particularly among cheaper toy makers, for military versions of civilian vehicles to be produced, by the simple expedient of manufacturing the civilian toy in military-coloured plastic, this third Jimson post covers one of those! And I should point out, yesterday's Land Rover was based on the Daktari one, not a clown/circus one!

 

These came with the Land Rover and futuristic Transporter/Tank combo', and while I don't think the figures have anything to do with the vehicles, I shot them with this one, just in case! They are high-grade piracies of the Matchbox American Infantry from 1974/75'ish.

 

Compared with the transporter's tractor-unit, the body is longer, and the stake-sided superstructure is held in place with the same clip used on the transporters. It would seem these late-cab toys are harder to find, so must have been made right at the end of Jimson's reign?

 

The mounting hole equates to the other position on the tractor-cab, which is the further-back one, not found on the first version, so clearly there was an attempt to mount some other bodies on the tractor, before the newer stretched-chassis was designed, as seen on the cattle-truck? The newer chassis, like the transporter cab-units, has no mark/number.

 

Badly damaged, but I was buying the lot for the Tank Transporter and Land Rover really, and, as I say, I don't think the figures belong with the set, but they might?!

H is for Holy Self-Signed Toy, Batman!

I bought this at Sandown Park, I won't tell you what it cost, but suffice to say it wasn't cheap as chips, and I was initially a little disappointed by it, suspecting a mug had been seen coming, a little buyer's remorse crept in, but, like last night's cartoon, that's something which often accompanies the post show sort-out!

 

Holy boxed battle-taxi, Batman!

First, it was sold to me as AHI (Azrak Hamway International) when it's not, it's the later Australian reissue from Len Hunter Trading, and dating from 1989 (AHI carried this in 1977), and that it was signed, which I quickly convinced myself was a bit dodgy? However, having seen the prices of a few unsigned ones, and enough samples of Adam West's signature to be slightly more convinced by its sloppiness, I'm much happier about the purchase now!

 

 Holy facsimile figurines, Batman!

 

The main body of the Batmobile is all-plastic, so it ticks one box, and has two figures, of The Batman and pesky Robin, The Boy Wonder, so it ticks another box there, and is clearly a scaled-up copy of the Corgi die-cast, where that was 1:43rd, this is closer to 1:35th/32nd scale.

 

Holy Batbath brum-brum, Batman!

 

The boat is the same, and while I initially though they were blow-moulds; so many of the bootlegs and knock-off's have been, it is actually a couple of lumps of polystyrene, the frangibility of which means they are far worse survivors, than the original Corgi die-casts.

 

Holy crime-fighting combination, Batman! 

 

I think the figures can be used in the Batboat, but the seats are closer together, so maybe only one at a time? I noticed, before purchase, the blister had been off at one point, and not replaced brilliantly, so there's an option to remove it again, in the future, photograph the combination in close-up, re-set the Batboat in it's trailer properly, and try resetting the blister a little better?

 

Does the fact that the autograph is 'To Robin' from Adam West, give it a little extra caché? And, as I said to the seller, with all its faults or potential faults, when was I going to see another one? Holy philosophical fuckwittery, Batman!

N is for Not Serious!

A few more toy or figure related funnies, and a couple of cats!

 

I believe this is genuine? But not necessarily a retail thing?

 

Ours were old, fat, bald and tattooed, with their brassy tarts holding the ladders!

 

Sigh!

 

Heehee!

 

Rubber jigglers!

 

Let's make death fun! And phallic!

AI from a couple of years ago - it was poor!

Check-out the white lines, crushed cars and dwarf in a pram! 

 

Real, but I don't know which model village?

F is for Follow-up - Marx Romans

As a follow-up to this original post;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2022/06/g-is-for-glory-of-rome.html

 

Reader Patrick Connolly from Canada, got in touch, first to reminisce, then with pictures! And among them is the one still missing from my sample, they are a bit bashed, but they have survived two owners and the best part of nearly seventy years, and it's the personal connection which makes all the difference! So let's have a look . . . 

"Here are pictures of Romans and Vikings. I think there were also Civil War figures. I remember the red shield and plumed guy was called Tiberius - maybe not the emperor."

 

"I remembered the guy with the leather arm and gold and red shield - one that you do not have pictured [on the right in each image, a gladiator?] - but he was not there - so on my last day in Edmonton I looked on the floor behind the shelf and there he was! - so these really were mine at one time."

 

We looked at the Vikings too, here;

 

https://smallscaleworld.blogspot.com/2022/06/v-is-for-vikings-vandals-varangians.html

 

And many thanks to Patrick for this trip down memory lane! Patrick has a web presence, check it out;

 

http://www.youtube.com/TrickTO

http://soundcloud.com/tricktol

V is for Valkyries, The Ride of the Valkyries

Or, if you haven't got loudspeaker-equipped Huey 'Slicks' to hand, Colonel Bogey on the two-tone 'dixie horns' might suffice! It's the Jimson Land Rover, much bigger than the transporter we looked at last, at about 1:24/25th, and a rather nice Series III, except it's ruined by the white cab-roof, and what I'm guessing might have been circus horns on another version of the toy; model number 115.

 

That's it, it's clean, it needs the surgical removal of the sir horns, and a repaint wouldn't go amiss, but would obviously ruin its resale value, there's not a lot else to add, so I won't, and it's a Jimson, push-and-go, carpet-toy 'Lanny'! ♫♪♪♫ Paar-paar-paar-paaaarp-parp ♪♫♪♪!!