Hong Kong Hollow Horses - P1 Pony (Type 1)

My old notes and the index-card text which accompanies the loose versions of these reads -

P1 - Pony. Very well-detailed copy - but smaller - of 'Smoothie' with more detailed mane, more realistic tail than 'P2', "HONG KONG" in small letters at rear of body cavity, which is arched. Identified by mutually exclusive association, two sources.

More clean samples have come-in since the card was written about 25-years ago, and that's what we're looking at here.

This is the horse in question and I hope he conforms to the above description, He's quite a solid chap compared to some HK horses, but smaller than most, so a 'new' sculpt, copied from the older donors.

P1 is marked neatly with 'Hong' over 'Kong' in a little block reading head-to-tail toward the rear of the body cavity which makes all these 'hollow-horses' hollow.

It's called P1 because there is a P2 (which will be posted above this post) and here they are, next to each other, the P2 has elements of what I call remoulding in that while the horse is equally small, its mane and tail are cruder and it looks like the changes have been carved straight into the tool. It's also a thinner-walled sculpt and unmarked.

P2 is also glossier than the matted, slightly (or subtly) textured surface of P1

My pelt drawing/diagram which also shows the strange arch under the saddle which may help ID them if you are following these none-to frequent posts (they will become more frequent - I just need to get a rocket up my arse!) with the aim of sorting them out of bigger mixed lots - which is the main purpose!

Horse colours are all realistic, as far as HK horses go, no bright colours or dark green ones!

The cowboys, as with the Indians they are the three old Giant poses, quite a reasonable take on the older figures, faces have gone and the locating-spigots on the legs are much heavier, with the single-six-shooter pose's having slight blobs on the tips.

The colour-palette is best described as subdued primaries and I'm not 100% happy with the pale-green double-six-gunner, his hat is slightly different and his feet likewise, but with two apparent cavities for the pose (fatter and thinner torsos) and no other set he fits with, he's here for now - see below.

The Native American Indians, again three poses, again ex-Giant and you can see another reason why both the pale green cowboy and the poorly-moulded ones remain in the sample, there are similar Indians, and they are better matches, so there were poor mouldings (too quick out of the tool leads to shrinkage which at this scale smoothes-off detail at the same time) and a few leerier colours; note the pinks!

P1 on the left, a Giant Smoothie on the right, you can see that the Pony is a much smaller version of the Giant mount - which has a smaller version itself.

As yet I have been unable to tie these into a set, brand or manufacturer, nor have any accessories yet been associated with P1 sets/lots.

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But is it Giant?

No, despite using the same Giant figures as many other HK Horse sets/groups and using the smaller version of a Giant horse, this family (see P2) is a later entity altogether dating from the mid-late 1970's or even (in the case of P2) the early '80's.

Battle of Stalingrad Mini Military Playpak - DFC - Multi Toys Corp.

So, to the second of the three sets issued jointly by the Dimensions for Children and MTC brands in 1983; small sets sold together in a trio and containing a handful of Hong Kong-sourced piracies, the contents similar between the three sets.

Scanned box, the artwork is even more exciting than on the (above/newer post) Battle of Berlin set, if only we actually found a Schwimmwagen with MG fitted upon opening the box, or plastic renditions of the walls of the Kremlin - wrong city DFC! Sadly - no such luck!

The figures are copies of Matchbox's US infantry and as we looked at the poses above, we are here looking at the colour variations of the two main armies, one being in a rich yellow-olive or khaki and the other set being in  a darker olive-drab or jade-green, however there is quite a variation between figures and each set has 31 figures, random by pose and number of each pose but always (or certainly - in the case of my three sets) 15 in one colour-way, 16 in the other.

In place of the Daimler armoured-car in the Berlin set we get two jeeps in this set, both scaled larger than the figures, one fitted with a spigot for an absent driver and looking vaguely like a US WWII-era Jeep, following a common HK design, the other having a hole forward of the driver's seat which may be for an equally absent driver, or a steering-wheel, as it's not present either - we'll never know!

This second 'jeep' however is not a Jeep, but resembles almost the Soviet version utility-car with a different bonnet (hood) and squat'er appearance, see also next/older post (Battle of the Black Forest) for a couple more views; it also lacks the star on the bonnet usually seen on Hong Kong Jeeps.

The different markings, plastic solour and wheels suggest both were bought-in from separate manufacturers, with the smaller one being supplied by the same producer who provided the armoured-car seen in the Battle of Berlin set, the larger one originating with the same company that made the figures.

