KEV'S LEGO

In answer to the question about Lego, here are some things I've made,

1. Space 1999 commlock.
2. The heroes of 'Star Cops'.
3. The starship Hooded Swan.

What a brick!

Kevin

NEW TO THE BLOG: SWORD CAPE KENNEDY SET BOXES IN HONG KONG TOY FACTORY ON FILM

Hong Kong toy factory workers using flattened Project SWORD Cape Kennedy Set boxes as production line table covers! What do you make of it?

https://www.britishpathe.com/video/VLVA38SVVZCW74P7YBE5RXEE4OHWF-HONG-KONG-MAKING-CHRISTMAS-TOYS-FOR-1971/query/hong+kong+toys

THUNDERBIRDS FILMING BEHIND THE SCENES

I like this old footage taken during the filming of Thunderbirds. Courtesy of You Tube.

What do you think?

LN BRAND PLASTIC CARS

I saw these old plastic cars online and then noticed the maker's mark. Its our pal LN, who also released Paul's Mechanical Fish and Arto's Combat Car, Space Radar Car and Amphibious Missile Carrier.

Can you find any more LN toys?

PAUL'S PEZ

I dug out my book on Pez. 

It is Warman's Companion: Pez, by Shawn Peterson, Krause Publications, 2007, however there are a number of other books on Pez as well. They originated in Austria in 1927, initially only in peppermint. 

The odd name is from the first, middle, and last letters of pfefferminz, German for peppermint. It was only after WW2, in an attempt to crack the American market, that other flavours were added. 

Heads were also added to the plastic dispenser. A base was added to the body in the late 1980s, my book says 'around 1987'. Some characters have been produced in several versions over the years, and in different colours. 

Many of the heads depict cartoon, comic, or superhero characters.

The Creature From the Black Lagoon is also known as Fishman, and there are other named or generic monsters: vampire, werewolf, Frankenstein's Monster; and superheroes such as Batman, Captain America, Green Hornet, Incredible Hulk, Wonder Woman, and even Zorro.

Astronaut, Asterix, sports balls and equipment with various team logos, Disney, Cars, Christmas, Halloween, Mr Bean, Muppets, Popeye, Robot, Smurfs, Star Wars, and many others since this book was published. 

Plenty to keep collectors busy!

Paul A
NZ

Do you collect Pez?

A LOOK AT DINKY JOE'S CAR AND SAM'S CAR

Here's a few old photos I took of my original Joe 90 Dinky Jet Air Car including the original bubble display, and the three different coloured Sam Loover's Cars  I own - The burgundy red one I've had since I was a kid. I managed to retain the original box, display plinth and the lapel badge over the years. The powder blue and silver versions I picked up a few years ago.  I'm told there's also other less common colours out there, a gold one and different shade of red.

I think the Dinky Joe's Car looks a lot better on the road than flying. (The much later released Vivid version looks better flying than on the road in my opinion)

HEADER FULL OF LIFTED SHIPS

Here's an obscure toy and one for the Project SWORD completist like me!

The Pop-Rocket Missile Airplane.

The header uses art lifted from other toy boxes.

Project SWORD Probe Force 2

Hover Space Bird courtesy of Arto

Nomura Solar X

Not sure about the yellow airliner but I imagine its lifted from a toy box too. Any ideas?

Model Citizen by Paul Vreede

These Lego cars were sold as being in the H0 scale of 1/87. Compared to other makes, Wiking for example, they tend to be a tad larger. But they were still very useful for a model train layout; something which Lego also suggested in an early ideas book which featured an earlier town plan with an H0 model railway running round it, over bridges and past buildings made out of Lego (See http://brickfetish.com/ideas/dk/byggebog_1955_26.html - there are minute links at the bottom of the pages to see the rest of that book; the entire site is very much recommended).

The train track is overdoing it a bit to my taste, so I'm contenting myself with just having some contemporary buildings, based on various sources.

The front cover of the town plan shows some buildings that I've also built. Incidentally, the boy playing with the Esso truck is a young Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen, the grandson of Lego Founder Ole Kirk Christiansen and the man who was CEO and Chairman of the company until 2004 (his last name starts with a K due to a clerical error when he was born apparently).

The back of the townplan shows other buildings, some of which were available as sets at the time. I've built a few of those to go with my townplan as well. The iconic Esso service station I initially built from loose parts, but then I found a glued-together display model at a swapmeet, made from all the correct parts including the special plates trimmed in red.

 When this town plan period started, Lego was made from cellulose acetate. Which has a lovely slightly translucent shine to it, as opposed to the dense colours of the ABS plastic that came in from 1963. But it has less clutch power (as Lego calls it) which when young we countered by clamping a sheet of paper between the bricks and tearing off the excess (a trick I've used again f ex in the aerial on the fire station roof).

Its other disadvantage is that it can (and most often does) warp over time, making larger bricks completely useless. The white flatbed trailers made from cellulose acetate are very likely to be twisted into weird shapes, and most Mercedes convertibles and moving trucks go somewhat banana-shaped as well. 

The Bedford trucks (and passenger cars) were issued in ABS plastic before the Bedfords were replaced with Mercedes trucks. But for sheer period nostalgia, the bright shine of cellulose acetate is hard to beat.