MARX BRISTOL 188 TOY RESTORATION BY KEVIN D: PART 1

Hi MB,

Don't know if you'd be interested in this, but I thought I'd show you a toy restoration project as I did it [ Ed.]

I'm not actually that much of a collector of toys outside of Anderson related vehicles, but when I saw Scoop's post on the Bristol 188 toy by Marx, I thought there was a toy I'd really like! I'd never even heard of the aircraft before (and I'm interested in that sort of thing!).

Anyway, I did a quick ebay search and found one. It was battered beyond belief but I thought it might be fun to try to rescue it. Nobody else thought so, as I was the only bidder. (£10 but that seemed ok to me?). It arrived, looking as it did in the listing, most of the chrome gone, a gaping hole in an engine intake and no nose wheel. Incredibly, despite all of that, the drive worked!

So, onto restoration. I have some chrome sticky backed plastic, so decided to use that, cutting out panels and sticking them on. I have done the wings and engines so far and it seems to be working. The hole in the intake I repaired by cutting out new panels in clear acetate and painting them in clear red paint. The white part between them I cut from a piece of plastic that fell out of the toy!

The nose wheel I used was from a wrecked Dinky Harrier, I cut it down, drilled out the stump on the model and just push fitted it in. It is not accurate, but it is robust and allows the toy to steer.

Take care,

Kevin D