To tow or not to tow

 This may be something that some of you know all about already but, for some reason, I have missed this in all these years and so, for the benefit of others like me, you will find that some early models have towing eyes cut out of the base and some do not.

Here I illustrate the relevant issues:

200 Ford Consul

201 Austin Cambridge

202 Morris Cowley

203 Vauxhall Velox

204 Rover 90

205 Riley Pathfinder

206 Hillman Husky

207 Standard Vanguard III

The Standard did not get a tin base, all model having the more solid type with a bulge on the rear axle. You will see the black base in two styles, just as the M bases had two styles of text content and placement, as well as a grey base, although this seems only to appear on the later shaped wheels edition with only the top of the roof painted red. I guess there may be examples of smooth wheel editions with a grey base but they'll be pretty scarce.

208 Jaguar 2.4 Litre

209 Jaguar 2.4 Police Car

Subsequent issues all appear to have the tow eye with the more solid base being fitted to 210, 211, 214 and 215 and all from 217.

The 213 Jaguar Fire Service appears only to have the base with a cut-out tow eye, much as one might expect as for the 209 Police Car, being a later issue. Similarly the last of the tin bases, the 216 Austin A40 appears only to have the base with the towing eye.

Generally, I cannot tell the relative numbers of each type and cannot advise which will be the rarer type of base for each of the tin plate models. I would appreciate any help with this, looking through everything on sale and keeping a note of examples found. So far, the Ford Consul seems comparatively scarce with a towing eye because I had to use the image of a very rare blue 200 (not 200M) that I have, all the usual 200 colours having no cut-out. I do expect to find more, though, and doubt that no cut-out can be very unusual.

Again, generally, I would expect the no cut-out models to be less common amongst the 208 and it is possible that none were produced for models issued after 1958 but that's merely my suggestion.

I have yet to examine all the other early issues but so far it appears that the sports cars and Bedford CA vans had no towing eye. That may just be that none I found have one so I shall continue looking before deciding anything on that.

Corgi Toys @ 60: Bedford AA Van and Dropside Trailer

It's June 1957 and Corgi mark the arrival of warmer weather with a bright yellow Bedford CA van. This is their fourth release with the Bedford casting (five or six if you count the different M models too). It is the AA Road Service van. It will be more than two years before the Royal Automobile Club gets some publicity from the Corgi firm. You do wonder whether maybe one of the directors broke down and either the RAC fellow failed to assist satisfactorily or perhaps the AA chap spotted the fault but refused to fix unless the AA got on the side of the next issue.

The AA van has curious paintwork - a blob of black across the front that I always used to think was hand-painted by some child until I realised they all had it. Often there are no visible headlamps and it looks terribly amateur but I guess that was the way it had to be. It is the split screen type in 1957 - you'll have to wait for the single screen type which was much later. You will, however, see this with either a curved top edge to the grill or a straight edge. As far as I am aware, all these split screen Mk I models will have smooth wheels.

Anyway, in a rather less than exciting month for those boys anxiously watching their local toy shop window for the latest release, June sees 408, a van and 100, a trailer, and that's something you can actually do something with, assuming, that is, you got one of the lorries issued earlier.

None of the other vehicles so far have a tow bar and there's a little while to wait yet before the Land Rover comes to the rescue. If you're looking at your trailer and wondering if it is the June 1957 issue then it will need to have the simple wire tow bar. The metal fixed draw bar (a broken example shown below) is a much later addition.

I think all these Drop-side trailers were cream on a red chassis and will have had smooth wheels.