The Model Club's latest issue has finally arrived, delayed through no fault of the Club, and, having read many stories about it, I am pleased to have had the opportunity to see it up close for myself.
Firstly, it arrives in what must be the most deprived packaging so far in the series. This time it has the merest slip of bubble-wrap floating around and the box free to cavort around the interior of the usual brown corrugated card affair. Luckily the car is unlikely to move much inside its box, being wrapped in some tissue. No chunks of foam with this issue (which I hear may lead to damaged suspension where the foam is inserted such that it wedges too firmly the car beneath in other instances).
One's immediate impression has to be good, an instantly recognisable colour and great chrome. I like wire wheels on Corgis a lot but I don't remember any of my originals ever having such shiny axle ends. These spoil the appearance a bit but perhaps mine became dull quickly and I never noticed at the time.
You will then have the now familiar disappointment with the 'jewelled' headlamps which aren't. How much extra would it really cost to fit little glass items? I am sure Steve Flowers would give the Club as super discount for quantity should they have trouble sourcing them in China.
As I am sure you will have read elsewhere by now, the funs starts at the back end. The transfer reads MGB GT! I guess that in China the team producing this are unfamiliar with British cars and reckoned that the model which looks pretty much the same as the MGB GT they had produced a while ago might well have the same few letters on the tailgate. A bit like nearly all Fords have the same Ford badge. Quite how that escaped the attention of some sort of quality control over in the East I don't know, then a later sample gets through the Club's approval process and the old MGB transfer gets applied to every model and shipped here when, finally, someone at the Club realises.
Personally, I find these mistakes quite fun. Yes, I know they make whoever missed this at the Club look a bit stupid but I can imagine that they may have been working with a poor original which had either no transfer or a damaged one. We have read before how they don't always seem to get hold of good examples of whatever they're planning to recreate and I'm not convinced that whoever does check most models is as well-versed in Corgis from this era as one might have expected.
Anyway, once this batch has been sold the transfer will be corrected and some of us will just have to buy the second issue. I think they have about 10-15,000 in each batch so it may be a while before the second comes and I suspect they will eventually be equally distributed and so, whilst this first one will have some value in future, it is unlikely to be significant with so many around.
The black case is a delightful copy and opens and closes just like the original. That little item itself is almost enough to warrant buying the model, with originals regularly selling for £10-£15 + post on Ebay.
The Club need to have a word with whoever packs the cars in the boxes as they are just stuffing the bag with the numbers into the box and that is resulting in many people reporting creased stickers which may not look great either loose or applied. Just adding a small piece of card in a slightly smaller bag would solve the problem.
As I said at the start, this is generally an excellent reproduction in many respects and the colour very close. I detect just a touch more lime in my original but that's all.
The tyres on an original would have been the 'branded' type with clear tread running around the tyre. This would surely be something quite easy for the Chinese to create but they have just left us with slicks!
The box has the usual annoying font error in the small text and numerals and has that shine which I wish they would try and avoid as the card itself is pretty much exact. I would also stop adding those little slits in the tabs which must account for no end of slightly damaged boxes and frustrated collectors, who knew they should have been more careful but took a chance and just tugged.
Looking back at my comment regarding the cost of cases, I have now looked up the cost of all the parts if you were to purchase reproduction items from Model-Supplies:
2 doors £2.00
2 seat backs £2.90
tailgate £1.00
tailgate window £1.75
window unit £3.00
chrome chassis / bumpers £7.00
chrome grille £1.75
2 jewels £0.80
tailgate transfer £1.55
suitcase £1.20
4 Racing numbers £1.55
postage UK £5.50
Total £30.00
Remember that the body items would be bare metal too, requiring paint. So the £28.98 that I think I paid wasn't such bad value! Now, does anyone need any spares!!
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