Mazak?

312 Marcos Mantis

Here is a very attractive model, the Marcos Mantis #312 from 1971 with Whizzwheels that actually look good. The tyres are still annoying black plastic but this is some improvement, at least.

With doors that open and close and stay almost in line, a pleasant interior and great metallic red finish this is one from the later days that is nice to have.

On the baseplate there are the words Mazak die-cast. Another collector with a large stock notes that the earliest this appeared was on the first Ford Cortina released in November 1970 and there are some views that Corgi had to seek another die-cast firm to produce items while they were reorganising things following the major fire a bit earlier. The Marcos was released in August 1971 but release dates don't necessarily follow manufacture dates that closely.

I'll see what appears on some other later models that are coming in. Mazak is the name of the alloy of metals that is used for this sort of die-cast work.

I have just published a post about a couple of very poor productions from Mazak: the C111 Mercedes-Benz and Reliant Bond Bug 700ES but I've also got a very good Cortina Mk III GXL with the same brand on the base so not everything with that name is bad.

313 Ford Cortina GXL

One more query on the Marcos. It does seem quite big. I thought Marcos were smallish sports cars but this is a very substantial saloon when you place it next to others, like the Cortina. It's bigger than an Oldsmobile Toronado, for instance. Now that doesn't make sense so I need to look more closely at the scale thing one day.

More as and when others appear.