Corgi Kits

 

I was fortunate to find four #602 Corgi Kits last week. All are complete and probably had never been opened, with instructions, a membership form and unopened bag of pieces inside the original boxes. Whilst the contents are the same in each case, each box has some faults but nevertheless I would be happy to have any of them in my own collection and I'll keep whichever one remains.

The one above has creasing at one end.

This second one is the best and nearest to what we'd describe as 'excellent' with just very slight creasing at the bottom left.

The third box has one edge on which the glue has dried and a small piece of clear tape has been applied. There are creases on the two long sides and one crushed corner, with some marks on one side, maybe where a pen line has been rubbed off. 

The fourth box has one edge on which the glue has dried (but no repairs attempted) and there is a small crease where one corner has been slightly crushed.

Original instruction sheets can be hard to find now as they tend to get lost and I think I may make some copies. The paper may be hard to match but I will have a go and they may be useful to someone one day.

I can resist the temptation to keep one and make up the telephone boxes because I already have two excellent examples as part of my Garage Set. That reminds me - ever since I received the lovely layout mats for the Silverstone and Garage Sets I have not managed to find time to recreate the Garage Set display with all the pieces that I do have. Now that my wife is away in Ukraine and, even if she wanted to, couldn't get back very soon, it could be a good opportunity to do so without it being in anybody's way. So that will keep me occupied for a week or two - including finding the correct cars and building a couple of the garages - Model Club issues, of course, which are a perfectly acceptable substitute in my opinion.

Writing this has also highlighted the fact that I have not listed the Corgi Kits in the Catalogue at all! That's very remiss of me. I know that it took me a long time to get them all, and I never did get built examples of the Timekeeper's Building or complete Pit Buildings. However, I did have nice examples of complete sets in original boxes and should be able to find the pictures. Adding a section to the Catalogue should be easy enough as there were not any variations to worry about, or, at least, none that I am aware of and I can't imagine much that could have changed anyway.

The kits are great and original complete examples are expensive. You'll find my prices in the shop or just get in touch.

These AA and RAC Telephone Box sets that I have for sale are not cheap but the proceeds will go towards the money I am trying to save up for the any Silverstone Set buildings which I need to find again now I have the layout mat to display them on. Sets do appear occasionally but made-up buildings seem very scarce and, of course, not every owner was careful with the construction. It is a bit of a dilemma as I would probably prefer to make one myself and have my artist wife add any paint or decoration required. That does mean, however, spoiling a valuable original set, which bothers me. Now, if the Model Club were to reproduce all the Kits then that would be a marvellous thing! When you think about it, they have tended to want to reproduce the less common model variations on the basis that people would be happy to have a copy for £30 or so when the real thing maybe several hundred. (Let us let lie the matter of their seldom actually getting the specification right for these variations.) Reproducing Corgi Kits follows the same logic but with the bonus that the parts would be dead simple to make, being mere cheap plastic and they only need to pay some children in China or Bangladesh to put the pieces in a plastic bag, not build, paint and decorate as they have to do with model vehicles. They did the Batley Leofric Garage brilliantly. I wonder how sales went?

These mats incidentally, were produced for me by a chap called Wolfgang who regularly contributes quite authoritatively on various Corgi online groups. They're heavy duty plastic rather than fabric but have the advantage of laying flat and without any creases. Having said that they have been rolled up for a few years so I may have to encourage them to lay flat again. If he happens to read this perhaps he could let me know whether he can still get these made and I will provide a link for anyone who might like one. I should have an email address somewhere and will get in touch with him, if he doesn't respond to this, once it comes to light.

Now I appear to have given myself quite a few tasks. More news on how I get on to follow. What we really need are illustrations of the completed models and the layouts which I'll try and dig out or prepare.

Corgi Kit 601 re-issue: the Batley "Leofric" Garage

 

The Corgi Model Club garages arrived a few days ago. This is the first Corgi Kit from the Club and, whereas I am not too bothered about their cars nowadays, I do like the idea of being able to complete my Garage Set, the Batley Leofric garages being the only items missing from that wonderful Gift Set. It would be particularly wonderful if the kits required for the Silverstone set also become available one day. These are so difficult to find these days, and always so expensive. The good Silverstone kits that I have had I have not wanted to open to make up the model and you will definitely not find a single nice made-up one that has survived intact in a hurry either! So, whereas we can buy most of the re-issued cars as originals in pretty decent condition for not much more than the Club price (notable exceptions understood), these kits are another matter altogether. So well done, Model Club folk!

So let's see what we've got.

