Case Overload

 Whilst collecting spy attache cases this Spring I gathered a few photos of various sets in a small archive.

This is it.

Do you have any of these?

Open and Shut Case: a Near Mint Redbox Special Agent 707 Set

 After buying a well-used Redbox agent 707 set last week, I treated myself to this much less used and superbly boxed example I stumbled across online.

A real bargain on Etsy, this set is virtually complete and almost near mint.

The photographic box is fabulous! It also incorporates a camera-wielding-agent painted illustration that seems to hark back to much earlier sets to me.

The CE import address sticker is for Redbox in Swinton.

The actual Red Box home address is in California!

You can see how shiny the case is compared to my previous purchase.

Some of the gold print has come away. 

The contents are just brilliant.

 The gun and it's accessories are a more authentic black and it contains both large and small toy bullets.

One larger bullet was missing in the opened packet but amazingly I had a spare courtesy of Bill!

Interestingly this version ran with a Gold Tip cigarette box pistol too. The other case I have houses a less controversial radio gun.

It also comes with two smart pistol dart missiles reminiscent of Marx's spy sets.

The little box of smaller bullets is hard to find separately, although Bill did give me a loose box-full about 25 years ago! Sadly sold on since, my other case is still waiting for its own ammo.

The 707 passport contains the toy's original lucky owner's details and his agent CV! It dates the set to 1990. I thought it was older.

Assembled with shoulder stock, silencer and scope, the agent's black pistol looks stupendous I think!

It looks better than the orange version in my opinion.

So, there you have it. An open and shut Redbox case. Hope you like it.

Have you an attache case readers?

Special Agent 707's New Case Opened

Just before Easter I treated myself to two Redbox toy special agent attache cases, a classic design that goes back decades: Agent 707 may ring bells with you readers?

One I've bought is an older boxed version and the other unboxed set a newer release like the one I bought at the Ridings Index store in the early 1990's, sadly since sold on.

This later unboxed release arrived this week and I've been busy cleaning it up and replacing the odd missing part, as always great fun messing with special agent stuff. 

This set from eBay was more compete than I thought: all two badges and the key present.

I cleaned everything up, glued down ripped pockets and blacked out any scratches on the case.

Luckily I had a similarly coloured plastic pipe of a suitable size to make a decent ersatz of the missing silencer. 

The black shoulder stock came without a grip fastener, so a couple of bits and some glue later, I whittled a fair enough replacement, that does the job.

All that's missing now are the small brown bullets for the little secret radio pistol (amazingly I found another one of these tiny guns at the local boot sale yesterday!)

All in all it's a great example of this later Redbox set, with it's orange weapons. I'm unsure if the black stock is the right colour - should it be orange? - but it looks good and harks back to earlier Redbox sets.

For the time being, this case, 707, is now closed!

REDBOX SPACE ACTON ASTRONAUT

I saw this online and it brought back memories of my own Redbox astronaut and deep sea diver in their characteristic triangular carton.

We've featured many of these over the years and they always make me think of Christmas, getting one on Christmas morning back in the mid to late Sixties.

Did you have one?

Did you have any other Action Man type figures?

LIGHTING UP CHRISTMAS: THE 707 REDBOX LIGHTER

 

I so remember these Redbox 707 mini-pistols and the plastic bullet-firing cigarette lighter they came in. Completely steeped in spy mania it came straight out of James Bond's toy box.

These two plastic pistols featured on online sale so have safety stoppers pushed in.

Here's a neat little see-through case of the Redbox plastic ammo.

Did you get something like this one Christmas readers?

BIRTHDAY SPECIAL! PAUL WATSON'S REDBOX ASTRONAUT - COMPLETED!

Hi Woodsy 

A few new photographs of my final iteration of the Redbox astronaut. Some of this set was purchased for me in 1970 when my parents couldn't find the official Action man suit.

It was played with to virtual destruction and then 45 years later I went looking for the other bits to make it up again.!

A couple of people have insisted that it had a large KO space sled with it BUT I only remember the near copy of the Action Man astronaut set.

Hope they're of some use to those chronicling the range.

ATB

Paul Watson

Return to Base

The Cold War may have been a trying time for adults in the U.S, but for space crazy kids, it was a boom time. A little inconvenience like the threat of carpet bombing by enemy aircraft or ICBM's dropping out of a dawn sky was not going to stop toy manufacturers making a fast buck before a nuclear holocaust affected consumer spending. As a result, companies like Remco, Topper and Deluxe Reading produced some amazingly complex and involved toys, themed on the idea of countering an enemy missile strike. Needless to say, these expensive toys were slavishly copied by the small Hong Kong manufacturers to be snapped up by an eager audience.

A fine example of this plagiarism is the Delamare Rocket Launching set, blatantly ripped off from Remco's Voice Control Rocket Base. The Delamare set uses elements from the Apollo Moon Exploring range, such as the conical rocket, which unusually, has been produced in bronze, with two upper sections to extend the body and give it a more missile like shape. The anti aircraft missile bank on the left, has been fitted with two non-firing launchers taken from the LP Moon Bus (themselves copied from Lone Star Modern Army series years earlier). The lifting arm between them is also featured on one of the Moon Vehicles sold in abundance too: https://projectswordtoys.blogspot.com/2010/01/strange-tractor.html

The whole set is neatly finished off with some grey astronauts helpfully glued onto the superstructure, a miniscule green Helicopter fixed to the pad, a small army truck and a flight of three chrome silver F111A swing wing fighters, hideously out of scale, glued to the back of the box. My example came in a battered box, with a Xmas Greetings sticker still attached. Its plain that the toy had never been removed from its pack, the base was securely wired in and everything was in place. Its amusing to see the note on the front reads - THIS IS A TOY - just in case the buyer was tempted to try and defend his personal airspace.

Next on the copyists list comes another Missile Array from Redbox Toys. Originally made by Topper Toys for the Cape Canaveral set, this little battery also appears as part of the Apollo Moon Exploring series, by Imperial, but exchanging the rocket launchers for Radar Dishes.: 

http://www.triangspacextoys.info/SpGAderv/APEX/ApEx304F.html

I originally had this, the Atlas Gantry and a Rocket Transporter in the seventies, each coming separately window boxed with a handful of white figures. The semi circular Atlas Gantry actually fires the missile and the three carried by the transporter could be used with it. Unlike the big Topper base, the transporter only came with a single missile design, although Multiple Toymakers did 'borrow' one of the other types for a slightly larger 'Titan' missile in a rack toy.

http://projectswordtoys.blogspot.com/2014/08/failure-to-launch.html

Deluxe Reading probably produced the great grandaddy of all rocket bases with the elaborate Operation X-500, which took all the elements from previous releases, beefed them up somewhat and added extra features like lights and moveable controls. It fairly bristles with rockets and gadgets and even has a train to deliver the interchangeable nosecones to the gantry, to be lifted by crane onto the rocket! Its complexity probably worked in its favour, as to my knowledge, the Hong Kong companies never managed to reproduce a small version of it, although they did come close!

Finally this fine Cape Kennedy rack toy, with powerful spring launched rocket and ejectable satellite!

The gantry helpfully rolls back from the rocket and a large well-detailed radar dish tracks the ascent.

Card artwork is especially fine, with clear renditions of Mercury Redstone type rocket and instructions for use on the inner pack.

Safety conscious, the rocket was tethered to the launcher by string, the upper stage springing out to push the circular satellite into space as the rocket is stopped in its rapid ascent by the string. Quite a powerful ascent it is too, untethered the rocket can easily reach a good twenty feet.