#419 YATMING – CADILLAC SEVILLE (1026), TURBO TRANS AM (1030) and DODGE MONACO (1031) (Around 1970)

Here are three more die-cast models made by the Hongkongese company Yatming (or Yat Ming). They are three American models: a Cadillac, a Dodge and a Pontiac.

They’re in great condition, the Dodge Monaco (in the plate you can read “Dorge Monaco”) is a bit older than the other two, it is still one of the original “Made in Hong-Kong” models (as the ones presented in the first YatMing entry), but the other two are later reeditions, since both have a modified plate indicating “Made in Thailand”. The Cadillac Seville and the Pontiac Trans-Am were bought sometime in the late 80s, and I have kept them ever since. The Dodge is a newer acquisition, bought only a few months ago.

Again, I’ll date them around 1970, since they belong to the 1000-series and they’re rather low numbers (26, 30 and 31).

In my opinion they’re great models; first because some are models that were never manufactured by any other brand in 1:64 scale, second because they have full interiors, windows, and some extra details, like the rear lights in the Pontiac or the chromed front and back of the Dodge, and third because of the nice decorations, and the shiny effect of the paintwork.

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: CADILLAC SEVILLE (1026), TURBO TRANS AM (1030) and DODGE MONACO (1031)
• Scale: Approx. 1:64
• Year: Around 1970
• Company: Yatming/ Yat Ming (Hong Kong)
• Size: approx. 6 cm

#418 FIGURAS EN ACCIÓN (F.E.A.) Nr. 10

The new edition of Figuras En Acción is now out. This is a very special number, since it is our tenth issue. The new number has a bunch of articles on many different topics, most of them related to action figures. Since every article is very different from each other, we had serious problems when choosing our cover.

The opening article is devoted to Mego, but you will also find articles about Mr. Potato, Count Duckula, traditional tin or plastic robots or Madelman football players from Spain´82 world cup. My contribution this time is a short article about Real Ghostbusters, based partly on existing articles from this blog.

I also interviewed Adolfo Bernalte, writer of the book "Aviones de Juguete", which was reviewed HERE, and we have the second part of the article done by Fernando Seage on Masters of the Universe bootlegs.

Hope you enjoy this issue, remember to download it HERE, and share it with your Friends!

PS. Thanks Dani for the hint!

#417 PILEN – RENAULT 12-S (1972)

This toy car was designed in August 1972, and manufactured from that moment on. The real car was the familiar car by Renault from 1969 to around 1980, so it was a car you could usually see on the Spanish roads during the 70s. That’s probably why Pilen decided to make and release it as a toy.

Pilen always took much care in its reproductions, and this car is a toy. It has practicable doors, a decent interior and some chromed plastic details (bumpers, fuel compartment interior) and also metallic hubcaps that perfectly imitate those of the real model. To increase realism, rear lights were painted red, and the license plates were also decorated with a sticker “P-503” (reference number of the toy).

In the base it is marked Auto Pilen, which is the name of the die-cast model line by Pilen. You can find more information about Pilen in previous entries dealing with this brand.

Another version was available with the reference number 504 in chromed silver. It was usual for Pilen to release some models in some colour as reference X and in chromed silver as reference X+1. The Renault 12-S was no exception.

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: RENAULT 12-S (Ref. 503)
• Scale: 1:43
• Year: 1972
• Company: Pilen (Spain)
• Size: approx. 10 cm

#416 G.I. JOE – SCOOP, OJOS DE SERPIENTE (v3) and T.A.R.G.A.T. (1989)

We continue the previous entry with three more Spanish carded figures from G.I.Joe's 8th wave:

SCOOP
Includes: Helmet with Mouthpiece, Pistol, Backpack, Cable and Videocamera

This figure looks pretty boring nowadays, although it was one of the few I bought back in 1992. Don’t know why, this figure was the one I chose among all in the 8th wave. I guess the videocamera was quite cool, since in the early 90s everybody bought one for private use. My family didn’t have one, but I had Scoop. The character’s name is Leonard Michaels (according to the filecard), which is based in TV journalist and reporter Mike Leonard.

OJOS DE SERPIENTE - SNAKE EYES v3
Includes: Sword, Nunchuk (3 parts), Backpack, Machine Gun and a very long Pistol.

As a kid I always preferred to play rather than watch TV, so I rarely saw the TV cartoons. In my mind, Ninjas like Snake Eyes of Storm Shadow didn’t really fit the G.I.Joe or the Cobra teams, so I never had any version of those figures, which I found quite boring. This version was specially boring since it is completely black with some silver details. The blister card was bought many years ago in Madrid, not through the internet.

T.A.R.G.A.T.
Includes: Backpack, Face Shield, Cable, and 2 Pistols.

This is another figure I bought as a kid. For some reason, the previous wave had very few new Cobra members, so when this new wave came out, I got the most bad guys that I could. The flying backpack was definitely something remarkable, and also that nice figure with a blue head.

Something interesting about the blister card from T.A.R.G.A.T., is that the figure was exported to Portugal. To my knowledge, portuguese G.I.Joe figures came either from the United Kingdom or Spain, and there the sticker above (or a similar one) was applied. The importer and distributor of G.I.Joe in Portugal was "Importaçao e Exportaçao de Jogos e Brinquedos Lda." located in Rua Melo e Sousa, Bloco 2, Escritorio 212, Estoril Garden, in the city of Estoril.

