A LALD/Oppo Post: Finally got around to sorting my dinky car collection from when I was a kid...

"RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars" (rallydarkstrike) 08/27/2019 at 12:05 • Filed to: LALD

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...turns out some of the boxes I had are actually my brother’s cars, so of the 424 I’ve sorted so far, a lot of them are his. He still has at least a box worth in his room yet and I still have a box to finish, but it’s nice to have them properly stored in decent cases! I also have several shelves worth on display on my bedroom. :)

I ordered 8 cases and they were NOT cheap, unfortunately (a bit more than $100 CAD!), but they are worth it. I put small pieces of foam in with some cars to prevent them from flipping over on their backs / sides when I move the cases around, and from knocking into other cars and damaging each other if I put more than one in a slot and thought they might move too much. The cars are a mixture of Hot Wheels, Majorette, Matchbox, Yatming, some very sporadic Tomicas...all put in these 46-car cases. Each case has two extra long slots for larger dinkies as well, like limousines, or tractor-trailers (though most tractor trailers don’t seem to fit, so I picked up a different container for those from the Dollar Store:

...the Dollar Store container is pretty much the perfect height for one ‘layer’ of larger trucks or dinkies too tall to fit into the slots on the 46-car containers. I’ll have to pick up at least another one or two of those for the remainder of the trucks, the rest of the ‘oversize’ dinkies and also my dinky-sized planes...

I did purge a LOT of really cheap, crummy Chinese dinkies, dinkies that were quite broken, or ones that I really didn’t care for.

LONG STORY SHORT - Thought I’d share some of the more ‘Oppo’ ones I found as I went (I’ve been taking a picture of every one I put away so I have a visual record!)

Majorette VW Type 2 Police van! The rear trunk opens! :P

So ‘80's....Hot Wheels Zender Fact 4 Biturbo!

So....’90's! Hot Wheels Vector Avtech WX-3!

From Majorette...Jeep Wagoneer Ambulance anyone? The rear doors open on this one!

Hot Wheels Jeep Scrambler CJ-8!

From Majorette: If the Cadillac Allante wasn’t panned enough for being terrible....why not a convertible one in hot pink? :P

Dinky cars these days have a lot of detail, but sometimes the old ones are still surprising, like this Majorette Toyota Celica! Opening doors AND...

...the pop-up headlights flip up and down! :D

Majorette Pontiac Trans Sport Dustbuster! :D

Hot Wheels - blindingly vibrant Pontiac Firebird with orange paint and pink lightning! :D

GMC Motorhome by Hot Wheels!

Pardon the dust....first-gen Range Rover Fire Service vehicle from Majorette, with removable ladder!

Matchbox first-gen Mercury Sable wagon with opening trunk! :D

Last but not least, some class....Talbo Lago T150SS from Hot Wheels, complete with white walls! :P

Azrek > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 12:11

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That’s fantastic. I need to do this to my GIJoe Collection. My mom still trolls me by taking photos of small plastic guns she found and asking if I knew which guy it goes to? Of course I do...

Spaceball-Two > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 12:16

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That Wagoneer is awesome!

Wacko > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 12:31

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We also used to call them dinky cars

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > Spaceball-Two 08/27/2019 at 12:32

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It is! It came with a Majorette MajoKit Hospital building (I have all the building playsets and everything too!)

I never put the stickers on it though!

TheTurbochargedSquirrel > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 12:38

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This reminds me, I really need to get around to cataloging the thousands of diecasts my grandfather had collected that have been boxed up in my basement for years now. He had a shelf running around his entire basement lined with matchbox/hot wheels and then about 5  of those plastic 4 shelf storage racks packed full of them.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > TheTurbochargedSquirrel 08/27/2019 at 12:40

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Wow, that’s insane! I probably have maybe....800 or so? I have a lot of 1/18th die-casts as well.

seaanemone85 > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 12:42

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Came in expecting to see a collection of dinky brand cars...this is fine too, though.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > seaanemone85 08/27/2019 at 12:49

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Haha, sorry....at least here in my part of Canada, ‘dinky cars’ is the generic term for all die-casts of that size/style :P

...the same way people often call tissues over here ‘Kleenex’ even though that is only one brand of them, but the name has become synonymous with that item.

shop-teacher > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 13:02

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Man, you’ve got some really good stuff there!

