Corgi Toys @ 60: Lots of upgrades and two VWs

There was an absolutely huge number of new issues from Corgi this month 60 years ago.

The Racing Car Gift Set 5 gets updated to Gift Set 5S (identified by a small sticker added to one end of the box) with the revised models 150S, 151A and 152S. This is a particularly scarce item. The cars are common enough but in this box very hard to find and good examples sell for a fortune. However, great care needs to be taken as the only difference in the box is that little sticker which is quite simple to reproduce. There may also be an alternative rectangular black print on white sticker applied which is also simple to replicate. The earlier issue from March 1959 is, itself, uncommon with only 64000 said to have been sold. Numbers for 5S are not available.

With the 154 Ferrari model coming next month, these cars will have begun to look very dated and the set had a very short production period, withdrawn sometime in the next year; hence the very high prices demanded now.

Another 'new' model wasn't really new - the Oldsmobile had appeared as the Police Sherriff's car six months earlier. This is a lovely looking saloon, however, and was issued in two colour schemes, a solid pale sky blue and a metallic silver-blue, both with cream-white side stripes.

Another model that wasn't completely new was the Land Rover Breakdown Truck which now gets suspension and an interior - the now familiar 'S' upgrade.

Interestingly, the first 417S models retained the twin-bar jib device. These are quire hard to find and and scarce but not always expensive as sellers often don't appreciate the difference. By far the majority of these models will have the later solid jib device which continued with the next change to a plastic canopy and was renumbered 477.

Next come three more Land Rover revisions, the S versions of the RAC Radio Rescue Land Rover, the S version of the RAF Land Rover and the 406S now designated as 438 for the standard Land Rover.

The 416S RAC Radio Rescue model gets suspension and a yellow interior but also has a change of decals, now featuring the logo on the doors and RADIO RESCUE across the bonnet. The canopy is in matching blue and has no transfers or stickers.

The 351S RAF Land Rover gets suspension and a yellow interior too. This is an extremely rare item with very few produced and they command very high prices as and when they appear. As I have mentioned in a previous article, they are actually quite difficult to spot too as many photos show a colour that is hardly distinguishable from the 438 deep blue-green. I have seen maybe just four of these in the many years I have been involved with Corgis. None were at all obvious and I do have to wonder whether there are more out there but I simply haven't noticed them.

They should have an RAF blue plastic canopy but that is even scarcer and I have yet to obtain even one of those!

The new standard Land Rover that was available in a box was numbered 438. In all respects it is the 406S in a classy dark green or deep green finish, with cream plastic canopy. There are two quite distinct shades but I have yet to determine which came first. The 438 models will usually have a yellow interior but a red interior is also to be found.

This will be an extremely long-running model for Corgi and will undergo several small changes in casting as well as different finishes for the standard box issue - although always a green of some sort.

More revisions now for the two trailers, the 100 Dropside Trailer and 101 Platform Trailer now getting the fixed cast type of drawbar in place of the piece of bent wire.

Both trailers remained in the same colour schemes as before and similar changes will be introduced for the other colours featuring in Gift Sets.

The last of the Land Rover revisions for December 1962 sees the Gift Set 2 updated to include a Land Rover with suspension and an interior. The set retained its Gift Set 2 number and had the new deep or dark green model pulling the 112 red and black horsebox which, at around this time, also gets the fixed drawbar like the trailers above. Another colour scheme was also introduced in December for the whole set and the Land Rover and Pony Trailer had a fawn and cream finish.

All the fawn pony trailers had the new cast type of drawbar. The first trailers had fixed shaped wheels which are not easy to find as the majority were fitted with free spinning wheels. Whilst the red and black trailers did get the fixed drawbar and fixed shaped wheels, they don't appear to have been in production long enough to get the free spinning wheels. Similarly, you won't find the fawn editions with a wire drawbar.

Sets did not mix colours - they were either deep/dark green and red or all fawn. The ponies were the same as in the earlier sets, most seeming to have the blue coat but, as they can simply be switched around it is not easy to be sure whether there were red or brown coats as well in the new editions.

The fawn Land Rover is known with a yellow interior but this seems to be significantly scarcer than the deep/dark green one with a red interior.

The only really 'new' issues in December were the Volkswagen Van and Camper Van, 433 and 434 respectively.

The van is the first commercial model with suspension (other than one or two Major model revisions) and, indeed, is a welcome addition to replace the very ancient-looking Bedford CA Vans and Karriers. The van is always white over red but is known with both a red and a yellow interior. Some small numbers were produced in special finishes and with decals designed for some firms but none of these would have been available at this time.

The 434 Camper Van is also only issued in the one colour scheme of olive-green and a very pale green and it always has a red interior.

This is a great little model which still looks good today!

Corgi Toys @ 60 : Racing Car upgrades

 

September 1961 sees the issue of the three upgraded racing cars. Suspension is added to 150 and 152, the Vanwall and the BRM but the very shallow Lotus lost out on that. They all get new numbers and a driver, though, a flag, decal or stripe and fresh paint.