FACTS and FIGURES:

• Name: SCOOP, SNAKE EYES v3 and T.A.R.G.A.T.
• Toy Line: G.I. Joe (Wave 8)
• Year: 1989
• Company: Hasbro (U.S.A.)
• Size of the figures: 9,5 cm (3 3/4'')

#415 G.I. JOE – ABISMO, COUNTDOWN and DOWNTOWN (1989)

In this entry and the next one, I’ll show some carded figures I have in my collection. I will start with figures from the Spanish series 4 (equivalent to the American figures from 1989 –wave 8–). It is important to mention, that these figures were released in Spain sometime during the spring/summer of 1992.
Some years ago, when I started collecting figures, I was crazy for G.I. Joe, that’s when I got most figures from this collection. I currently have most of them, and those which are still missing are very expensive and difficult to find, so now I search and buy them, but rather slowly. They must be complete and in a good condition.

Back then, I also bought some carded figures. At the time, they were already quite expensive, but that was nothing compared to the prices that carded figures have now… at least for Spanish carded figures, which are the ones that I mainly collect. I guess many collectors want to have the figure as it was sold, and they value the great artwork done for each individual card.

The first three figures will be presented in this entry, the next entry will show three more figures. Currently I only own these 6 carded figures from this wave, plus the Blizzard Tiger Force which was already shown in the entries dedicated to the European Tiger Force models (#253).


Wave 8 comprised the following "normal" figures (not belonging to any subgroup):

Alley Viper v1
Annihilator v1
Backblast v1
Countdown v1
Dee-Jay v1
Deep Six v2
Downtown v1
Frag Viper v1
Gnawgahyde v1
H.E.A.T. Viper v1
Night Viper v1
Recoil v1
Rock & Roll v2
Scoop v1
Snake  Eyes v3
Stalker v2
T.A.R.G.A.T. v1

In Spain, wave 8 also included a few figures from wave 7:

Budo
Charbroil
Dodger (in Spain, the Battle Force 2000 was part of the normal series)
Lightfoot
Muskrat
Shockwave
Spearhead and Max
Storm Shadow
Toxo viper
Voltar

Plus three european exclusive figures, which are now very hard to find:
Lowlight (similar to the Slaughter Marauders version, but different camo patters)
Mutt (in grey and dark blue outfit)
Spirit (in grey and red outfit)

The figures selected for this blog entry are:

ABISMO – DEEP SIX v2
Includes: Helmet, Backpack, Cable, Buoy and Rifle.
A nice figure if you enjoyed underwater battles. I always found a bit disgusting, that the helmet didn’t have a window through which we could see the face of the figure.

COUNTDOWN
Includes: Helmet, Backpack and Rifle.

This astronaut includes a special backpack which can be used as some kind of zip-line or to climb walls. The backpack is rather fragile, and is usually broken or missing some parts. It is made of four parts plus a hook and a weight attached by a string/thread.

DOWNTOWN
Includes: Helmet, Revolver, Mortar (3 pieces), Backpack and 6 mortar bombs.

This figure came with many accessories, which is always something very nice. The helmet has a very nice design and the mortar is a nice piece which adds a lot of playability.

FACTS and FIGURES:

• Name: ABISMO/DEEP SIX v2, COUNTDOWN and DOWNTOWN
• Toy Line: G.I. Joe (Wave 8)
• Year: 1989
• Company: Hasbro (U.S.A.)
• Size of the figures: 9,5 cm (3 3/4'')

#414 DTV JUNIOR / ASS – KENNST DU DIESE DICHTER? – BUCH UND SPIEL (Nr. 7701) (1981)

This book is not a book about toys, but it has its place in this blog anyway. I love books, I read many of them throughout the year, so I also sometimes take a look at old books at flea markets. That’s where I found this book. I saw the cards on the cover, and that caught my attention. I picked up the book, and I discovered something wonderful. The book is at the same time a quartet game, so you can learn by playing and by reading.

The deck of cards is “hidden” in the book. It consists of 32 cards (8 families), each of them representing one country. For example “Klassiker aus Russland” (Classics from Russia) are: Dostoyevsky, Pushkin, Gogol and Tolstoi, or the Classics from America are: Melville, Cooper, Poe and Twain. The back of the cards include a short biography. The cards are manufactured by ASS (Altenburger Spielkartefabrik).

The book is defined as a quiz book on the cover. The biggest part of it is biographies from the greatest writers and poets from Europe and the United States, one page for each writer, although instead of the name, you can only see his or her silhouette. This means, you have to study the bios on the cardbacks first, or try to guess who could be that person from the silhouette, so you can connect the poet with the facts.

The last pages are really a quiz with many questions which are very difficult to answer, I mean, you really need to study everything thoroughly if you want to get some answers correctly.

On the last page of the book, two games are proposed. The first game is the typical quartet game, but the second one is a quiz game: One person reads aloud the back of one card, and all players try to guess who the poet is. The first who guess it, keeps the card, and the person who got the most cards at the end of the game wins.

The price of the book in 1981 was 12,80 DM (6,55 EUR). Other titles in this collection were: "Kennst du diese Komponisten?" and "Kennst du diese Baustile?".

UPDATE (JAN/2017): I found some time ago two more boks of this series: Kennst du diese Opern? and Kennst du diese Maler? I proceed with the pictures.

Barock and Italienische Oper

Nationale Schulen and 20. Jahrhundert

Zwischen Tradition und Moderne and Operette

Grosse Oper / Musikdrama and Deutsche Oper

The card backs look like this

Gotik and Renaissance

Barock and Romantik

Impressionismus und Expressionismus

Moderne and Surrealismus

The card backs look like this

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: KENNST DU DIESE DICHTER? – QUIZBUCH AND QUARTETTSPIEL (Nr. 7701), KENNST DU DIESE MALER? – QUIZBUCH AND QUARTETTSPIEL (Nr. 7703) and KENNST DU DIESE OPER? – QUIZBUCH AND QUARTETTSPIEL (Nr. 7704),  
• Year: 1981
• Company: DTV Junior / Ass (Germany)