R32rennsport > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 13:28

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Let’s see those 1/18s!

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > shop-teacher 08/27/2019 at 13:33

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There’s a lot more, haha! :D

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > R32rennsport 08/27/2019 at 13:36

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Crappy pics as I am headed out, but here are some of them...a lot of 50's American stuff but some German stuff thrown in!

facw > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 14:42

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I had (have?) this one:

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > facw 08/27/2019 at 14:50

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It’s a cheap chinese-y Lotus Elise I think...

R32rennsport > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 15:02

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Nice! That red Baja Beetle in the last picture was the first Hot Wheels I got as a kid back in the 80's and I still have it!

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > R32rennsport 08/27/2019 at 15:09

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Awesome! :D

It was prior to my time, but we got a lot of our cars at yard sales as a kid, so I imagine I got it from there! :)

R32rennsport > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 15:28

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Here’s a bit of my hoard, no duplicates. I don’t currently have a picture of my case of 1/18 collection but it’s around 50 cars, mostly Le Mans, DTM and 50's/60's sports cars.

fintail > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 15:30

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Looks like you cherished these and played with them carefully, well done.

ITA97, now with more Jag @ opposite-lock.com > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 15:34

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I had (still have in my parent’s closet) that Pontiac Dustbuster in both red and white.

IDM3 > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 17:05

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I like what you got there! but you ned a few more. Like maybe 10,000 more?

What are your plans for your purges?

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > IDM3 08/27/2019 at 18:43

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Well, the purges are just cheap Dollar Store-type chinese ones, so I’ll probably either put them aside as yard sale items or keep them to use in the classroom for the kids on rainy days when I next get a Term teaching position and am in a specific classroom for awhile.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > ITA97, now with more Jag @ opposite-lock.com 08/27/2019 at 18:44

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Awesome! I think it’s the only one I have....I DO have a Hot Wheels Chevy Lumina taxi version somewhere...the Majorette one is more detailed though!

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > fintail 08/27/2019 at 18:50

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I very much did - we were taught to take care of our things growing up. I do have a LOT that are quite beat up, but we often bought dinkies we liked at Yard Sales when my parents and us went out and about on weekends for some fun....they were beat up because the previous owners treated them more poorly than we did. :)

My brother and I (twins) had a huge dinky car CITY (no word of a lie) spread across the floor in a giant unfinished, unused room in the basement of our large house growing up. There were 9 Majorette MajoKit buildings (4 garages, a hospital, a fire station, a restaurant, a car wash, and a set that you could build your own sidewalks, etc), a Matchbox ‘Days of Thunder race track’, a Matchbox harbour port, a Hot Wheels Contruction Site, 2 Matchbox Truck Stops, two Road Champs Garage/Truckstops, 2 airports, an HO-scale electric train railway that ran around the room, a ‘National Park’ we made out of model railroading stuff on a piece of cardboard, a ‘Housing Development’ with milk carton houses (we were quite mature as kids, LOL), a highway of bristol board that ran the length of room that had exits for each important location, 2 Hot Wheels garages, a Hot Wheels Blimp Port, 2 farms, 2 farm equipment dealerships, 2 military bases, 1 junkyard .....yeah....it was insane....and all filled with hundreds of dinkies from many, many brands (mostly Hot Wheels, Majorette, Matchbox, Yatming, Road Champs)....VERY fond memories, and a huge part of why cars are so important to me now. :)

...wish I knew where the photo album with pictures of it was...

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > R32rennsport 08/27/2019 at 18:52

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I have a lot of duplicates because apparently one of the 3 boxes I started on for this endeavor (I am out of the double sided cases and will need to order more to finish the other three boxes) was actually my brother’s cars....sortof annoyed as now his and mine are mixed together in those cases and as we’re 33 now, it’s hard to remember who owned what, lol...

Love how you have those organized though....I REALLY love those double-sided cases!

fintail > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 22:17

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I treated my cars well too, but eventually some would be worn or have some kind of flaw, and then I would speed up the process, as every car layout needs a junkyard. My little brother would also destroy a car here and there, sometimes to my great ire (I still remember when he crushed my Majorette Saab 900, a casting I loved for some reason). I had a car city at times too, where I would build Lego buildings. Y ours was a lot more elaborate than mine.

