Some interesting little Imps

 Many, many years ago I came across a #251 Hillman Imp in bronze with jewelled fog lights. This week another one arrived and, unlike the first one, this is in pretty reasonable condition.

It is a strange model. It has the same jewelled fog lights as were added to the first Monte Carlo Hillman Imp #328 but the windscreen is the later style with two horizontal lines as was fitted to the second Monte Carlo (Sunbeam) Imp #340.

It is the same bronze colour as was used for the Transporter Gift Set models, which were also available individually in boxes for some lucky buyers at the time. Although this one came with an original #251 box I have no idea whether that was added later and believe this would have been part of a late set and not issued individually. With its normal shaped wheels it is not the last of the #251 production as I also have the delightful and very scarce edition with cast wheels.

The timeline for Imps starts with the blue (and maybe individual bronze) issues in November 1963.

These were withdrawn from dealers' order lists in 1966 and were absent in the 1967 Corgi Catalogue.

The Car Transporter Gift Sets 41/48 were available from December 1966 to 1968 and these contained the bronze edition.

The first rally edition, #328, had a short life from January 1966 to February 1967 with the #340 edition appearing in March 1967 and staying around until quite late in 1969.

All #328 models had shaped wheels and no lines on the windscreen. They can be found with either yellow or white interiors.

The double lines on the screen were absent from the #328 model but do appear on all #340 models, even the early ones with normal shaped wheels. Later (and most) #340 models have cast wheels.

All the 506 Police Imps were the Sunbeam version, using the #340 style of base, and all these had the double lines on the screen and cast wheels.The Police models often display marks at the front where the holes for four jewels were filled in.

So it would seem that cast wheels were first fitted to Imps in late 1967 or early 1968 and the one I have in bronze would have come from one of the last Transporter sets in 1968.

The bronze edition with jewelled fog lights is likely to have arisen when the #328 was replaced by the #340 and bodies given a bronze coat of paint instead of the metallic blue and, as this would have been in early 1967, I can only imagine the small batch getting this treatment were sold in a few Transporter Gift sets in early-mid 1967. Although it is possible that they were sent out to dealers as a sort of one-off addition, maybe free to them, I suspect the box with this one has been added at some time between 1967 and 2025.

I shall, therefore, put this one with the cast wheel edition in my own collection cabinet and transfer the box to one or other of my #251 models that I have available for sale. I might sell the other two but they will not be cheap as I do think they're pretty scarce models and, at the moment, I have nothing to compare them with in terms of valuation.

I do seem to be accumulating rather a lot of models like this - genuinely very scarce ones for which I have little guidance as to what they may be worth. It is probably the case that values for items like these will very much depend upon the depth of the pockets of those who would like them. For my own part, my resources are quite limited and, even if something wonderful appeared on the market that I had always wanted but never owned, my limit would have to reside in the three figure numbers. For someone fortunate enough to have a far greater amount of funds available, and with other living expenses taken care of so that whatever he has he may spend freely on a hobby such as Corgi Toys, then should he wish to have a model, and that model is likely to appear just once in a blue moon, then he will pay a vast sum for the satisfaction with just a mere small dent in his bank balance.

Sometimes you get a pleasant surprise

 Whilst I am only too fully aware of the number of models sold on Ebay which are far from what they seem and have descriptions which, even those written by AI, veer markedly from the truth, I do sometimes strike lucky. I bought those illustrated below plus a couple of other Corgis for £30. They did look a bit dirty and the photos provided weren't very well-focussed but I was happy to pay a lot more for just one of them - what looked like a lovely example of a #322 Rover 2000 Monte Carlo, one of my favourite models.

It has two or three small marks to the paintwork but none in obvious places and is totally original. No one has attempted to repaint the roof and it has the correct original decals with that slightly unusual font which most dealers supplying replacements get wrong. And the rear window isn't cracked where the Trans-o-lite system joins. Amazing! Prior to starting the catalogue and my Corgi business I had always kept my own Rover model on a shelf or on my desk at an office for many many years. It was one of the first models that I searched for in 2013 because my own model had disappeared. I did need one now for a Gift Set 38 I am building to take advantage of a reasonable reproduction box that has come my way but I tend to buy these when they're at reasonable prices anyway. It must be something about the colour and I do love jewelled headlamps and, of course, the super Trans-o-lite double headlamps.

