MY NEW RED TRAILER

 A few shots of my new car boot red trailer. It's a neat fit for the JR21 Land Rover. I couldn't easily find my JR21 Thunderbird 2 so my Dinky stood in.

Not sure what's in the container? Any ideas?

Your garden toy photo's welcomed!

GREEN AND RED: THE JR21 LAND ROVER

 Looking into the legs of the JR21 Thunderbird 2 I couldn't help noticing the Land Rovers too [referred to as a Jeep as well].

The Land Rover was issued with the JR21 version of TB2 and not the initial British HPM TB2, which had a mole.

Its 2.75 inches long.

The colours I can find online are:

Green

[not sure if this is a real JR21 Land Rover?]

and Red

Back in 2012 over very own Scoop pictured both his green and red Land Rovers, together with the HPM mole.

Over at the Big Red Toy Box you can get three different coloured repro windscreens ...

and as is made clear there, the grey windscreen is for another TB2 Land rover, the Spanish version by MOLTO.

The Molto Land Rover is also 2.75 inches long like the JR21 original.

I also spotted this 'white' MOLTO Land Rover, but I think it may just be a trick of the light and its actually a grey one.

Are there any other Thunderbird 2 Land Rovers out there?

JR21 THUNDERBIRD 2: ITS STORY HAS LEGS!

I've been researching the legs of JR21 Thunderbird 2's of late, you know, the retractable part metal/ part plastic rods with those cute button feet.

As far as I can tell there are two colours, red and white. 

Having read up on the subject in various places, it would appear that the red ones were released with the HPM version of the toy - thats Herts Plastic Moulders i.e the initial and UK version [the one later partly filled with sweets 'cos they couldn't source the friction drives!]

HPM then lost the contract to a Hong Kong factory and the resultant JR21 logo'd [2 versions of logo positioning] Thunderbird 2 had white legs.

Is this your understanding readers?

Which one have you got?

BILL EV's FAB1's and CENTURY 21 THUNDERBIRDS TOYS

Here are a number of my Century 21 vehicles and real ones in rough scale, as per Chris Thompson's fabulous comparative scale illustration.

Here are some super close-up shots of the Konami FAB1 together with the IMAI kit version. The coin is a UK 5p piece.

SWEET TWO

Further to the sweet filled flying saucers, here’s my JR21 Rosenthal TB2. The sweet filled one. 

Actual sweets long gone! 

Will O.

UK

Did you have one of these?

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Woodsy adds:

Way back in 2009 I blogged about this amazing JR21 variant of the TB2, when reader, contributor and Thunderbirds collector Steve sent me pics and info of his own example, the first I'd ever seen. Click the label below for more, Steve's Sweet TB2. Its something of a blog legend now, not often mentioned these days. Nice to see Will's all these years later.

The Japanese were great ones for filling cool toys with candy and chocolate. Again, we've enjoyed some over the years on MC such as an SPV and most of the Thunderbirds fleet filled with sweets. 

How cool would it be to get something like this this Easter!

LIKE PEAS IN A ...

I'm always on the look-out for ersatz toy parts including the Landrover from the JR21 Thunderbird 2 pod.

Here's a possible green pod contender in this vintage bagged Soldier set I saw on an old online sale.

THUNDERBIRD BRICKS

I've been messing with Junior's lego this Easter whilst he stays away.

Here's a Thunderbird 2 take-off with lego plume!

I tried the opposite with the lego pouring out of the pod too!

What can you do with lego?

THUNDERBIRD 2: PROJECT BODGE

Recently I had an incomplete JR21 Thunderbird 2 very kindly donated as a fixer-upper during our isolation.

I've never really 'restored' an actual toy like this and knowing how skilled you have to be to do a decent job its a daunting prospect!

I'm more used to making creations from scratch after a stint at SpaceX II last year, so fiddling with a real vintage toy is quite a challenge for me!

My initial thought was to take the easy way out and find real spare parts on Ebay but I couldn't find any and I imagine they'd be too dear anyway.

So, opting for the harder route and scratch-making what's missing, I've set to and jumped in with both feet! No doubt they'll get covered in glue!

I'll keep you posted if I dare!

JR 21 TOYS CARTON

Not sure if I've blogged this before. Its in my Ebay auction photo's archive from last year.

Its an old JR21 Thunderbird 2 cardboard carton.

2 dozen Thunderbird 2's went in here. That's 24 fabulous boxed toys.

One of them may have been yours!

I wonder what the written numbers and letters mean?

Its interesting that JR 21 Toys is also abbreviated as JRT.

I've never seen that before.

Have you any JR21 or Century 21 Toys cartons, crates, paperwork or shop displays?

