bloggiversary dossier: billy blastoff and his miniature figure space chums Part 1

I love miniature space toys. Always did.

I was brought up on Billy Bastoff after all!

Here's a few I never had but would have loved to zoom around the room!

They'd make brilliant birthday prezzies!

First up I give you Space Operation Charly Duty by CoMa of Italy!

Its the latin knockoff cousin of Billy Blastoff! Some collectors think this is an ugly set but I would have one in my collection no probs! I think I would have loved it as a kid! What about you? I've seen those green translucent aliens in the bags before. You?

Ebay: Weboys10

Fore more discussion on this interesting set see Alphadrome's thread on Charly Duty.

For some reason the Charly photo box reminds me of this other unusual set I've seen online. Also from Italy its the Super K Veicolo Spaziale by Ceppi Ratti. They appear to be die-cast Transformer-style bots sat on spaceships. Anyone got any?

Big boys Remco made a little fella too called Adventure Boy, whom sadly I never had the chance to introduce to my Billy Blastoff 'cos I didn't know he existed!

Billy also spawned a Mexican Blastoff called Capitan Boy along with mini chum Robotin

Beyond Billy's boyish looks another small adventurous chap was called Jack -

 Action Jack by Star Toys, a sort of Action Man packed into 2 inches of jointed plastic!

 Issued in Crackerjack style boxes Action Jack is addictive to collect. I used to stock them in my dealer days and they were always popular on my vintage toy stall.

Pic: El Juguetionista

Jacks were popular worldwide and this beautiful Argentinian blog about the line proves my point http://eljuguetionista.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/action-jack-fines-70s-principios-80s.html.

The style peaked I would say with Matchbox Mobile Action Command which is a whole collecting area in itself as you can see for yourself here on the fabulous Germany-based website Mobile Action Command.

This is Mobile Action Command's marvellous logo.

Another design similar to Jack's but a little more knobbly-knee'd was Hestair's SRL Heroes Astronauts. They're related to Tiny Tuffy's too.

Here's the Hestair Toys Astronaut basic set including the rather neat Space Buggy. 

Mettoy gave us the Busybodies range and even threw in a spaceship and little green man among other aliens and astronauts. I sold a set like this to our very own Bill B years ago on Ebay! ha ha [wonder if he still has it?]

and then there's the even more unusual Nimbl Niks and Space Warriors by Miner Toys Industries

Never wanting to miss out on the action Jack had many other knockoffs too including Brazil's Action Star line by Donovan

But its an even more obscure line of Jack-a-likes that attracts me the most. I first came across them when our very own Bill B introduced them on the blog 7 years ago in his brilliant resume of small action figures, Its Raining Men.

The line is Spacelink by Capsela, the connectables specialists. A typical figure stands centre stage in Bill's identity parade below, the yellow one with the flares and space helmet.

Among the many complicated Spacelink boxed parts and vehicle sets I've seen online, its these simple carded rack toys I like the most.

Beautiful!

There is one more set I'd like to mention 'cos its sort of nostalgic for me as I got it when I first began collecting toys in the early 1990's.

Its the Star Adventure carded set made in China from 1996, a sort of little people style figure and some space vehicles on a blister pack. There were two different sets, one with an astronaut and one an alien. I got them at a discount shop in Wakefield. 

Alas, like most things I sold them back then and I don't have a picture and can't find one online. I still have them listed on my ancient sales list, which I had on my first Project SWORD website on Yahoo from back then. Amazingly I saved a copy of the list with its basic hyperlinks - here's a screengrab.....

 but I'm not sure how to put the actual file on the blog. Anyway, at least Star Adventure got a mention!

Hope you enjoyed this article folks!