In the group was this little #328 Monte Carlo Hillman Imp. Now I did expect this to arrive with something wrong, most probably broken suspension which these Imps so often suffer from. However, apart from some flat spots on the tyres, which were rock hard and have now been replaced, and some wear to the decals on the sides, this is a super little example. It is also the version with a yellow interior whereas most I've had have been white.

The #314 that was in the group is not a model I like very much and they all do seem to be very cheap and plentiful so the £5 I effectively paid for this one isn't quite so much of a bargain and I probably won't sell it for ages and even then at only £10 if I'm lucky. It's clean, though, and just missing the Ferrari transfer and a RN4 on one side. Unlike the other two I have at the moment, this one does have both exhausts! They seem to break very easily, being thin pieces of chrome-plated plastic and a little vulnerable at the rear. I know of only two variations for this model and that is in the lines on the base. Early models have two simple parallel lines. Later models have an angled section at the rear end of each line. This was around for such a long time that there may well be other differences that emerged with time but I have yet to know about any. I do notice different RN transfers - colour and style of numeral but wonder that these may just be poor reproductions.

Another model I have managed to avoid having for many years is this #151A, the second outing for the rather bland-looking Lotus Mark 11. The first edition from 1958 was a little interesting in that there are some scarce colours like red and silver to discover but for this one it's just smooth or shaped wheels and RN3 or 7. This one does have a driver although I am not sure it's the correct character as he appears to be much too high above the screen. Having said that, the Simon Templar father-figure in the #215S Thunderbird would suffer at any speed as he sits several inches above the top of the screen in that car too.

I am quite happy to have this, though, as it is very clean, all original and a colleague in Australia sent me a sample reproduction box in return for my assistance with design and dimensions for it. His work is excellent, rather better than some we may be more familiar with and I can now sell this model with his box, which has been lying around for a couple of years at least. 

I am also most relieved that the tyres are OK on this one. I have no idea how anyone can change them!

I shall not bother to bore you with photos of the other two models, for which £5 was probably about the right price to pay if I am going to get any profit at all from them. One was a #309 Aston Martin Competition, a late model with the small, closed vent. The paintwork was not good, though, showing a lot of playwear so it could be something someone might wish to restore. The only other fault is a small scratch on the front screen so I really don't want to break it apart as the decals, suspension, wheels are all sound and, despite being well worn, it is still all original. So someone might like it for a few pounds.

The other was a #155 Lotus-Climax Racing Car. It looked great, with a driver and suspension is intact and the paintwork very good. Unfortunately, though, it has lost the twin chrome exhausts. It does look an easy repair and one that ought to be worth doing as the end product will be a lot better than some restoration repaint. There's no need to break it so perhaps that'll appeal for a few pounds too.

This article was just about some of the every day models we see come and go and to share how sometimes you can do well on Ebay. The site is much-criticised and some people seem to want to avoid Ebay like the plague but I don't have a lot of trouble there. The costs of selling are high but it is the only site which I feel reaches a large enough audience of people who are interested in what I have to sell. I would much rather everyone buys from my own store, where I do get to keep a lot more of the proceeds and, accordingly, list products at lower prices, but it's simply not anything like as well-publicised.

You do have to be careful - and I feel sorry for whoever bought a fawn-coloured 'Pre-production sample' of a #241 Ghia L6.4 this week for £166. I did write to the seller when I first saw it to say that he would be disappointing a buyer as there were several signs that this was most definitely not a pre-production sample but merely something someone had repainted and screwed back together. The seller maintained that the screw was the same type as another that had been illustrated, possibly in the Great Book of Corgi, of a factory sample of a Ghia Mangusta 5000 De Tomaso and even included that illustration in his listing. The two screws were quite obviously different and, whilst I doubt Corgi had any 'standard screws' for holding models together anyway, I am sure that a pre-production sample, which would be from 1962/3 would not be identical to a 1968/9 one for the later Ghia!

