FORGET ORION, HERE'S ARTO'S BELT MADE OF SHELL MAN IN FLIGHT COINS!

Just wanted to send you a piccy of this preposterous invention that I learned of only today.

Remember those collectable Shell space coins from the Sixties? 

Well, there must have been some surplus stock left here in Finland, because there were enough coins for these Super Belts. "Suits All Outfits"!

A brill idea of some Finnish Gyro Gearloose, who wisely has left all information out of the header card.

No limit for innovative recycling here!

Here's the Finnish version of the Shell space coins' backing card, found online. Lentävä maailma means "The Flying World".

https://www.kerailyraha.fi/verkkokauppa/shop.php?sivu=tuote&tuoteid=33829

I believe they made a different backing card for every country, even though the coin set was the same.

100% unlicensed and off-the-grid!

The question remains: who took the trouble to punch two holes on every coin and then join each and every one of them with a metal wire?

Arto

Helsinki

PS. Woodsy adds: for the UK TV ad for these Man in Flight coins check out the top of the right side-bar.

CHROME SWEET CHROME

I saw this Star Wars Razor's Crest toy online and immediately thought of that similar chromed craft the Helijet from Terrahawks!

Which do you prefer?

ARTHUR'S PROMETHEUS AND THE OX WING

I was blown away by this cover art for Arthur C. Clarke's Prelude to Space from the 1950's. 

Just look at that ship! Its basically a set of super wings!

Don't know the artist but that huge jet-tipped hyper wing totally reminds me of the wings of our fave Century 21 space plane, the Zero-X!

Check it out! 

Below is Imai's plastic wing from their vintage OX Mars Explorer set. 

Its a dead-ringer! What do you think?

Clarke's amazing lunar plane is called Prometheus and predates the Apollo programme by over a decade. 

Prometheus is made up of two sections, Beta and Alpha, and flies to the moon and back in a certain way involving separation.

The novel, Clarke's first, written in 1947 and published 1951, concerns Dirk, a journalist for Interplanetary , who is sent to England and Australia because ...

 'The world's first lunar spacecraft is about to launch. The ship, Prometheus, is built from two separate components -- one designed to travel from Earth's atmosphere to the Moon and back, and the other to carry the first component through Earth's atmosphere and into orbit.'

Wiki describes the Prometheus' separation manoeuvre thus:

 'Beta is a nuclear-powered flying wing which carries Alpha into orbit .... Alpha separates from Beta' 

[above is an extract from a fuller description here]

This could almost be a description of the Zero-X uncoupling from its wing units in space, which we can clearly see in the movie Thunderbirds Are Go 

[courtesy of You Tube]!

Later editions of the book gave Prometheus a chromed finish 

but I still prefer the early cover art with the mega wing!

What about you?

MJ'S SPIDEY COMPETITION CAPER

 

Here's my new custom action figure short Woodsy, a Mego Spidey. Its totally original, apart from the dash of paint on his face and hands.

Enjoy!

The story of how I came to have him could be straight out of the book from that Plaid Stallions fella. The Spiderman film (that was actually a TV series) was on at the cinema and my local paper had a competition to win some Spidey merch.

 I entered not expecting to win. Then 2 weeks later I get a letter saying I had, my prizes were to be presented to me by Spiderman himself (a bloke in a costume!).

 Unfortunately I couldn't go, so although I had won and received my prize through the post, the Newspaper still did a piece with a random kid receiving the prize.  The photo was with the kid and some laughable costume on a member of staff from the Paper!

MJ

Southcoast Base

UK

THE STUPENDOUS SATURN V ILLUSTRATION

I love this illustration by an unnamed artist from inside Popular Mechanics July 1967. 

You could even get a copy of it as a colour print! I wonder if anyone did? Do you like it?

To see the full article on the Saturn V check it out in here:

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=x9MDAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=saturn+v+model+popular+mechanics&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiMqIjypt78AhUzQ0EAHV-cA5QQ6AF6BAgHEAI#v=onepage&q&f=false

SUB HUMAN

 Years back I blogged this image of the cover of the January 1964 edition of Popular Mechanics. 

I suggested the one-man sub shown looked like the SpaceX P3 Helicopter - a bit!

I've dived a little deeper into the baby sub and discovered that the cover painting was by none other than Bob McCall. I also found this image of the subs workings, which is rather neat.

Turns out the old submersible was German and very few exist. One of them was bought by Achim in Germany and is documented in his You Tube video:

I Bought a Submarine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMnuFA0FiMM

There appears to be a black and white photo of it on this old grainy Alamy preview too https://c8.alamy.com/comp/E0WJ2P/mar-03-1963-new-one-man-submarine-on-first-great-tripon-exhibition-E0WJ2P.jpg

For the full low-down on the sub back in 1964 then read the whole article in Popular Mechanics courtesy of the amazing Google Books facility [p.134] - be careful of all the adverts, they're a real distraction!

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=GywDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA142&dq=popular+science+january+1964&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjvoq31nd78AhUWS8AKHbyaDDUQ6AF6BAgIEAI#v=onepage&q&f=false

Have you got a submarine?

TERRANOVA47'S KEATON COMPETITION BATMOBILE

Hello Woodsy

At the weekend I went through some old job samples. I failed to find what I was looking for but found this.

A press release photo from 1989 for the then upcoming Batman movie with Michael Keaton.

I had this print to include the image on a competition entry form for The New York Daily News, winning entries won two tickets to the movie. 

It was not wanted by the person who supplied it so it ended up mixed in with some of my work samples unremembered to me.

So here it is for Moonbase Central readers to enjoy umpteen years later. I think it looks pretty good the way it's lit, nicely showing off the bat wing fins. Like it?

Terranova47

USA

MJ ON TISWAS WITH ROGER DALTREY AND KENNEY JONES IN 1981!

MJ from Southcoast Base has supplied me with this hilarious clip, in which he appeared in the UK TV show Tiswas in March 1981!

MJ says "So here it is, look at the comments from me on this for the full story!"

Long-time reader and contributor MJ is the tall lad with glasses stood at the back for a second just as this clip starts!

Was anyone else on the telly?