Were you in Quebec? It sounds like you had a lot of Majorette exposure, more than I recall seeing in BC or WA back in the day - the cars were common, but I have no memory of MajoKit being sold out west.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > fintail 08/27/2019 at 22:22

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Nope, always been in Nova Scotia, but Majorette was sold here! I never destroyed any cars deliberately, nor did my brother. If they got damaged (other than the yard sale cars that were bought used), it was from us accidentally knocking them together and nicking paint, or accidentally dropping them, etc. :)

Also, this Majorette Saab 900? :)

Mine’s pretty beat up...got it at a yard sale somewhere, but I always loved it....opening doors! :)

fintail > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 22:32

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We had Majos, but just vehicles, no accessories.  I don’t recall them in BC either.  From what I recall, WA had a better selection of Tomica, BC had Majorette.

I also attended yard sales looking for odd models. I even burnt some worn models, or punched out the windows etc - realism, dammit!

That’s the Saab, mine was blue (then pancaked by the foot plate on a treadle sewing machine). I bought a collection a couple years ago and there was a blue one, but it had a couple small chips, so I sold it off with most of the rest.

However, I did keep this from the collection, a quite scarce Majorette car hauler, 1988 issue, with 5 cars - and one of them is the Saab:

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > fintail 08/27/2019 at 23:25

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I have that Volvo and that Ford Sierra! :D I got them separately though...is that gray car a Mercedes? I think I have that one somewhere as well! That red one also looks familiar.......Alfa of some sort....? My mind is failing me as I haven’t seen a lot of these since I first put them in those boxes nigh on 20 years ago...

fintail > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/27/2019 at 23:32

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Yep grey car is a W201 190E, and the red an Alfa 75. I had the Volvo and MB in a few colors, and I had the Sierra in blue as well. I recall the USDM blister pack for the Sierra called it a Tempo, as it kinda sorta resembles a Tempo, and I guess they wanted to relate it to the market. I loved Majorette of that er a, as most castings were everyday cars seen on the street, and many had headlight or tail light lenses.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > fintail 08/27/2019 at 23:38

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Yup, most of my Majorettes come from that era! I think, overall, I have more Hot Wheels than Matchbox or Majorette, but I probably have an equal number of Majorette to Hot Wheels. I have literally like...3 Tomicas, that’s it. One is a 70's American police car....Dodge Coronet maybe? I forget.....blue and white two-tone with red spin-y lights on top. The second is a yellow Nissan truck with....gas canisters on the back I think? I THINK the third is a Hino gas truck in yellow for Shell...? Tomica were never sold here that I know of , so I found all of those at yard sales...

fintail > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/28/2019 at 00:05

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I was mostly into Matchbox, with Majorette 2nd, and others more distant. Tomica was widely sold in the US until ~1987 as “Pocket Cars”, I don’t recall ever seeing them in BC anyway. The police car is indeed a Coronet, a casting Tomica dressed in numerous liveries. Every week or so I post a review on LaLD, I recently showed the fire chief variant:

https://liveandletdiecast.kinja.com/review-tomica-dodge-coronet-fire-chief-car-1836264872

I currently have a collection of maybe 180 boxed mostly pre-1965 Matchbox, and maybe 160 boxed Tomica, I need to make an inventory list.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > fintail 08/28/2019 at 07:25

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I have quite a few in-package Hot Wheels, but nowhere near as many as that! Very cool! :)

Almost all my 1/18th Maisto/Bburago/Road Legends/Road Champs models are still in their boxes though.

fintail > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/28/2019 at 09:55

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I like models in boxes, so they can be examined and then stored in the box. Far superior to blister cards.

I had a number of Bburago back in the day too - I actually played wi th many of them, including the 1:18s.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > fintail 08/28/2019 at 11:42

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I’d say older Bburago are my favorite brand of 1/18th that I had! :)

fintail > RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars 08/28/2019 at 11:51

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I didn’t get into many other 1:18s, as they didn’t hit the market until I was collecting a lot less.  I notice many old Bburago can still be had for around their original price ~30 years ago.

RallyDarkstrike - Fan of 2-cyl FIATs, Eastern Bloc & Kei cars > fintail 08/28/2019 at 12:09

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Yup, I’ve noticed that as well!