The Corgi Model Club : a taxi while we wait . . .

 

1962 was a good summer for fans of the Ford Thunderbird. Corgi had issued the Hard Top and Convertible 'S' upgrades with suspension and new colours in June and in July they had another go at the Convertible and added a strange-looking roof, stickers and a driver to a new issue #430 called a Bermuda Taxi.

It would have been a relatively inexpensive set of changes at the time and I am sure the same consideration was persuasive when deciding on this month's release from the Corgi Model Club. It's a cheerful model and brightened up a gloomy November morning when it arrived.

You'll see some additional packing with this one - a quite solid bit of card protecting one end, as well as the now familiar chunks of white foam plastic. The cars are also now being wrapped in thin white paper. I can only assume that some people have complained about some scuff marks on unprotected models that allowed a little movement in the past. It's a good idea but I do have to say that in the old days we had the box, the car and a membership certificate and that was it in the vast majority of cases! 

It is another excellent reproduction all round. I don't have my original to hand to make comparison photographs but everything is pretty much as for the re-issue of 215S which you can refer to.

The additions will be the roof, stickers and the driver. The stickers are not stickers so don't try to peel them off as you could with an original model. Whilst I appreciate that these transfers, or maybe they are produced as part of an advanced printing process now, look good and will be cheaper to produce than separate items which then have to be stuck on, and this is not like other issues where we were given the stickers on a sheet to apply as and where we wanted, I would have preferred stickers to make this that much closer to the old #430.

The driver is the one I am familiar with in these models. I have encountered, and written about, another with bigger yellow boots and one or two other differences but I have no idea if that one ever appeared in an original #430 or was something a parts firm had created. This chap looks fatter than I remember the original being but I really cannot be sure about that.

As always, the box is very shiny and I still have an issue with some of the fonts used but the main appearance is very good.

As something to keep us amused for a while this is fine but you know, and I am sure the Club knows, that we are really holding our breath for the much more exciting things due in the next two or three months!

Corgi toys @ 60: Volvo P1800 and Thunderbirds Go Tropical

 

July 1962 saw the first Corgi Volvo arrive in the local toy shop. Model 228 was the Volvo P1800, a nice, simple model with just jewelled headlamps as a special feature. This was issued in two unusual colours, beige and salmon, as well as several shades of red, varying from an orange-red shade through to a quite rich, deeper red. The salmon also varied from dark to pink.

Most of the beige models had a red interior but they can be found with a lemon interior. Similarly, the salmon model had a lemon interior but is known with red. I expect there will be red models which have a red interior although I have only seen lemon to date. All the 'alternatives' are scarce but not every seller knows that so you can find these scarcities at reasonable prices.

The 228 Volvo P1800 will always have free-spinning shaped wheels and good suspension with wires. They should have a silver line running along the raised 'chrome strip' and the top of the rear fins. Ofte this gets worn or not well-applied at the factory.

The car will be familiar to fans of The Saint TV series in which Roger Moore as Simon Templar raced around Hertfordshire lanes near where I lived in the early 1960s. In due course Corgi would release their version but you'll have to wait until 2025 for that!

The other new issue in July 1962 was the rather strange-looking 'Bermuda Taxi'. Clearly, someone on the Corgi Production Team must have been on holiday in the winter of 1961 and seen the old American cars in use as taxis on Bermuda. It was another way to get a little more life out of the ancient casting but not a model I had ever particularly desired.

They painted the body a creamy white and added some stickers. Unlike transfers, these would easily come off and so now many models will be either lacking them or display reproductions. They planted a suitably brown driver behind the wheel and gave him a stupid-looking plastic canopy, supported by a single pole at the back. A truly dreadful affair. The canopy came in green, blue and yellow, each having a red edging.

As with the 215S, this always has free-spinning shaped wheels. It may be the colour producing this effect but it appears lower and more natural than the red 215S edition. I doubt that it is any different, just appears a little more realistic.

Marcel Van Cleemput quotes a scale of 1:46 for this, as opposed to 1:48 for the 215S model issued in June. I think that has to be an error. They're the same but i don't know which is correct.

Corgi Toys @ 60 : Thunderbirds get suspension and the first Oldsmobile

June 1962 brought three new American cars to your local Corgi toy shop. The two Ford Thunderbirds' bodies had been around since March 1959 and now finally get the S treatment. New paint, suspension and an interior for the hard top and a driver for the convertible.

The dark metallic grey is a super colour that never is to be seen again. It suits this car well and, whilst the red roof seems a little odd at first, it is an improvement on the Mechanical Ford's pink and plack scheme. This is a good-looking model, one of my favourites. It is always with free spinning wheels and a lemon plastic interior.

