The Die is Cast

It's Friday night, so I thought i'd just pop up a little vintage eye candy, from the catalogue collection my dad acquired over the years. The Dinky catalogues range from mid sixties, to mid 80's and cover the regular Gerry Anderson ranges, along with the oddball, like Parsley and Tiny and the rather unsettling Candy and Andy!

 

My favourites must be the fully painted artwork from the sixties landscape catalogues, which devoted a full page to each vehicle - such as the wonderful Fab 1!

 
   Its interesting to see how some of the less popular models dropped away, to be replaced with more up and coming series, like Star Trek and Space 1999 and eventually, the ill fated Investigator models, which were slipped in under a different name.

 

Permission to Land: The Fireflash

Aircraft enthusiast Ralph Morton recently commissioned a scale model of Fireflash from a professional modelmaker in the Phillippines, with a special BAOC livery, loosely based on the Air Terrainean brand.

The stunning wooden model recently arrived and looks like it has landed straight onto a runway in a re-imagined 1960's! Compare it to the earlier version pictured below.

After I ran the first article from Ralph, Terranova recognised the handiwork of the maker and realised that a model of Dan Dare's ship, The Anastasia' was completed by the same company!

Rockets Galore!

 Resident modeller Kev Davies restored a Rosenthal X60 Rocket Transporter recently, by fitting out the rocket with new engine nacelles and various other missing parts. The Dan Dare like transporter looked almost as good as new by the time he was finished.

 However, Kev was lucky enough to come across a new set of the accessories for the toy (which are always bagged separately inside the main box) and was able to complete the X60 to pristine condition. This left him with an original engine and the two he had scratchbuilt, so rather than discard them, he built an entirely new rocket around them!

 The X60B (sic) is almost the same size as the original, but entirely custom built apart from one silver nacelle!

 Carried to the pad by a vintage Dinky Antar Tank Transporter, the rocket fits neatly into the X series of toys made by Rosenthal in the sixties.

 See the X series toys here: http://projectswordtoys.blogspot.com/2009/10/to-be-or-not-to-be-jr21-by-ferryman.html

RED STAR IN ORBIT

Looking through my Smithsonian Air and Space book and the Soviet Space history books I got recently, I was reminded of the huge difference in technology between Russia and the United States. Whilst the first american satellite was the baseball like Vanguard, which struggled to leave the pad - the soviets were preparing Object D, a trabant sized orbiting laboratory close to three tons. As the Kremlin were keen to snatch a propoganda victory over the struggling US, the Chief Designer, Korolev was put under pressure to produce results. So Sputnik 1 was hastily assembled and shot into orbit to worldwide acclaim. Meanwhile Object D would eventually be launched successfully as Sputnik 3, shortly after.

 The odd cone-shaped body has always fascinated me, with its multitude of curved antennae, so I decided to make something loosely based on the design. Using a mustard bottle top, some paperclips and two of the ridiculously fiddly tools that Apple provide for fishing a sim out of an iPhone, I set to. A handful of model parts from the scrap box and voila!

In order to balance out the homespun space race, I whipped up a US Ranger analogue too, in homage to the lunar surface plotting series of satellites.

  

RANGER 4

SPUTNIK 3

JOHN KOENIG FIGURE FROM BIG CHIEF STUDIOS

BIG Chief Studios, designers and developers of limited edition figurines showcased the prototype of their 1:6 scale Commander John Koenig from Space:1999 at Fab Worlds of Anderson at the weekend, and I must admit it looks pretty impressive.

It comes with some nicely detailed accessories - A tiny stun gun and holster, as well as a Comlock.

The stand isn't the most flattering as you can see, but I understand that it isn't the final design.

I don't have a whole lot of info on it at this moment in time, but I'm told the figurine is still in development stage and is still subject to more tweaks, but I have to say the likeness to Martin Landau as the Commander is excellent.

The figure is also subject Licensor and Talent Estate approval. 

Assuming they get the go ahead I think BIG Chief have got a winner on their hands here

THUNDERBIRD 2 READY FOR TAKE OFF AT FAB WORLDS

There was a lot to see at this year’s Fab World of Anderson, which took place at Leicester’s National Space Centre. It was certainly true when it came to scale models
( which I’ll try to cover as many as I can over some forthcoming series of posts here), but one diorama did dominate the main display area – A working 40” Thunderbird 2 complete with hangar, runway and rising launch platform, that did everything apart from take - off and fly around the Space Centre. 

This ambitious undertaking was built by Ben ten Westenend, a brilliant scale modeller who hails from the Netherlands. He and his assistant Robert Zijderveld brought this and several other models for display, all the way by car.

The Thunderbird 2 model is actually 4” longer than the original studio prop which was apparently 36”.

The secret cliff door descends into the ground, revealing the hangar door. Once it’s open, the mighty Thunderbird moves forward as the palm tree fall to the side.It is fully lit, with cockpit, observation windows and flashing navigation lights.

Even the Cliff House is illuminated. All the gadgets are operated by a hand held remote control.

The removable pod has rollers and contains an electric motor which carries the model to and from the launch platform.

Once it’s in position, the launch platform rises and the engine exhaust extractor flips up. All this to the sound of the engines (I believe the original engine sound was from an Avro Vulcan)

It was used constantly throughout the Saturday, and sadly towards the end of the day the pod motor had a minor breakdown. Ben checked it and found a broken ‘o’ ring was the culprit, which meant Thunderbird 2 was grounded at the end of the runway for the rest of the day.

Thankfully, on the Sunday Ben managed to find and fit a spare, much to everyone’s relief.

The detail is truly remarkable. The hangar lighting looks exactly like what we see on screen.

Considering the logistics involved I don't know whether Ben and Robert will decide to display the whole set up in future, but I and everybody at the event was certainly pleased to see it.