THUNDERBIRD 2 BOXCAR ORIGINS BY ARTO

Dear Woodsy,

 I came across this page in Ideal Toy Catalog of 1958 (from the http://www.usdimestore.com/ website).

Look at that boxcar - is it not a dead ringer of our dear TB2? 

The overall shape which with minor adjustments would turn into that chubby fella, the opening front which reminds me of an opened TB pod with ramp and all, but especially the similarity of textures both on the chequered body and on the striped tail fin.
The most important thing from the likeness list: it's all in the eyes! The line of four squinty windscreens zeroing on the potential threat and ready for rescue!

The Ideal plane was released as Globemaster Flying Boxcar

https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/ideal-globemaster-flying-boxcar-499048475

Looking at the toy itself, the resemblance is not as striking as in the catalog photo because of different materials and of the colour scheme. Perhaps Derek Meddings leafed through the Ideal '58 toy catalog and that stuck with him!

This might already be common knowledge among anderson aficionados, but wanted to share nevertheless as the similarity is (at least to my eye) so striking.

Cheers

Arto

____________________________________________

Woodsy's Footnote:

Arto has struck a chord here.

Looking at the 'pod' vehicles in the Globemaster a little closer I was amazed to see the Jeep and the Radar truck!

The amazing Toy Soldier HQ website showcases them all:

The Jeep could easily double up as the Land Rover in the JR21 Thunderbird 2 release [or the Spanish Molto version].

You can see what I mean in this comparison. 

Ideal Globemaster and descending green Jeep photographed by our own Ed Berg.

JR21 Thunderbird 2 and descending green Land Rover photographed by our very own Scoop.

can spacex toys fit into a JR21 thunderbird 2 pod?

If SpaceX- Golden Astronaut toys were Thunderbird 2 pod vehicles which would be the ideal Thunderbird 2 toy for their size?

The die cast Dinky Thunderbird 2 would be too small except for the tiniest of SpaceX missiles and accessory craft I assume.

What about the plastic JR21 or the later Matchbox/ Vivid Thunderbird 2's?

Anyone got SpaceX and a TB2? send us some snaps!

What are your thoughts readers?

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Postscript

As usual I completely forget what's on the blog. Paul V kindly pointed out that we have pics of this very subject on MC already! Paul provided the pics as well! So, from two years ago here we have SpaceX pod vehicles! Thanks Paul.

Hi Woodsy, 

light had gone pretty much by the time I could get round to these, but not too bad. The TBs are 90's Matchbox of course, but the size of the large one goes well with Spacex!

Best,

Paul V

April 2015

JR21 TOY LANDROVER MYSTERY

A while ago I found a JR21 Landrover in a junk shop. Its incomplete but does the job.

I couldn't help noticing the similarity it seems to have to the yellow one in this neat Fairylite road construction set listed by Vectis  some time ago. Is it the same?

I've no idea how big the Fairylite vehicle is. Has anyone got one?

TRACY ISLAND BEACHCOMBER

I had to chuckle when I saw this beach piccy online. I was looking up the meaning of flotsam and jetsam and came to it. I wanted to describe my flea market finds this month as such,  flotsam or jetsam, which included a JR21 Thunderbird 2 Land Rover. 

Lo and behold, in the picture to the left is what at first glance looked like a Thunderbird 2 pod! ha ha! On closer inspection its just a plastic canister. Drat! [but is it flotsam or jetsam? hmmmm]

HALF TERM JETSAM

Some of the booty netted this half term holiday at boot sales and on the net. All interesting in one way or another. The old Dutch Prins Valiant comic is opened at the start of a Zero X strip.

Bill built a Thunderbird 7/ Project SWORD Beetle by Imai, which had been lying around for ages. It looks neat on an empty LP Moon Explorer box he kindly donated. Like many Imai models this one has a battery-operated remote control for forward and reverse motion.

Blue dog is just about to stretch and yawn its all so exciting!

The opened Thunderbird 7/ Beetle reveals a pull-back spring missile firing chute. One of the missiles is a small copy of the Project SWORD Booster Rocket. The model's labels have yet to go on.

Mint Imperials! Some more bagged LP cake toppers

A lovely Major Matt Mason cake decoration in its original shop bag...

..... which when turned over reveals a super cool SWORD Apollo Saturn cake decoration, based on the Sears version [more on this to come]. This is the icing on the cake!

A US flag cake decoration

A JR21 Land Rover sans windscreen

On the base it simply says Made in Hong Kong [do you have a different colour to this red readers?]

A Kidco Turbo Firebird from 1980 - the key is missing [how did they work?]

and two pirate action figures which remain a mystery if anyone can help me identify them?