As with the other two sets this is a 1:1 scan of the play-mat in case anyone needs to print a paper replacement for the PE original, and, in keeping with the Battle of Berlin set, seems to have eschewed the iconic scenes of urban combat around the tractor-factory, rail terminus, river-side wharves or main square, depicting - instead - the rural idyll to the South of the city as described by Guy Sajer in his seminal autobiography The Forgotten Soldier!

So we've had Berlin and Stalingrad, what great battle next; Iwo Jima, Leningrad or Moscow, Tobruk maybe, Kohima . . . Mote Casino, Dunkirk even . . . ? No, we're off to the Black Forest!

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But is it Giant?

 

No - date is way off, source-material for the piracies is way-off, plastic play-matt is not Giant's style, although some of the comic-stuff with Giant figures did have similar play-mats; they were paper.

Battle of the Black Forrest Mini Military Playpak - DFC - Multi Toys Corp.

This set is in the same vein as the other two, and has almost identical contets to the Stalingrad set, whether the likelihood of getting two jeeps or an armoured car in each set was fixed or random I don't know, but one day will track-down some duplicates which will answer that particular question!

Again we'll lead-off with the box scan, hint's of a German tank are going to prove misleading when the purchaser opens the box, but at least this time we have US forces on the cover!

Of course; there was no major combat in the Black Forest in the Second World War - the people who started the bloody conflagration escaped remarkably unscathed, as - indeed - in the case of the Austrians, they had in 1918, after starting that 'show'! Some of the Cities had been bombed, often heavily for years, and there were some limited actions against fanatical Nazis in some towns, but generally Southern Germany and Austria escaped the worst.

The complete contents vis-à-vis the figures and in keeping with the two sets above ('newer post' or click the DFC tag) we get two colours of Matchbox US infantry copies, 15 in one colour and 16 in another; figures are reasonable for what they are, early 1980's piracies from Hong Kong.

It's seems amazing; but with random pose-numbers and plastic colour variation, it looks likely that the figures were hand-sorted/counted into the boxes, each of my three having exactly 31 figures with a 15/16 split as far as main plastic-colour goes.

Two Jeeps, again as per the Battle of Stalingrad set from the same brands (Dimensions for Children / MTC) and within the same retail liner, from two sources; one is a common HK design with star on the bonnet (hood), the other looking a bit 'quatsch'!

Well, it says Battle of the Black Forest and for once the play-mat delivers! Two connected, twisty paths for your handfuls of figures to rush round, stalking each other, a bit narrow for the jeeps though!

It's a 1:1 scan for anyone who needs to print-off a paper replacement for a missing plastic one - the original is basically printed on plastic carrier bag material; Polyethylene (PE) film/sheet.

What's clearly a missed opportunity with these three sets is that despite the similarity of the contents and the fact that they were sold as a trio in a cling-film wrap with card-tray, they (the designers, shippers, jobbers) didn't think to make the mats line-up . . . a bit of tweaking and they could have matched-edges like Lego base-plates!

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But is it Giant?

 

No - date is way off, source-material for the piracies is way-off, plastic play-matt is not Giant's style, although some of the comic-stuff with Giant figures did have similar play-mats; they were paper.

Hong Kong Hollow Horses - Mexican Large - Lucky Clover - Fort Cheyenne with Red Indians

I think we can assume there was a similar one printed 'With Cowboys', but more on that below. This is another easy one, clear distinctions between the similar 'bits' of this set and other sets, some of which we will look at here, others - in future comparison posts.

We've looked at the ancient and Royal Guards sets over on the main 'Home' Blog, and this has no real surprises, however while they had the same title (Tower Fortress with Soldiers) or shared the same packaging, this has a set-specific title block.

Four mounted figures replace the guns or chariots of the other sets and again we can assume that would be true for a cowboy version. A number of relatively unique (by size) foot figures accompany a pretty standard Hong Kong Wild West fort, although it has higher walls than the more common versions from Giant, Woolbro, Gordy, et al., and shallower step/walkway . . . too shallow to stand the figures on!

Logo, code number and a locating arrow, the purpose of which will be to ensure the packers get the tray-insert and the lid to line up, with the fort's own title-block reading in the English fashion (right-way-up, left-to-right) for neat, uniform, shop-displays.

The Stock-code number is the same for all sets, and as I've seen some of the sets as a probably later 1970's blister-carded assembly coded 6647H, it is fair to assume this too probably appeared in that guise, however, both from the numerically earlier stock number and the graphics, we can place this in the 1960's and indeed James Opie dates them to 1969.

The Indians; I have no way of knowing if these are all the poses, and the evidence would suggest probably not! There's a seventh damaged foot figure still to find, complete, for a start!

The figures are based on various sources, notably Timpo '1st version' Swoppets providing the mounted poses (spellchecker wants me to replace 'poses' with posse!), with a couple of Britains Swoppets and the Crescent 60mm sets providing the foot poses. They are also quite large, 26-28mm for the foot, so hard to mistake for other HK figure sets using any of these poses.