The BRM gets a nice shade of pale turquoise-blue and you'll find RNs 1, 3 and 7. The wheels are always smooth and fixed but Corgi packed a sheet of 6 'wire wheel' stickers in the box, together with a typewritten note explaining how to apply them. They used some fierce glue for these and it really was important to get them centralised neatly as, once affixed, they wouldn't come off at all easily.

On the base, there are two rivets and the text goes along the length of the model, similar to the later 152 models.

The Lotus is now in a bright shade of blue and can be seen with either RN3 or 7. It gets the number 151A rather than 151S as I guess S meant 'suspension' at the time. Although they're not always easy to spot in pictures, this model did get shaped fixed wheels later in production but started off with smooth wheels.

The Vanwall is now a rich red colour and has the RN25. I have not seen any other numbers. The base has the later style 2 rivets but the text runs across the width of the base. This also had the 'wire wheel' stickers in the box with instructions.

Trophy Models

I have a second BRM available. For a change, the wheels are not as blackened as many of these become (and I haven't yet found a good way to revive them as they were a fairly miserable grey in the first place) but you'll see that one has been fitted the wrong way round!

On a model like this I don't think the error adds to its value (as it would for a normal Corgi edition). The gold plating is pretty good, some flakes on the rear and side only and it doesn't suffer from the rough corrosion I have seen on some.

These models are not easy to find these days and I have yet to find one on its plinth, never mind with a box! From what I can gather, these didn't sell particularly well at Marks & Spencer and not a great many were produced anyway. Here are all five, although I do need a better Austin Healey or, at the very least a less ridiculous-looking screen!

Update 17 September: I have re-loaded the images on this page as I am aware of some issues with those published previously. If you do experience any problems with any images in my articles on this blog please let me know.

Racing cars

I am nearly complete with Corgi's early racing cars now, having found an exceptionally nice green Vanwall, 150, and a pretty good red one. I knew nothing about these before but am learning fast.

These were not that easy to find, at least not in good condition, but I was very fortunate with the green Vanwall which also came with a spotless BRM 152.

It seems that the first issues were in British Racing Green for both 150 and 152. Perhaps the similarity between the two was a bit confusing but, whatever the reason, they changed to red a little while later for the Vanwall. The BRM, however, is always in green.

The red Vanwall seems quite scarce. This one was the best I could find anywhere at the time and has reasonable paintwork, a complete screen but the Racing Number transfer is mostly worn away. It looks very much like the RN1 used on later models so I may get away with a replacement.

Almost all the red Vanwalls I found were actually being sold as 150S models, which made searching more difficult until I caught on to the fact and just looked for Vanwall. The S model has a silver band on the bodywork around the front end and there should also be a driver sticking out of the cockpit. It also has suspension but, of course, you can't tell that from most photos. There were plenty of 150S models floating around but very few of its predecessor.

This leaves just a couple of items remaining in this section: a first type Lotus Mk II (151) and the first type of Bluebird (152). I have a silver 151 but need the red and blue variations. I doubt that I'll be able to get a red one as they're very rare and, so far, what I thought would be cheap and cheerful in blue has not proved to be the former at all. It's a very dull looking model that really doesn't excite me a great deal but even the blue ones have been way too expensive.

As for the Bluebirds, well, they're another story. I'll write about them once I find a reasonable earlier model which, hopefully, shouldn't be so difficult.

Looking back at the Vanwall and BRM for a moment, there are two seat colours for each model. The green BRM can have either a cream or silver seat. So far, I have a red Vanwall with a silver seat and a green one with a cream seat. I suspect there will be models with these reversed so I guess I'm not done yet! I don't list the blue-tinted glass separately. If I did that I would have to find further examples of just about every one of the early years' issues! So I shall regard that as one of those random variations that isn't hugely important and hope I can get away with that for now. 

Surprisingly nice little cars and vans that came in May

Discoveries last month included the NSU Sport Prinz in a sort of metallic brick red colour. Shown here against the more common bright cerise, the car I've bought has a few chips but it's not at all bad. These are odd little motors. My collector friend from Eilum sent me a marketing brochure for this and it has a tiny two-cylinder 500cc engine of little more than 500cc. The cerise is, indeed, one of the colours offered too!

Sort of thrown in with the 316 NSU was this Police Sunbeam Imp which I wasn't too bothered about really. However, having had a good look at it now, it is in remarkably clean and untouched condition. It is the version with just black bonnet and door panels. There is another with a black roof and, of course, the blue and white one too. This particular example is lovely but, as is so often the case with these Imps, there is no suspension. I shall try and revive it by inserting some rubber but that doesn't always work. More on that if I succeed. Otherwise it is available for someone else to have a go and then have the most delightful example of the quite sought-after model which even has clean little cast wheels.