I have had many genuine colour trials and factory samples and they have rarely been screwed together. The base is either riveted as per a normal issue or where the model is very much something being worked on and a very early sample, the base is held on by elastic bands. Screws may have been used sometimes and I am sure some people will have genuine examples but that badly-painted brown Ghia was not good. Unfortunately, now that it has achieved that price once this will be used by someone to justify another high price next time it appears on the market and, much as we may criticise Ebay sellers, there are plenty of similarly inaccurate descriptions at all the major auction houses where I suspect this will finish up one day at £400.

But that is all another story. For now I just wished to share you some of the nice surprises that can be found on Ebay.

Late model differences

 

A 413 Mobile Butchers Shop came this week and prompted me to write about the small but important differences that you may find in models issued at the very end of their production period. The Karrier is a great example as it must have looked so dated on the shelves in 1964 and to discover that there was actually one of these old things with suspension was quite a surprise a year or so ago when I first found one. I now see that there is a reference to 413S in some Corgi documents although the boxes still read 413. This is certainly a rarity.

Another scarce one is this 210S Citroën DS19. It seems that Corgi decided to continue to produce these after having adjusted the casting for the 1965 Monte Carlo version to provide holes for the four small jewelled fog lamps. Instead of fitting jewels, though, we get some bright metal blobs instead. I have seen these fetch £150 or more at auctions but they do seem to appear regularly and maybe are not as scarce as I had originally thought. I now have four in stock although this latest addition is by far the best. Interestingly, only these models with the fog lamps have free-spinning wheels.

Free-spinning wheels are the difference on this late edition 223 Chevrolet Impala. It was a popular model, the very first Impala issued, in fact. and stayed in production for a long time before being sliced in half for the MkII version. Shortly before that some models got free-spinning wheels fitted but these are not at all as common as you might expect.

Corgi started fitting the shaped wheel in place of the smooth wheel in 1961 and some of the later editions of the 207 Standard Vanguard had them fitted. They also made another change that people may not have noticed, however, and that was in how the red paint now only covered the roof, not the pillars. Although shaped fixed wheels are less common on many models from this period (205, 209, 213, 214, 215 and 216 can be found, and 210 is common) only the 207 had this additional change.

Whilst late Buick Rivieras with cast wheels in metallic blue are quite common, and you find a few gold versions too, the pale blue Buick with cast wheels is very rare.

Wheels, again, are the thing to look for on the innocent and ancient-looking Jeep FC-150. This long-running model first appeared with fixed smooth wheels and the vast majority that you'll come across will have fixed wheels of one type or the other. Very few do exist, though, with free-spinning wheels and are worth picking up when you do see them as it is not something that sellers will realise is rare at all.

The penultimate one for now is the maroon Rover 2000 with cast wheels. Together with the equally rare gold Hillman Imp with cast wheels, it was produced for a Car Transporter Gift Set 41/48 which also featured the more common grey Ford Cortina Estate, Morris Mini Minor and Mini-Coopers all with cast wheels. Incidentally, a blue Cortina with cast wheels is also a desirable model.

Here is the Hillman Imp, which I had omitted from the article when first published.

There are, of course, many more models I could write about in a similar vein. I may return to this topic in another post. If you have any particularly interesting and rare late variations do let me know.

Artificial lack of intelligence

Have you noticed the spread of flowery language across sites like Ebay? Take this example:

This Corgi Jenson's Blue Morris Mini Minor Scale 1:43 diecast car is a must-have for collectors and fans of vintage vehicles. The car is beautifully crafted with intricate details and a stunning blue colour that is sure to catch the eye. The 1:43 scale makes it a perfect addition to any collection, and the code 3 ensures that it is a rare find.