The foot figures have 'peanut' shaped cloud bases which are quite thick with an ogee edge and the locating studs on the mounted figures are surprisingly small, almost pointed pimples and all the Indian figures only appear in shades of purplish or oxide browns and red-browns, the darker figures are a bit translucent, and may well be from the later carded sets (if they existed), but the paler solid-colour ones are definitely from these window-box sets.

The horse is the one I call Mexican Large, and is about the best examples of the type you'll find after the Giant issued ones, unmarked and with a slightly textured surface to the interior to the body cavity and very thick body-walls.

Base mark is a blocked HONGKONG in a DIN type font and the fort will be looked at against the others in a comparison post at a later date.

Because I have only the three sets (Guards, Trojans and Indians) we will look at the cowboys as well here, in the hope that a cowboy set will turn-up one day . . . it will! I know the cowboys belong here as they have the following in common with the Indians . . .

• Size
• Base mark (foot figures)
• Peanut bases (foot figures)
• Ridden horse
• Locating stud (mounted figures)

. . . and because they came together in 'clean' loose-figure samples. Indeed; they were among the first sets to be sorted out of the main lump, such is the clarity of their signature features.

There are a couple of differences, namely that prior to obtaining this set, they had only turned up with a darker fort (although there were a few creamy-tan spare bits in the unknown box from mixed samples) and they don't take any poses from Timpo or Crescent.

It is my belief therefore; that the dark-brown (Indian figure colour) forts probably accompanied the so far missing cowboy sets, while the Indians got a fort which contrasted with their own plastic colour. Although the previous clean-sample loose sets I had taken-in often contained similar quantities of cowboys and natives, so there may have been 'belligerent' sets with both sets of figures and an oxide-brown fort.

The Cowboys; again I have no way of knowing if this is all the poses, but at eight foot and seven mounted two things are likely: A) there are probably less cowboys (if any) to find than the Indians, and B) there probably ARE one or two more Indian poses to find!

Always in the same four primary colours, but various shades and hues, the poses this time are from Britains Swoppets only, but from both the 1st and 2nd series. If anything their bases are even thicker than the Indians and with a sharper radius on the edge.

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But is it Giant?

No. 1969 puts it a year or two beyond the best of Giant, although some of their original stuff lasted on as sell-through (barbed wire, wagons) or comic book game-playing pieces, they were gone before this lot hit the toy, model and sports and bicycle-shops of the West!

Wild West Figures - Wing Lung - Airfix Copies

It is unfortunate (for this Blog) that some of the stuff which would be [is!] due to appear here ended-up in storage, among which were all the Guards and their forts/sets (most already on the home Blog though), all the Giant and Giant-like ancient and medieval forts (some on the Home Blog) and loose (apart from the few on the Roman Page some of the chariots and the Viking ships) and all the loose Matchbox and Airifx piracies; I do have the mint bagged stuff here, so we can visit some of that in good time.

The Blue Box is the opposite, with the loose stuff here and all the sets, cards and boxes in storage! Also I do have all the Britains/Crescent combat figures (loose and carded/bagged) here so we will finish what we started over on the Home Blog, along with 90% of the hollow-horsed Cowboys & Indians, so - with the Airfix exceptions - they will star to start with.

So this is just a brief shot from a scan of old photo's never used in the 1-Inch Warrior magazine days, showing four of the Wing Lung copies of Airfix 1:32nd scale (54mm) figures downscaled to 30mm (and now in storage), so you can compare them with the Modern I and Modern II sets I have posted (two posts immediately below/'previous posts'). There are Cowboys as well, equally distinctive and obviously we will look at them all here in time.

Both Indians and cowboys only come as foot figures, no horses or accessories, and they are marked boldly on the base "HONG KONG" either in-line or up-and-under. This base-mark is the same for all three scales Wing Lung issued. Both this and the next image are a bit crude, but they give the post a bit of substance!

Wing Lung sold them in header-carded bags on the runner ('sprue') which was of the tree design and you may be more familiar with their larger 45/50mm copies of Matchbox British and US troops, or in about 18mm: Airfix German Infantry, German Para's and Matchbox US. The logo's are cropped-out of much larger evilBay images, so they've been a bit pixilated!

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But is it Giant?

Nooooo.

Hong Kong Hollow Horses - Modern (Type I) - W - Western Warrior

I do know (or have known in the past to be more accurate as I clearly don't know now!) what the W stood for, it's not Wing Lung (who are responsible for larger - 30mm - Airfix piracies), I don't think it's Welly (but I'll check!), it's not the Woolworth's mega-brand 'Big-W', nor is it Wentoys (although from that same late 1980's-early 1990's era of rack-toys), if anyone does know, let the rest of us off the hook, otherwise you'll have to wait until I remember/find the reference, and update the post...which will be...er...when I update it!

