Quatermass History Video

Hi Woodsy

I just found this on You Tube, a 23-minute history of Quatermass. 

From the original TV serials by Nigel Kneale, to the later Hammer film versions, and the paperback books.

At the end of the video a View-Master package for The Quatermass Xperiment is shown, but I doubt this is real. I could not find any sales listings for such a set, and it seems like a very unusual subject for a View-Master reel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAijLPntwqU&t=32s

Do you like Quatermass?

Paul Adams from New Zealand

Doll, Card and Blister: My Home-Made Star Maiden's Final Look

 Armed with my baguette blister box I've finally finished my home-made Star Maiden Guard doll on card.

Here's she is complete with new glued-down blister cover.

This decent 12 inch blister does real justice to Wotan Bill's fab repro card art and my home-made doll and clothes.

Its been fun!

Hope you like the final article.

BLISTERING SUCCESS, SORT OF!

Blisters are tricksy things. Finding blisters for toys. Transparently obvious I know but a clear path to victory is eluding me!

I have had one success with a Star Maiden doll blister. Short of buying a brand new doll in a plastic box [which I did look for in discount shops] I first bought a box of Xmas baubles. This required printed labelling being removed with lighter fuel and a light scourer. Alas, methinks he scoured too much and it was compromised. Besides, it needed cutting and gluing to make it fit, never great for that perfect blister.

So, thinking out of the box, I searched for subway packaging - you know, the foot long butties - and found a company, Advanced Disposables, that did clear baguette butty boxes. 

The box cost 5p for a single sample and postage was £3.55. I received tracking info every day from Royal Mail until it arrived; the service was startlingly impeccable so the box makers must pay handsomely for that!

Here is the baguette box, a hinged affair from which the top is perfectly clear and can be cut off to create a fabulous 12 inch cover for a doll or figure. I was thrilled!

However, finding a decent blister for my 7 inch Victim project is another sandwich altogether. Currently she resides in a Sushi box, but being trimmed and glued, it just doesn't cut the mustard for a backing card as good as Wotan Bill produces.

Finding myself in Poundland I stumbled across blusher cheek brushes. Wow! The boxes looked just the thing! The right petit size and depth, in a fever of elation I bought three for £6. At last, the Victim will be finished and could well get some pals!

Alas, on closer inspection at home it turns out what I thought were paper labels inside are actually printed onto the plastic in a thick central band. Tarnation! Scouring and lighter fluid will get it off but ruin its pristine clear looks.

Back to the drawing board with this one to find that goldilocks box that's just right!

Toys: A Short Film by Roman Kroitor and Colin Low

 https://www.nfb.ca/film/toys/

This is an unusual and old film with a macabre spin on Action Man/ GI Joe toys from the National Film Board of Canada. Looking at the date, 1966, it was made when the toys were first out in the shops.

No doubt you'll decide for yourself what you make of this if you watch it.

I understand the debate about military toys generally and its one I have come across often having a grandson. 

All I can say is that personally my own Sixties and early Seventies childhood was completely filled with Action Man and I loved every minute of it. I reckon I turned out more or less OK too now I'm in my Sixties.

WINTER WARMERS

As winter approaches, I am drawn more to eBay, as traipsing round shops in the rain has little appeal. This month it has delivered in spades, with a great selection of vintage Hot Wheels.

Just arrived are a pair of later Sizzlers, ‘Flat Out’ above an ‘March Ford’ below are Formula 1 type cars, which like the blue ‘Indy Eagle’ shown later, have a narrower body and a different tubular battery to the more drum-shaped one in the earlier cars. As a result, I can’t test them out until I source a new battery.

Even so, after removing a greasy deposit that covered all the cars, from the decayed battery, they scrubbed up really well. The engines were all re-chromed with a silver marker and the plastic bodies polished up. Unlike Redlines, Sizzlers are almost all plastic, to save weight and help the tiny motor run faster.

An earlier win brought the ‘Indy Eagle’, a similar race car layout with large exposed engine.

This week, I was pleasantly surprised to get two vintage Redlines, the ‘Ford Vicky’ and ‘Ford Woody’ in one sale for a very low bid. Both had slightly bent axles and worn paintwork, but a swift spray of auto paint brought the two back to good order.

The Vicky was in slightly better shape than its sister, but benefitted from a coat of blue to hide the chips and scratches.

Originally Ultramarine Spectraflame, the Woody’s paint job had deteriorated badly, but a light coating of automotive lacquer, let the metallic finish shine through. 

My second ever Hot Wheels, back in the sixties was a green Silhouette, which these days is showing its age. Luckily eBay provided me with a lovely purple example, with good paint and just needing a new side pipe.

The ‘Repco Brabham’ has appeared here before, just needing a little lick of chrome on those fragile exhausts.

The ‘Indy Eagle’ Sizzler arrived with a more futuristic model, ‘Sideburn’. The Sideburn is one of the first wave and uses the standard drum battery, so may well be running on a track sometime soon.

Last of all, the trusty Deora, my first ever redlines, back in the day. This replacement model just needed a clean and a pair of handmade surfboards for a great finish.

CONSOLE YOURSELF

I'm always on the look-out for the console seen on the only drawing of the Project SWORD Moonbase Playset.

This isn't it but I like it anyway, the Mini Computer.

Have you a toy console?

and I may as well ask, have you got a Project SWORD Moon Base Play Set or have you ever seen one?

PULP ACTION: ACTION MAN AND GI JOE BOOK COVERS

IF you like to see Action Man/ GI joe used on vintage paperback covers like me then you'll like this site:

 https://sciencefictionruminations.com/2013/05/16/adventures-in-science-fiction-cover-art-plastic-toy-spacemen/

Hot to Trot: Plastic Horse Kits - Keeping Costs Down!

With plastic horse kits like the Aurora Black Fury blogged this week, I have noticed something while looking in to these - although Aurora, Revell, and Remco all produced a number of different horse kits, these came from just a few actual moulds.

Mould the horses in different colours, and include a few different accessories, and you have a 'different' kit.

Aurora did three horse kits - the first was issued on its own as Black Fury, and with three different riders and saddles, etc, as the Gold Knight on Horse, Apache Warrior on Horse, and Confederate Raider on Horse.

The Thoroughbred Race Horse seems to be the only Aurora kit that was not issued with a rider.

Then the last kit was issued on its own as the White Stallion, and with the Lone Ranger and Zorro kits. There was also the Forged Foil version, which was covered with sheets of metal foil.

Remco did the three Action Stallion kits, all of which were actually the same kit, but in different colours and with different accessories.

Now it looks like Revell did exactly the same thing. There were five horse kits in the 1960s, and four in the 1970s, some of which were re-issues of the earlier kits. But there were only two different horse models.

Two of the kits were tie-ins with TV shows - Blaze King from National Velvet, and Black Beauty (which is not even mentioned on Scalemates, or in the Thomas Graham book on Revell).

None of the Remco or Revell kits included riders. Scales also varied, but were around 1/8th (Aurora Black Fury), to 1/10th for the Revell models, and 1/12th. I have no idea what scale the Remco kits were.

Well, that was one way to keep costs down.

I wondered if readers had encountered the same thing with Action Man and Sindy toys horses?

Paul Adams from NZ