Putting suspension on the convertible model, however, didn't work as well, the car now seemingly floating some several inches higher than it ought to be. Wherever you see a Thunderbird from this era it is pretty much on the ground and you wonder how on Earth it would cope with sleeping policemen and those high kerbs in car parks.

The Corgi Model Club have produced a fine reproduction of the 215S model. The other problem for me with this model is the driver. The character is simply too tall, his head well above the windscreen and he just looks silly, not a good look in a car like this in the real world!

The other June arrival coincides with the latest Corgi Model Club issue too - the lovely 237 Oldsmobile Super 80, appearing first in County Police Patrol livery. It's a simple model with no opening features, just suspension and free-spinning wheels, an amber beacon on the roof and stickers on the sides.

Corgi Model Club: Ford Thunderbird

The most recent release in their excellent series of Corgi reproductions is the 215S Ford Thunderbird, the Open Top edition with suspension and a driver.

In the same size box as the original a piece of polystyrene protects the screen and driver's head. This is particularly useful as I have always found the driver to be a bit ridiculous, being way too tall, as well as looking very much like the character who would be chopped down to Roger Moore in The Saint's car three years later. I may be wrong there. Maybe he re-appears in the Mercedes 300SL. But that's all another story. So here, nearly 60 years later, is a fine and remarkably accurate reproduction of the car.

The original 215S I had always thought sat a little too high. The 215 was as it should be. I presume the requirements for suspension movement meant the height had to be increased. Here's a fairly similar vintage sitting in the village just around the corner from me.

The model itself has a lovely coat or two of the right colour red and the silver paint has been very well copied, being a strong feature on the original. Perhaps the detailing is a little too precise on the headlamps and at the back end but that's hardly a criticism.

The interior is just as ghastly as the original, and you still have to wonder where passengers put their legs. The colour is perhaps a little darker, more brown than the 1962 issue. The screen is very accurate.

The only thing that struck me as a little odd when I first took it out of the box was the wheel design. As these were supposed to be just the normal shaped wheels they'd produced very nicely on several preceding issues, I was surprised that these seemed slightly different. From some angles they're pretty near perfect but from others they look wrong.

The base is nicely very similar to the original with just the reference to China instead of Gt. Britain. The box has been well done. I think the font for the model title is slightly wrong and the box has that bright finish which is unnatural but really this is a very good effort.

All in all, this may not be my favourite Corgi but I am still delighted to have this in my collection and I have to congratulate the good people at Blue DTC Brands, whoever they are, for their efforts once more. This series is proving a huge success and all just as collectible and exciting to look forward to as the originals.

 

Ford Thunderbird Mechanical and a question of boxes

 

This is not something you'll see every day. A really well-preserved Ford Thunderbird in Mechanical form - and the friction motor works smoothly too. It came from an auction in the outskirts of Leicester, another surprise win from a casual bid and I suspect that it may have come from the same collector who provided the Riley Pathfinder and Studebaker that were featured in a recent article here.

It isn't perfect so was probably disregarded by those who seek only mint models in mint boxes but I am delighted to have this and think that the odd small chip isn't such a bad thing and does mean the model has seen the light of day in its 60 years of existence.

The box is a bit of a mess, with flaps at both ends missing but it is the correct box and that's not at all easy to find these days in any condition.

It was the box that first caught my eye, albeit for the wrong reason. I had initially thought that the 'normal' box would have been the old blue style and that this new type would be something of a rarity, especially as the model was really not around for long, barely a year before being discontinued. This model first appeared in March 1959 and I believe that this 214M and its sister the 214 model were two of the first to have only the new style yellow and blue boxes.

From what I can gather the new style of box must have been introduced in December 1958 or January 1959 because the Jaguar 2.4 Fire Chief's car, model 213, only seems to have a new style box and that was issued at the start of the year, making it the first model to have only the later box.

The previous model issued was the 152 BRM F1 Racing Car and that may have a blue box (or a yellow and blue one for later sales).

So I was not right about the box being particularly special but it is still good to have even part of one. Perhaps I should look out for the BRM in the old box, though, as that, and a few other later 1958 issues, may be a little scarce.

New arrivals in 2020 Pt 2

Another example of the rare Citroen with fog lamps has come along. It is not in the best of condition and it is beginning to look as though the fog lamps go hand-in-hand with free spinning wheels on this model.

At first glance this looks like any other Morris Mini-Cooper but it is a scarce type which has a white bonnet and free-spinning wheels. Usually it is only the models with just a white roof only that have the free spinning wheels.