It's all really nice and just like the original in almost all respects. The box is the only disappointment, being as shiny as anything and this is all the more noticeable due to its dimensions. I am quite sure a word with the printer would lead to a more matt finish and all would be well with the world in that respect, at least.

The individual pieces are all nicely finished, no sanding or removal from sprues here. I even appeared to have three of the very tiny 'bolts', two being required in the mechanism for the door which could easily get lost. I use the past tense because now I look for it, it is nowhere to be seen! I suspect I have knocked it down the back of the immovable unit upon which I made and photographed the construction illustrated.

The Assembly Instructions are a very close copy to the original, with just references to the Club in place of Corgi Toys. Nicely done. I was concerned that, in this present age of control by one or another government department, who appear to assume that few have any common sense and even those few may have some allergy or tendency to get injured, over-anxious or just generally upset from involvement the product, we might have had DO NOT EAT THE PARTS or BEWARE GLUE IS ADHESIVE or DO NOT PUT HEAD IN BAG included in the text to comply with some EU regulation that, despite not being in the EU any more, we still need to be told. 

I smile at the instruction to 'Recycle' the box. I am so glad that we were not so encouraged with the originals, the packaging often now being worth as much as the content, notably significantly more in some cases. The 1965 Monte Carlo Set springs to mind, with the cardboard regularly making a cool £1500 or more at auctions than the models inside. I shudder to think, in fact, how much the outer cardboard for the Garage and Silverstone Gift Sets would be worth, as they make several thousand pounds as complete sets and the contents, whilst not as easy to find as the three rally cars, would still total only hundreds not thousands. But that's another story . . . maybe an nice idea for one or two Christmas Club re-issues? (Just not shiny, please!)

As you will have seen at the start of all this, I have successfully completed one of the three I need to make. It is quite fun, but the door mechanism is tricky and you may need the assistance of a child with small fingers or some tweezers. My glue does not set quickly and I should really have followed the instruction to take my time. Trying to attach the very last two pieces, gable covers or whatever they're called, the whole affair objected to being squeezed in a particular direction and I was very nearly back to square 1½. I can see a small gap  which I need to address but otherwise I was quite pleased at my progress and doubt you'll struggle unduly.

At just a few pounds too, you can always get another if things do go badly wrong! That simply is not the case if you were trying to make an original!

Expensive glasses

 

You may remember that I have this promotional completed US sample of the lovely Motel Chalet. It was missing the Motel sign and also had just one glass on the table.

I have always felt that there should be a bottle and two glasses on the table but you can appreciate just how fiendishly difficult it could be to find such minute items now. The Motel sign is a little bigger but still may look just like any old piece of white plastic. So the only way I could complete this kit was to buy another that was complete but, of course, these don't come along very often and, even if they do, they can have parts missing.

So I have just paid an absolute fortune to be able to describe my sample as 'complete' at last. But there is a bonus - the kit I've acquired has two bottles and four glasses!! That means I can add a bottle and glass to my sample and still feel happy selling the kit with sufficient components to display as I would expect it to. (I suppose that, if all the kits have two bottles and four glasses then this one will, technically, not be complete but I think it'll have sufficient to satisfy whoever decides to display it).

Looking at the illustration on the box I can only see one bottle and maybe only one glass but, with two chairs, two glasses seems right. We don't get a plate in the kit, either.

Looking at the illustration in the Corgi Toys Catalogue of 1965 (or 1966) the Jaguar's number plate reads COR 64. On the 611 Kit box I have it is COR 62!

This is a lovely kit and, whilst it doesn't have the original plastic bag containing all the pieces, I have counted everything and they're all there, as well as the instruction sheet and transfers.

It's all contained in an immaculate box.

Another difference is that none of the illustrations, or my made-up sample have the Motel sign attached, although there are places for this to be affixed.

I have often remarked that it's the little things that make collecting Corgi Toys so fascinating and enjoyable. In all respects, here's another example, indeed!

As I think I reported a while ago, someone in Japan did buy the sample last year but one piece of the very delicate railing at the top and the parasol pole were damaged en route and I took it back. My brilliant artist wife repaired these pieces and I cannot see where she has done so which means I have put that up for sale again and if it goes then I may be seriously tempted to make this set up for my own satisfaction. She can paint it very professionally in the correct colours and I'll be more than happy to keep it for displays. Maybe someone will like the box so I can get some return on all the expense.

Chalet repairs

 

This delightful 'Motel' is one that Corgi built for sales personnel to show to dealers to promote sales of the #611 Kit. (I understand that they also created all the other kits too for the same reason.) I was very fortunate to acquire this very same item, as you will see from my photo below of the box I have. 

It was sold by Vectis in their Ron Slyder Collection way back in 2007 and made £240 then, or more like £300 by the time fees and delivery would have been added.