The car is made by the well-known brand Corgi, and features the Morris vehicle make. It is a contemporary manufacture and falls under the category of toys and games, diecast and vehicles, and cars, trucks and vans. Add this unique and charming diecast car to your collection today.

As well as the model being artificial, which, to his or her credit, the seller does acknowledge may be a possibility, although it would have been better if they'd said certainty rather than possibility, the whole impression given by the phrasing of this advertisement is bizarre.

On the one hand it is grammatically correct and seems quite uplifting. But it has that unworldly quality, as if spoken by one of the androids featured in the Humans TV series or the film Ex Machina. It's almost unnerving.

Not being able to spell Jensen's made me smile, though, which just goes to show that AI can't do much about human low intelligence!

I do hope that it is now clear that these Jensen's Minis are all just normal Minis with some transfers added by a dealer or, indeed, anyone, as they reproduction transfers are easy to get hold of now (and there even used to be sheets of originals doing the rounds). There is just one Jensen's special issue and that's the light blue Hillman Imp.

An odd little Imp with jewels

This odd little model arrived last week. I have had a couple of bronze Imps before with jewelled fog lamps but this one is different. This has the later 'Sunbeam' type of window unit but the earlier 'Hillman' base.

Quite a strange one, this, and difficult to figure out how it came about.

It is a factory bronze 251 issue and no-one has messed around with the base or repainted a blue 328.

To all intents and purposes, it is a 328 but in bronze and with a cream interior. I wonder if, perhaps, at the end of the production of the 328, when plans would be made to switch to the 340 to mark the later year's rally success, there were some castings with the two holes still to be painted and, rather than make 328s which may have been unwanted, someone decided to send them off for the bronze treatment with normal 251s. Maybe they would have headed off to Transporter Gift Sets or some lucky collector might have found one in a box at his toy shop.

It would have to have been made in the few months in early 1967 when the Sunbeam window units would have started to be available and production of the 251 was ending.

This particular example had been 'modified' by its last owner, unfortunately, and my efforts to ring it back to how it once would have been haven't been successful. I had removed some water transfers very easily but under them I found three white panels - one on each door and a circular one on the bonnet. I'd thought they were transfers but they were painted and bore hand-painted numerals - the bonnet number being different to the sides! The paint nearly came off but I damaged the base bronze colour beneath in a couple of places so, for now, I have covered the damage with some unwanted Citroën Monte Carlo transfers. (They use the wrong font). In due course I may change these for some more accurate Hillman Monte Carlo numbers if I can find something appropriate. 

These oddities are fascinating to find. It's a pity this one has had to have the decals but I don't imagine I am going to find another in a hurry! This one actually came from France. The other two that I had without decals were in quite bad condition with broken windows and suspension so this is, at least, intact and, yes, the suspension has survived!

Jensen's Minis: Myth. No Mystery.

Martin Uden seems to know what he is talking about and has some good background on this:

Jensen's was and still is a food company in Denmark* known for its cheap pâté, it had a very limited run promotional 251 Imp made and as is usual with Corgi promos was issued in a non-standard colour. Always hard to find and our Danish friends constantly remind us that they have NEVER seen a playworn Mini. The really big question is that how could a small Danish food company commission a myriad of Minis over all the years of their manufacture, all of them in factory standard colours and all versions from red smooth wheel Austins to late lilac louvre wheel Morris … it just [does] not make sense . . .

In the mid 80s a trader named David Highnam had an A4 exercise book full of original Corgi transfers and stickers, I bought a fair few and swapped a few with friends (they know who they are) and amongst them was some original Jensen decals … Highnam told me he had approximately 250 of them and this must be where they all started their journey. . .

*It seems that the company is actually based in Germany! Whether it has always been there, pretty close to the border, or has moved is unknown but the logo is still very similar and ir really does look like we have settled who Jensen's are now.

