MOONBASE CENTRAL

Wednesday, 15 September 2021

DID YOU KNOW THE BLOG IS 13 YEARS OLD TODAY?

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

My New Cricket - The Long Distance Rover! A Birthday Arrival

Way back (or so it seems) in early August, Woodsy spotted an auction on Ebay US for a Spacex Cricket copy, advertised as a 'Hamilton Invaders Vehicle' or some such. Its the one pictured above.

As I am a huge fan of the Cricket design and all its many variations - all of which appear to stem from the Remco Hamilton Invaders Mosquito Jeep below - Woodsy gave me the heads-up.

The Spacex version is the original toy that I came across, as a child with a later variation appearing in the Spacex II line in the form of the Apollo Tracker. Later, with the advent of the internet and ebay, other versions appeared, as army missile launchers and more military style jeep models.

https://projectswordtoys.blogspot.com/2015/05/cricket-team-spacex-cricket-clones-and.html

As this particular model was a new one to me, I looked into trying to acquire it, but as it was US only, it proved difficult. So I asked Terranova, a good friend and blog contributor, to see if he might expedite matters for me.

He very generously did, bidding on the item and winning it for me with no opposition and receiving it by post at his home address, before re-posting to me in England. This however, is where the fun begins!

The item was listed as being in Wisconsin in the United States and Terranova is resident in New York, some 900+ miles away. So the little car travelled across the mid West and arrived in New York in short order. Terranova then parcelled it up and re-posted to UK, on the assumption that it would be leaving from the main dispatch point of New York.

USPS clearly decided that this was an outer space vehicle, used to traversing long distances, so sent it to Cincinnati. Then it spent a few days visiting various departments, before taking off for Chicago! For a few more days it was passed around various facilities there, before someone decided to pass it on - back to New York!

A diligent USPS operative must have noticed the address label and passed it on again to - Chicago again. Once more a day or so passed and it went off to New York again! By this time it was early September and I began to despair that the little toy was going to be lost in the mess of sorting offices, but then I got another tracking email to say it had arrived in Texas!

Just as I was about to write it off as lost, the Houston office must have finally noticed the UK address and very shortly it arrived in London.

I had a couple of days quiet panic as it fell into the Customs Office black hole and I feared the worst, but at the beginning of this week it finally appeared, unscathed!

As you can see from the shots above, it is very similar to the Triang Spacex version, with some minor differences. The silver grille on the bonnet has less striations and the dome is smaller and cast in blue plastic.

The cannon is non-functional and cast in two parts and is glued in place. There are no makers marks apart from the obligatory 'Made in Hong Kong' on the base. It was missing the two from chrome hubcaps when it arrived, so I popped in a couple of Spacex originals.

A few similar models in different colours have surfaced recently and you can read more about the Crickets chequered history over at Paul Vreede's excellent Spacex site here.

Its been a long journey for the little toy and I am very pleased with it and I would just like to extend my gratitude again to Terranova, without who's help I would not have been able to add this little gem to my collection!