I'm pretty sure also that these late production figures have enjoyed more than one issuing 'Brand', so if you have them in another packaging, consider a guest-post to elucidate the rest of us! A couple of shots of the header card, and any variations in [wagon or tee-pee] colour are all that's needed.

Arlin Tawser (who believes the logo might be a double 'WW') reports on Plastic Soldier Review (PSR) that these were also sold as a set called "Cowboys, Indians, Horses and Wagons” in the 1990's, and further reports that his version of the set shown here has the foot figures marked 'CHINA', mine however have the normal smooth/unmarked bases.

Quite familiar to collectors, both because they are the more recent, and because they have a useful set of Airfix piracies as foot figures, instead of the tired-old ex-Giant/Britains Swoppet mouldings or Crescent 54mm's that everyone had been using for the previous 30-years.

You also get a wagon which is easy to sort from similar examples, a cloned (and miniaturised) Britains Herald Totem-pole and the same donor's tee-pee/tipi, so - lots of play value.

The horse hasn't got a specific title in my 'system' being a Smoothie who's also a Remould, and made (like the rest of the contents) from a tinny, rigid ethylene, that's quite distinctive enough to sort-out of mixed lots, the whole set oozes 'new production' when compared with the bulk of HK hollow-horsed Cowboys & Indians from the 1960/70's.

Basically I call him 'Modern' as I do several other, dissimilar, mounts also known as moderns, so for tagging: I've called him 'Modern I'. Crudely marked with a quite large 'HONG KONG' in the top of the body cavity reading head-to-tail in squared letters, it's also got quite think sides. Note also the reinforcing on the inside-legs of the black one, about 10% of all the horses have this, presumably one of the cavities was so treated, probably to prevent curving of the legs after release from the mould-tool?

The all important shot in this post . . . at last! Someone designed some new figures! OK, they took them from Airfix's 54mm/1:32nd scale cowboy and Indian sets, but as Airfix hadn't seen fit to update their own small scale atrocities with better figures, even with their own large-scale, pantographed down, we were just happy someone had!

Six-each of both foot cowboy and foot Indian poses were nicked, and they were issued in four basic primary colours, although (as always with these cheap figures) much variation in shade or hue between batches.

The mounted figures can be mistaken for other set's figures, a couple of them (Indian archer and full war-bonnet) are old, tired, rehashed poses, and the colour variation is wider than for the foot figures - they may well have been bought-in from a third party - but there are a few signature features that make them reasonably easy to sort-out of larger mixed lots.

The Mohican haircut of the brave with flapping jerkin sets him apart from similar versions from other sources, while two of the cowboys are all new; Britains Herald lassoer and Swoppet twin-six-gunner (I think the other guy may be the Crescent firing-back pose?). Then there's the aforementioned dense, tinny plastic for one, large, reasonably long and directly-opposite locating-studs for another, the flash on some of the figures &etc. Once you have ID'd a few you will get a feel for them and it's easy to find the rest in a big lot!

The wagon is very easy to separate from other HK wagons by dint of having a standard towing eye at one end, and - for no explicable reason I can come-up with - a crude copy of the Giant chariot drawbar-front, combined with another towing eye at the other end! As that original Giant feature was itself a ruination of the - even more original - Marx chariot's ornate tooling, it is a complete mystery why someone in the 1980's decided to sculpt it onto the other end of an otherwise OK covered-wagon!

The wagon is also much shallower than most HK Wild West wagons, having only one plank, more of a tray than a box-body! In other respects it is the same basic ex-Giant design, based on the old Tudor Rose vehicle, with the tilt-tabs punching through four locating slots in the corners of the bed.

The other accessories so far associated with these figures/this set are the very crude copies of the Britains tee-pee and Totem-pole. The pole is - I think - unique to this set (in the small scale that is, I think it was also issued with 45'ish-mm figure sets?), while the rigid plastic separates this version of the tee-pee from earlier softer ethylene ones issued by Einco and others.

Now Known to be from the Wing Wah (WW) Plastics Factory, of Smithfield Road, Kennedy Town, Hong Kong (Hoo Sai Industrial Building).

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But is it Giant?

No! Don't be silly! This is a tail-ender of its type from the ay'tees! All 'big hair' and shoulder-pads, T'pau, Frankie Goes to 'ollywood, Top Gun and Max Max III with that Tina Turner; "Why, you're just a little raggedy set of Cowboys and Indians"!