Extra update #1: Our 2015 Club Vehicle is now available!

Extra Update #2: Our Calendar has been updated to include the next K-mart Collector Day!

Extra Update #3: We now have a second video! You’ll find if you just keep reading, so…

…On to the photos!

August 2015

Merry Belated Christmas Giftery!

…Is what I offered to Rob. If you’ll recall from our 2007 Gallery, Rob has a sweeeet Ranchero. I picked up this book last December at Dollar Tree, strictly based on the name, as a gift for Rob. From that time forward, Rob has managed to successfully avoid Suncoast Diecasters meetings. His streak fell flat this month, and I begifted him. I advised him that it was a “title only” purchase, and knew nothing of its content. He promised to get back to me on that after he reads it.

Big Tractor Mike bought all my Star Trek toys! Now I don’t have any! (Except for the action figures, and playsets, and model kits, and Hallmark starship ornaments. But still, I mean, you know….)

Speaking of books: I got all the use I could out of this’n, so I put in on the table and tagged it “make offer”. Ken made an offer, I accepted it, and now the book is Ken’s. And now I miss it terribly.

Ken also acquired this awesomely retro collector’s case. Thought it’s an off-brand itself, it boldly declares that it’s suitable for “Matchbox, Hot Wheels, Corgi and most mini-cars.” It wisely and thoughtfully lists Matchbox first, considering its example car art is probably totally unlicensed.

As mentioned in the caption above, Ken got these two airport vehicles. Thought their plastic design is rather simple, they’re still quite cool. They’re also classic Ken, in that they are an oddball no-name foreign brand.

As mentioned in the caption above, here is a close-up for you. Specifically, the motorcoach. True, its shallow detail lines, solid (rather than clear or even smoked clear) windows and astoundingly simplistic wheels would indicate a “cheap” model. Yet, airport vehicles are a popular sub-set for collectors, especially since they often are available only through off-brands.

The other one is this groovy stair-truck. Most likely completely incomprehensible to younger collectors, this model harkens back to the days when airports did not have extended ramps and gates with segmented umbilicals that attach directly airplane doors, a simpler time when passengers actually walked out of the airport, across the tarmac and up mobile steps to their airplane.

I mentioned the example art on Ken’s car case. The big red fellow leadin’ the pack is clearly Mod Rod by Matchbox. The yellow van could be Matchbox or Hot Wheels or Corgi or Playart or Yatming or Summer or any other brand. There’s not enough of the purple one to identify it. But the one that really intrigues me is the green “rocket sled”-type fellow in third place. It looks like something from Harley Earl’s Firebird series. If you have any info on this model (if indeed the illustration is based on an actual production toy), please post it in the Comments section at the bottom of the page.

Well, what have we here? The orange fellow in the upper left looks kinda Rodger Dodger-ish. Light blue guy at lower left might be the Ford Mk IV. Or, I could stop funnin’ ya and just tell you that they’re all Sizzlers. Yep, those wild, rechargeable self-running rods from the early ’70s. Oh, you don’t believe me?

Here, BTM knuckles down and charges up one them right before your eyes. As you can see on the label, “Sizzlers”. Told ya.

They’re all part of this awesome kit brought in by awesome Doug. This is the 2007 retro re-issue, and it the highlight of our August meeting. Doug set up a short loop (initially), and we basically had some demo runs. Later, he extended the loop, and we did some actual racing. It all was so entertaining that I even shot some video, and that’s available at the bottom of this update. For its coolness, its retro-ness, and its ability to keep middle-aged men entertained like small schoolchildren, I hyarby declare Doug’s Sizzlers set our Find of the Month!(*)

For this video, I decided it was time for something better, so I set up a Vimeo account for Suncoast Diecasters. Unlike our Christmas 2012 video, which is in uncompressed WMV format (and thus takes a while to load), Vimeo automatically compresses uploaded videos, so this one will load much more quickly. You may notice a difference in cars in the high-angle shot versus the “pit row” shot. That’s because they’re two separate runs. I edited them together to make the video more dramatic. Please enjoy:

(If the video doesn’t play properly, you can watch it in a separate window.)

See you at the September meeting!

~WM