Over time the Motel sign and a tiny bottle have gone missing, and maybe a second glass. (I need to check on that). Otherwise, however, it is complete and looks stunning.

In the illustrations of the model on the box there is a yellow Jaguar 2.4 so I have added one of mine here.

This was purchased a few days ago by a Japanese collector but, on its way to Heathrow to the agent who would transfer it on, it became damaged. Rough handling caused two of the railings at the top to come adrift and the drainpipe at one end to come off.

The was also a loose edge to one wall but the most awkward damage was to the parasol with the pole breaking. I could not see how it could be possible to re-join that very fine pole. The parasol itself comes off freely but still this would be the most delicate of repairs to undertake and beyond my ability.

This work was not beyond the amazing powers of Olga Savina-Hill, however, a remarkable artist in her own right and capable of quite extraordinarily detailed work that would normally require the patience of several saints. She kindly helped me with this task and today delivered the chalet looking like new. She even got the stairs working so that when you lift a panel on the roof the stairs drop down, which I had not attempted to test before.

I have, of course, refunded the man from Japan and will now re-list this. Maybe he will buy it again (at a big discount after all the trouble) or maybe it will stay available for a while. I am happy to keep this as it is a very attractive item to display. I don't really need this particular special one, though, and would be quite happy with another that someone has put together. They are really not easy to find, though, and I would be very surprised if I ever find the bottles and glasses - these are minute little pieces of clear plastic which will so easily get lost forever.

There are complete kits for sale from time to time and I had one for sale a year or so ago. Again, there aren't many, however, and, in any event, I do not want to open a pristine kit and attempt to make one myself. I might consider stealing the bottle and glass(es), though.

On the subject of kits, I would very much like to get all the items needed for the Silverstone Set. For that I need everything but for the Garage Set I have everything except the Batley garages. I have nice mats for both too. I also have the two phone boxes, beautifully painted by Olga too. If I do ever manage to get the items needed in ready made-up form then I can't imagine that I would ever sell them. These are things that any money I do make from the business will go towards and I look forward to being able to display them again another day.

So, if anyone out there has some buildings they don't want or even some little bottles or glasses, do get in touch. If they are inexpensive because they need repair then so much the better as I know someone who can do that!

Corgi Kits from Batley to Chalet

I have been looking at the kits that were available, mostly between 1961 and 1969. As well as being components of the two big Gift Sets that every collector would love to acquire but which few will ever even see, the Silverstone Racing Layout and the Garage Layout, they were sold individually.

The plastic pieces required painting and gluing together so if we do find any that have been made up now the appearance of the product is very much down to the skills of the youngster who made it. Buildings ought to be OK but I'm not so sure about the telephone boxes. The later public and police boxes came with characters that needed to be painted and they would be quite difficult to get right for most of us. I can see very few of these kits for sale in made-up form in my early searches. I guess that those listing them on Ebay, for instance, will not necessarily know they are Corgi or even kits so perhaps by using those two search terms I wouldn't get a great many anyway now I think about it.

I would like to get hold of examples of all of them now but suspect this could take a while. I can find most of the unmade kits in nice original boxes but I wouldn't want to spoil those - and, anyway, they're extremely expensive!

My spreadsheet lists now include the kits 601 to 611. I think that's all of them. Here they are for quick reference:

601	Batley Leofric Garage
602	AA and RAC Telephone boxes
603	Silverstone Pits
604	Silverstone Press Box
605	Silverstone Club Hose and Timekeeper's Box
606	Lamp Standards
607	Chipperfields Circus Elephant Cage and elephant kit
608	Fuel Station Building
609	Fuel Forecourt Accessories
610	Public Telephone and Police telephone boxes
611	Motel Chalet

Below I include illustrations from the 1961 and 1965 catalogue pages. As and when I can find some decent complete models then I will add those too but I fear that could be some time. Of course, if anyone happens to find some reasonable models, or even part-completed items, that they can let me have at a modest price so that I can feature these things better, do get in touch.

Memories (now better illustrated!)

Someone asked me this afternoon why and when I started what has become this Corgi Toys business. I say what has become because what I'm doing now is not what I had originally planned. I took her back to the mid-1960s and my first Corgis. That meant I had to try and recall just what my first model had been. As my father worked for an agricultural machinery depot, the first items may have been the Massey Ferguson tractor and trailer Gift Set 7. I know now that it must have been the early one as there was no Farmer George on the seat. I also had Gift Set 2 but, as that had a deep green Series II Land Rover it would most likely have been Christmas 1962 so that wasn't the first.