A super example of the gold Bentley, issued in the Golden Guinea Set. As this set sold only about 30,000, the models in it are really much scarcer than many people seem to realise. That is not a great deal more than a 322 Rover International Rally edition, for example, regarded as one of the more expensive Corgis.

Issued in 1959 and withdrawn in 1960, this was the last but one model to have a friction motor and these are now hard to find in good condition. I am lucky that this one also has a smooth, working motor.

Most early 438 Land Rovers you'll encounter will be in deep green but the very first that were include in the Farming Gift set 22s were a much lighter shade, more of a mid-green. They did not have a canopy, nor were they ever issued in individual boxes to buy at your local store. So these are quite rare and worth a good price, especially when coupled with the all yellow 101 trailer. that too, was only available in that Gift Set. It did survive to get coupled to the deep green Land Rover too, however, so, whilst not at all easy to find is slightly less expensive.

The first Fordson Power Major Tractor, model 55, coupled with the first edition plough, model 56 to make Gift Set 18. The plough would only fit this tractor, with each using a very accurate but awkward attachment method. This Fordson has the later red plastic wheels but early editions had pale orange metal wheels. I don't know which are the scarcer.

The Massey Ferguson Combine Harvester was on my Christmas and Birthday Lists for many years but never arrived. It was quite expensive at 19/11d. (That's one penny, or about ½p less than £1) when first issued in 1959 with metal times like this one. This edition is unusual, however, in having orange wheels.

From the same collection as the Combine Harvester, I received this lovely Massey Ferguson 65 Tractor with a Fork attachment, also featuring unusual orange wheels. Both came from the States and I wonder whether the export models had different wheels.

Continuing my purchase these days only of the slightly uncommon models, here is what looks like a very ordinary, and not very good condition, 218 Aston Martin DB4. It has fixed shaped wheels, however, and they are looking to be quite rare on this model. It started with smooth wheels but also was fitted with a criss-cross type of cast wheel to look like spoked wheels and later editions got free-spinning wheels. Those with shaped wheels, however, like this one, are few and far between.

One way to use up the stock of spare Hillman Imp castings was to make them Monte Carlo Rally editions and Corgi did this a couple of times. In 1966 there was the 328 Hillman Imp and a year later along comes the 340 Sunbeam Imp. The 328 gets a couple of jewels added but the 340 gets six, with two replacing the headlights. The interior is a distinctly different white too.

I finally got a black hard top - and another E Type Jaguar to put it on! Love this model.

With a big chunk of paint missing from the front of the bonnet, this 281 Whizzwheels Rover 2000TC is not exactly mint but it dos have a complete chrome section front and rear. It is such a shame that this model had such poor paint, which comes off if you as much as blow on it, and very brittle plastic used for the revised front end. One of the rare ones, though, with only 48000 made. That's less than the yellow Fiat Ghia Jolly.

Another model only around for a very short time and selling in small numbers was the Whizzwheels version of the Chevrolet Corvette Stingray, two models now available in a strange pink colour. Note the different headlamp covers too. I need a supply of right hand targa tops! It is always the right one that goes missing!

The rather better and gorgeous-looking 300 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray, also only available for a short period before getting the Whizzwheels treatment.

A rare 'transition' model - the 387 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray with Whizzwheels but retaining the rear jewelled lights which were mere blobs of casting metal in the vast majrity of models. This one now gets its right-hand targa top which had been mssing for a year or two.

A nice example of the rare 438 in deep green and red interior.

A complete Gift set 41 with all the right cars on the Transporter.

Here is something most unusual. The 319 Lotus Elan from the Lotus Racing Gift Set 37 but with spoked wheels! In fact, the chassis came from a 318 from the same set but that was in very poor condition so I switched it to this one. I presume this is something that someone has created at some time. Looks great and a lot nicer than either the small shaped wheels or cast wheels normally used.

These Rover 2000 International Rally models are expensive so I could only manage to get this quite worn example. It is all original and the screens are undamaged, though, which means it still will not be cheap.

Lastly for now, a very rare Land Rover! It is the fawn edition from Gift Set 2 but with a yellow interior. I didn't even know that this existed until a collector friend in Germany told me about one he had found. I had to pay quite a bit to someone in America for this one, not because of its scarcity but because it was in America and, for some reason best known to Americans, they all want to use some Global Shipping Programme that is really profitable for whoever runs it and ruddy expensive for us who have to pay. It was also virtually unmarked, as was the matching Pony Trailer.