Essex Models and Miniatures - It's a small world

May 11, 2012

Morestone, AA Land Rover

by Peter — Categories: 4x4 vehicles, Benbros, Diecast models, Land Rover, Morestone — Leave a comment

Even after all the years I have been collecting diecast I can still get it wrong, this article is such an occasion and decided to write this to help others spot the differences between what are two very similar models.

A few weeks ago I saw a Benbros AA Land Rover for sale on Ebay, these are getting very hard to find and despite the fact I have none in my collection and the picture wasn’t the best in the world, decided to bid on it, the outcome was good and I won for a reasonable price and waited patiently for it’s arrival.

The description said the axles were slightly bent but that’s ok and wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, other than that was exactly as I expected, yesterday I took some pictures ready to post on here and started to research the Benbros company for the article, then something started to feel as though this wasn’t all it seemed, as it turned out this one is actually a Morestone, not a Benbros and many people including websites don’t really seem to know the difference.

My research is added below and hopefully will help someone recognise which model they have or at least avoid buying the wrong one as I did, I must admit I’m still pleased as I didn’t have the Morestone one either.

The Morestone AA Land Rover was No 3 in the Morestone range and produced around 1956, to about 1958, my one has metal wheels painted black but it seems later one’s may of had black plastic wheels.

This would of had a black painted roof and the name casting on the side would of been highlighted in black.

The base plate just says, ‘Made in England’

This is how it should look. notice the smooth roof casting on the Morestone one, also the Morestone version was always yellow with a black roof and black wheels.

The Benbros version below, the main difference here is the Benbros one was always yellow with yellow wheels, mine had the remains of black paint on the wheels both back and front, the roof casting differs too, the Benbros one has ribs on the cab part of the roof, the Morestone one doesn’t, this follows through on other Benbros Land Rovers, although not as obvious the headlight are not as pronounced on the Benbros model either.

My conclusion is I have the Morestone version of this model, I don’t blame the seller as he probably didn’t know, more than 50% of the pictures I found on the internet were Morestone Land Rovers labelled as Benbros when in fact they wasn’t.

Mine will be restored in the future along with it’s Bedford CA counterpart that I already have.

The real AA Land Rover

The AA 1952 Land Rover

History of the AA

May 8, 2012

Corgi, Chieftain Tank

by Peter — Categories: Corgi, Diecast models, Military vehicles — Leave a comment

There are many classic vehicles built by Corgi, and none more so than the range of armoured vehicles, tanks have been made by Corgi, Dinky and Matchbox over the years, my favourites are the older British tanks.

This is the Corgi version of the british Chieftain tank, No903 and was produced between 1974 and 1980.

This would of been supplied with shells that fired from the end of the gun, although this part is missing from mine, the red button on the back was the means of firing.

The scale is listed as 1:50 although have not checked this.

This particular model has now been sold and graces somebody else’s collection.

The Real tank

The FV 4201 Chieftain was the main battle tank of the United Kingdom during the 1960s and 1970s. It was one of the most advanced tanks of its era, and at the time of its introduction in 1966 had the most powerful main gun and heaviest armour of any tank in the world. The Chieftain also introduced a supine (lying backwards) driver position, enabling a heavily sloped hull with reduced height.

The Chieftain was a radical evolutionary development of the successful Centurion line of tanks that had emerged at the end of the Second World War. The British had learned during the war that their tanks often lacked sufficient protection and firepower compared to those fielded by the enemy, and that this had led to high casualty levels when faced with the superior German tanks in World War II.

The main armament was the 120 mm L11A5 rifled gun. This differed from most contemporary main tank armament as it used projectiles and charges which were loaded separately, as opposed to a single fixed round. The charges were encased in combustible bags. Other tank guns, such as on the Conqueror, needed to store the spent shell cartridges or eject them outside. The combustible charges were stored in 36 recesses surrounded by a water/glycol mixture – so-called “wet-stowage”. In the event of a hit which penetrated the fighting compartment, the jacket would rupture, soaking the charges and preventing a catastrophic propellant explosion.

For more on the Chieftain tan Click Here

May 6, 2012

Corgi Rockets, superstox

by Peter — Categories: Cars, Corgi Juniors, Corgi Rockets, Diecast models, Racing cars — 2 Comments

The Corgi Rockets Superstock cars wasn’t one’s I had as a kid but remember them well because my brother had both.

Corgi produced two during the Rockets production years of 1969 to 1971, Number 919 was Todd Sweeny and number 920 was Derek Fiske both real cars and drivers in the late 1960′s.

The third one in the picture on the left is a later Whizzwheels issue No75 and is the same body casting as Todd Sweeny’s car.

The Derek Fiske car had an opening bonnet revealing the power plant and the number 304 was the actual number of the real car.

The Todd Sweeny car also had the real car number of 531, the third car is numbered 404 but when I got these three cars all the number stickers were missing so I made new ones, 404 was made up but have since found out this one was numbered 864.

The difference between the Corgi Rockets car and the Corgi Whizzwheels car can be seen in the picture below.

The real cars

Superstox is a type of single seat formula racing, similar to Sprint car racing developed in the 1960s in the United Kingdom. Racing is ‘contact’ whereby drivers can use the front bumper to help dislodge any car in front. Like most other forms of short oval racing, the higher rated drivers normally start at the back of the grid for each race.

Its original roots come from the mid-1950′s, it derived as a cheaper alternative to BriSCA Formula One Stock Car Racing, where a smaller junior forumula was raced nationally before the Southern ‘Spedeworth’ short oval tracks broke away from the main promoting body in 1961 to run their own version of Juniors which they called Formula Two. The cars were originally standard or ‘stock’ but became more modified over the years until 1968 when a new ‘stock’ car formula was introduced and the original much modified class became known as Super Stock Cars. This was later shortened to Superstox. Today the class bears no resemblance to a road going car. Chassis are generally built by specialist companies and all the components are special racing ones. The cars are all of front engine design although rear engine was allowed up until the mid 1970s.

The names on the Corgi Rockets cars did actually exist and drive, here are a few pictures from the www.superstox.org.uk website

Derek Fiske

Todd Sweeny

Both raced at Wimbledon, Todd Sweeny won first place in 1967 and Derek Fiske was placed third in 1968, see full list here

I found this video on UTube showing both Todd and Derek racing in the late 1960′s

For more on Superstox now and the past drivers and cars Click Here

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