Jensen's Fine Foods GmbH
Hans-Redlefsen-Straße 1
24986 Satrup
Germany

I have written to them too :) It would be so good to have a reply that throws more light on the promotion but that is probably expecting too much as a member of staff 40 in 1964 will be 98 now. Oh dear. Let's hope a young lad or lass in the office remembers something or that the Germans kept good records. 

It is clear to me now that none of the Minis I have seen advertised to date have been genuine. None referred to the correct type of shop and I really do now have to doubt just how much that chap Mike Battsford really did know about the promotion as he had Jensen's down as a Dutch car company.

We are left with the business of the white 'J' label that some have on the end of box. I am not swayed by this either, mainly because it is quite different to anything else that Corgi added to distinguish models and I have yet to see any difference on a 251 Hillman Imp box which, surely would have had the same treatment. I have to say that, just as sellers embellished their descriptions with 'Jensen's' leaflets and cards, or just referred to the [wrong] company in the text, one or two may well have added a label to the end of a box for good measure.

The lack of 'play-worn' Jensen's Minis is actually a good point. None that have been advertised have been much short of mint or, at least, in good to very good condition with minimal wear and only the occasional touch-in here or there. In contrast, a good proportion of the Hillman Imps I have seen in photos have been worn. Especially as we see far more Minis than Imps on the market, one would really expect more to be in less than great condition. As Martin says, no-one has yet seen any - not even in Denmark. It does rather defy logic to think that only the nice examples have surfaced.

QDT rather dismissed this as "I haven't seen it so it doesn't exist". I think that's a bit unfair. A lot of us are saying we haven't seen something in a particular condition as one would have expected.

I don't know whether I will hear from anyone else on this matter. I would very much like to have something from some more ex-Corgi people and Jensen's themselves as this matter does need some sort of firm conclusion and it would be nice to know if I'm right about the 1964 date.

For me, this matter is 99% decided now. There are no Jensen's Minis other than those 'created' by various people over the years. If someone wants to pay a grand or more for a normal 225 or 226 model with what may or may not be an original Jensen's transfer on the doors then I cannot stop them but I do appeal to the auction houses and any seller who actually cares for their customers not to try and say they're genuine promotional issues. If I do see any I will do my best to have them more accurately described, at the very least. There'll be little anyone can do about the price they ask or that someone may bid.

One idea I have is to create a lot of these myself and flood the market with them at whatever they cost me to produce - about £50 or £100, maybe, with a good box. The trouble is that this may simply mean more appear at a higher price as unscrupulous people buy mine and then continue to try and sell them at huge prices to people who'll never have read this and all I achieve is to add to their stock and profits. So, OK, forget that idea. But if you can help me spread the news that these Minis are simply all fake then that'll be a good start.

I have revised my Corgi Catalogue pages now so that only the Hillman Imp in pale blue is recognised as a promotional variation for Jensen's.

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.

An Imp in The Old Cricket Mews

I think this Hillman Imp will be at home in somewhere called Old Cricket Mews in Southampton. This was a completely wrecked model but, as a bronze edition having the really scarce jewelled fog lights, it was too interesting to discard. I even repaired the suspension. All the windows were replaced.

I do have another, oddly enough, which is reasonable and will stay intact. No idea yet when or why these came along.

The last two components of a Transporter set arrive in Rugely

And another jewelled bronze Hillman Imp

Having never seen the bronze Hillman Imp with jewels before, I now find myself with two of them in a matter of weeks!

This one is rather better paint-wise and the screens are all intact apart from a small scratch on the windscreen. Its suspension, however, is as flat as a pancake, non-existent. Such a shame and I can't see a way to repair it without taking the car apart which I don't want to do. The base on the other one is quite loose, though, and I can't see anyone wanting it with no front suspension, broken windows and no opening rear window so that one I may decide to work on. If I can find some suitable bronze paint, and a tailgate that is. My only concern is that it could just as easily be regarded then as a more common #328 that someone has resprayed. Now, I do have a set of #328 Monte Carlo transfers. Hmm. Watch this space.

I hope the suspension is reasonable easy to fix. I've never looked inside one before but guess some plastic is broken.