Rob's 1968 Imai Thunderbird 1

I Was going through some old print photographs, and found an actual snapshot of my IMAI Thunderbird 1 model taken in 1968!

Unpainted, in all its original out-of-box glory!

I had forgotten that in addition to the big wheels on the bottom (the side away from the camera), there were spring-loaded swing wings, and the red nosecone also launched with spring action! 

Second photo is of the AHM/IMAI box top, which I managed to save all these years.

Rob C

CT

USA

ROB'S SPECIAL IMAI THUNDERBIRD 2 BUILD

Woodsy,

Here at long last is my attempt to build the iconic Thunderbird 2, based on the 1/350 scale Imai model kit called “TB-2 Special.” Originally from the late 1960s I think, I managed to snag one of the 1995 reissue US imports by Imex on eBay about ten years ago.

This is one of those kits that took me twice as long as usual to assemble and paint, and looks half as good as my usual! This “Special” Thunderbird fought me all the way. I swear, some models do not want to be born! Speaking of swearing, I won’t even mention some of the horrible things I called this kit.

No weathering or panel line washes or any of that, just an out-of-the-box “New Toy” version.

Two of the telescopic legs broke during final assembly, and are wobbly as you can see. As a final insult, I neglected to carefully prefit the pod before painting, so it does not fit into the main fuselage! Thus, no “flying” pics...

Cool Excavator for Pod 6, though!

Rob C

USA

POD CAST: KEV'S THUNDERBIRD 2 MODEL POD FLEET

I've now painted the annoyingly small and fiddly pod vehicles that come with the Thunderbird 2 launch bay kit. They look, hopefully a little less like Kinder egg toys now.

The ones that I think are probably the Imai ones, which aren't terribly accurate, I've made a little display area for, like the garage area we see in one episode.

The 4 that seem to be new are far more accurate. Since you get several, I'm going to put some in the pods when I've made them. The others I've put in a little box frame for display.

Podding off now,

Kevin

UK

KEV'S AIP THUNDERBIRD 2 LAUNCH BAY BUILD

Hi,

Just finished the AIP kit of the Thunderbird 2 launch bay. It needed a lot of scratchbuilt parts adding to it, but I think it came out OK.

Flatten my palm trees,

Kevin D

UK

KEV'S POD FLEET

I'm currently building the new kit of the Thunderbird 2 launch bay, which is quite a big job. It comes with a huge collection of pod vehicles. 

 I've put them together but have yet to paint and detail them. Just looking at them like this though, I thought that if Kinder eggs had included pod vehicles, this is what you would've got!

As an aside, doesn't this fire vehicle look a lot like the, as yet unseen, SpacexII crash tender?

Back to it,

Kevin D

UK

VINTAGE IMAI THUNDERBIRDS MODEL TV ADS IN JAPAN

This is majorly cool. Vintage TV ads for Imai's Thunderbirds models including Mole, Excavator and  Zero-X!

Courtesy of You Tube.

What do you think?

 

Can You Still Dig It ?

Prompted by the sight of the unmade Excavator kit on the blog recently, I have dug out some shots of the various Excavator toys available. Above is the Imai Excavator kit, that Rob C has. This came in motorised and static versions, this is my take on the static model, with some customisation. 

Again, an Imai model from the Recovery Vehicle triple pack, this version is about 4" long and much more basic. Again, customised by myself.

The original Ron Turner art, which was used as the inspiration for the model, which never appeared anywhere else.

Smaller Imai Excavator emerges from the large modern Tb2 pod.

Models from Andrew Cooks collection, Bandai Ledy Motorised toy, Imai Kit and Billy Blastoff knock off Lunar Scout toy.

Andrew's Excavator model.

Bandai carded X-Car

 Two mock ups of Spacex and Moon Traffic Excavators, by myself.