I did have a 216 Austin A40 but I only bought that at a later stage because I wanted to paint it red as my father's was an A40 Countryman version, red all over. (There were no 216Ms available at that time or I'm sure I would have spent the extra 3d and just painted the roof!)

I am pretty certain that my first car will have been the Jaguar E Type. It was the plum red version which, coincidentally, I have been looking for for some time now. Back then everyone had the plum red version and I didn't even know the pretty metallic dark grey existed. That, as it happens, was also one of the very first models I acquired when I did start this business. Now all that is see for sale are the metallic dark grey versions. Odd, but probably just one of those things. Mine had the matching plastic removable roof and both survived intact and more or less unmarked for more than 50 years.

Second would have been a gold and white Triumph Herald with its little removable black air filter on the engine accessed by folding forward the whole of the upper front body section.

I know that the Bentley Continental was available but it was expensive at 7/7d. (That strange looking price construction means 7 shillings and 7 pence. In 1961 there were 20 shillings in a pound and 12 pence in a shilling. 7 and 7 pence as we would have said then is about 38p in today's decimal currency.) I did get a two tone green model but suspect that came as a present in 1962. What I did get next was the Mercedes 220SE. I had a black one and think I still have it too. The paintwork did suffer a bit but that wonderful steering meant that it was played with a great deal.

Apart from the Austin A40, which I don't really count as I didn't play with that, the only model I had with fixed wheels was the Austin Seven. I remember how much better it was to play with the Morris Mini Minor which I bought later. I also didn't have any models without suspension and was completely unaware of the early models and certainly knew little of their Mechanical cousins.

By 1963 I was in the first form at school and getting enough pocket money from odd jobs and saving dinner money to buy almost every new car that came out. I say car because I had little interest then in the commercial vehicles. My father bought me a Bedford Machinery Carrier, to which I applied an Agricastrol transfer, and I also had a Carrimore Car Transporter but that was pretty much the extent of my trucks or vans. Just one exception - an Austin Mini Van, which I found great fun to play with as you could put a finger or two through the rear doors and kind of drive it and push the back out round corners!

Just as these memories flood back now, so they had done in 2013 sometime when, having retired from lecturing and helping to introduce technology in education, Corgi Toys were one of the first things that came to mind when I thought about starting a new business. My plan was then to buy wrecks and restore them. I bought all sorts of equipment which I thought would be useful but it wasn't long before I realised that collectors were not very interested in restored models. They much preferred an original, even if it was not in great condition. I had hoped to get £20 or more for decent restorations but you could buy played-with but still decent originals of the more common editions for that amount.

So the restoration plan was binned and I carried on the other part of the plan which was to build a nice web site that could be a useful and genuinely comprehensive catalogue too. That took shape in 2014 and I bought lots of models with money inherited when my mother died. Once I'd taken some photographs and studied the models I began to sell them so that I could have funds for the next ones required. It just carried on from there.

I never expected it to be much of a business. I hoped people would enjoy reading my news from time to time and I tended to write about whatever came in as and when it occurred to me. It still tends to be that way although the Corgi Toys @ 60 series I started in 2016 has provided some structure. The rest is rather random as anyone who is still reading this will have appreciated!

I have since had a look at Ebay and there are models I've had for sale there for over 5 years! Clearly I am either asking too much or the photos are bad or the descriptions are poor. Maybe all three. Now there's a job for the next few weeks - to try and revive interest in these. I get a number of models listed free but, as my total number of items is well in excess of that, these listings have effectively been costing me a few pence every month and 60 times x pence means I've probably spent more listing them than some are worth! Expect to see some 'special offers' soon!

For those who may also have played with Corgi Toys in the 1960s, my layout was a piece of hardboard that my father had cut to fit nicely over the metal frame of a single bed in the spare room at the first house I lived in. I had made roads using thin strips of masking tape with additional edges from various pieces of Floral Garden and Bayko. Bayko provided a few nice buildings and garages that cars could actually be driven into. The Floral Garden stuff was quite delightful too. I would love to get some again but prices are even higher now than Corgis!

The one Corgi building that I had was a BP Filling Station. Well, it was the shop part and some sort of panelled bit at the side. No pumps but I may have had a BP sign. As I recall I could choose between BP and Shell logos (although the box image I've found just refers to Shell. Were there two?) I still have this tucked away somewhere. I should get it out and use it for some of the photos in future if it is respectable still. I have been looking to buy some kits but they are mostly very expensive. In fact, I'd be happy with a made-up kit rather than the unopened bag of pieces.

Looking to add pictures, I couldn't find any of the Filling Station building, which I had. I shall have to dig out my own - and seemingly take good care of it!

So that was a pleasant trip down memory lane.