I was never particularly fond of the Corgi racing cars and this is the first of the very early editions that I've had. This is 152, the BRM without suspension and, correctly, without a driver. It is pleasantly charming in the metal and I am even quite looking forward to finding the 150 Vanwall now! This was ridiculously cheap but is in amazingly good condition, especially bearing in mind that children would be inclined to race these around the room and bash into chair legs and skirting boards at speed. I like the silver paint on the air intake and what I assume is a lamp of some sort. The RN3 is also only slightly damaged after all so many years.

Yet another oddity arrived in May! This is the penultimate Karrier Bantam, used here as another shop, this time a Mobile Butchers' Shop. I cannot imagine children getting very excited about having one of these and, issued in late 1960, it was competing with the Jaguar 2.4 with suspension and things like a Land Rover Breakdown Truck. So it only sold about 100,000 which is fairly low by Corgi model standards. 

This one looks great and has only paint loss on the leading and risen edges here and there. The good thing is that it has all its original dark blue stickers and the windows are clean and show the really old-fashioned card illustrations very well. Its scale is a silly 1:55 so don't park this too close to your cars or it won't look right!

I am nearing the end of my Wants List now and things like this are what I need to get hold of. It's nicer than I expected, I have to say, like the BRM.

Let me introduce you to the very, very first Corgi model. Number 200, the Ford Consul. And this is the most commonly found colour. Also available in cream.

I can just imagine the conversation:

We've got a new car, children!

Ooh jolly good daddy! What colour is it?

Er. Mushroom, a sort of mud brown . . .

Oh.

I can take you to school in it in the morning!

It's OK dad. We'll get the bus.

Corgi had a more cheerful pot of paint for their Standard Vanguard III. This is the fairly scarce 207M version with a Mechanical motor. Even fewer of these were sold than the ruddy Butchers Shop! Every example I have had had has quite a few chips which really do show up against that colour but, at least it is nice and original - and the motor works very well sixty years later.

You may remember that I had a 448 Police Van missing a door. Well, finally, after several months, I found a decent condition 448 which was going very cheaply because it needed the door that I did have! So I have made a complete and quite good-looking model here and may actually be able to get some income from the two now. There remains in my shelf a van with slightly cracked windows and no rear doors at all which I may have to use for spares. I now need the left hand door for a green 450 Mini Van. Then perhaps my shelf will have a bit more room.

These will all soon be on my web site so if you want to take a closer look please visit any time.

Ecurie Ecosse Racing Car Transporter

Every year from 1961 to 1967 this would be on my birthday and Christmas lists but it has taken me until 2015 actually to have an Ecurie Ecosse Racing Car Transporter of my own.

It was an expensive item in those days. Quite frankly, it's not cheap now, either! I saw this going as a complete set - the Gift Set 16 with the later edition racing cars - and didn't expect my modest bid to win but at 2am not many others were around or hadn't set their maximum bids very high.

The transporter appealed to me at the time because it had steering and I loved how that system worked, something Dinky never matched, their steering being a most unrealistic whole axle rotation that just wasn't right! I also liked the idea of putting a car inside and carrying it around.

What didn't appeal to me at all, though, were the racing cars themselves. The BRM and Vanwall aren't too bad but seem very old-fashioned, even for those days.

Those two are in excellent condition, being the S versions with suspension added and slight changes to the paintwork, adding a silver nose cone and decals.

The Lotus is a weird looking affair that may have been what was racing around Le Mans in the Sixties but, in my view, it didn't make a very appealing model. This one is 151A, the A being the second edition which included a driver and a slightly different windscreen fitting. I think there were similar blue 151 models but most of those were silver. The paintwork isn't too bad on this one but those big wings fore and aft are very vulnerable and chunks are missing there. There was no space for suspension without major reworking so this never got an S suffix.

The steering wheel was broken on this one and the driver didn't look right. I have replaced the steering wheel and used another driver but I'm still unsure. I feel he needs to be leaning back further so maybe both are wrong. I think I'll leave that to a new owner to sort out. The steering wheel is simple to fit and a driver can easily be installed on this model too.

As I said, the thing I really wanted, though, was the truck and it has some delightful features, including the little vice in the workshop area. The windows are remarkably clear and the interior all good but the paintwork has quite a few chips. The top deck folds down very nicely with a clever mechanism and locks in place again when the tailgate is returned to vertical. Corgi were good at this sort of thing, although many examples have had to have replacement tailgates from what I can gather looking at others on sale. This one is all original.

The steering works but the turning circle is about as big as the real thing would have been!

I'm glad to have got this and seen it up close but I won't be sorry to see it or the racing cars go to a new owner. It will be quite a decent bargain: about £45 for the truck, £29 for the Lotus and around £40 for each of the BRM and Vanwall. I think the whole set could go for about £130 and I expect it to sell pretty quickly.

I guess I will still have to get the original racing cars, without the S or A suffixes, one day but I can't get too enthusiastic about them and, despite longing for the truck 50 odd years ago, now that I've seen it and checked it off my list I won't be that sorry to see this one go either. My dad was probably right not to buy it.