Kenner / Hasbro Collecting > Vintage

Die-Cast Vehicles

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Reconsgt:
The recent action fleet thread got me thinking about an article I wrote years agon a couple of other sites. I dug that out of my files and updated it a bit.

Here is a little bit on the old die cast vehicles,  I have a few of these myself and even have one of the hand painted Landspeeder prototypes I will have to dig out of the archives and show you guys.

Now for their day these were incredibly detailed little ships. Kenner produced a total of 11 ship designs being released in 3 series. Some of these are very difficult to find packaged and some are fairly easy, You could also receive these via brown cardboard boxes from a few of the mail order catalogs of the day.

Series 1:
Landspeeder
X-wing
Tie Fighter
Darth's Tie fighter

Series 2:
Millennium Falcon
Star destroyer
Y-wing
And the elusive Tie Bomber

Series 3:
Slave 1
Snowspeeder
Twin pod cloud car

 These were initially released on cards much like the Kenner figures with colorful graphics and a plastic bubble. Series 2 saw these released in a window box format and lastly series 3 went back to the carded design. Here is a brief summary of each series.


Series 1

 They had some interesting variations compared to the screen used versions. Such as if you look at Darth's Tie you will see that the reused the tie fighter cockpit as opposed to creating a correct version that Darth used even though the cockpit isn't accurate they did a fair job on seating a good likeness of Vader inside. Also the Tie bomber is in white rather than grey and the pilot looks less like a tie pilot and more like a Hoth snowtrooper.
While speaking of the Tie fighters I have note that the wings are held on by small plastic dowels that are easily warped and most loose versions will have a droop to the wings. The Darth version is more apparent due to the increased wing size and weight. The X wing is a good likeness. The pilot being a bright red makes him stand out. The laser cannons tend to bend but the wings do work and can lock into attack position. The Landspeeder has Luke and C3PO seated inside. The windshield is also prone to discoloration much like its larger scale cousin. It rides along on small wheels to simulate the hovering action.

 Series 2:

 The Falcon is a great example with good paint and moving parts. You can position the top gun and radar dish. This is by far the easiest series 2 ship to locate. The hardest and most expensive to locate is the tie bomber. Boxed examples are a real find. When looking for loose examples take care as these have been faked in the past and many people are offering resin cast kits of this ship. The last ship in series 2 is the Y-wing. It has a moveable top gun and a cool little bomb like its full-sized cousin that is removable. The wings can come off this ship as well.

 Series 3:

 With a move to all ESB ships enters Kenner’s final run of die cast for the vintage era. The Slave 1's guns and wings can move. The ship is fairly accurate but lacks a good paint decal job leaving me the impression that it is to flat. The Cloud car is another plain example not much to it but it looks like the cloud car from the film. The rebel snowspeeder has moveable guns but not much else about it. It looks good as is but could use a little more paint to me.

 The display box for the ships was a neat little table top header type display. You can still find these but a lot of the ones I have seen are just the back drop and are missing the box portion.


If you find and needed corrections please PM me and I wil include that in the main body

Mr. Black:
I loved these little ships. I had the Slave I and the Snowspeeder. I also like Hasbro's Titanium series and have a couple of TIEs. Really brings me back to my Kenner DieCast ships  :)

Never had the TIE Bomber, which indeed is an (in)famous collectible. What's it worth MOC nowadays? $1,000?

Reconsgt:
I can't honestly say what they are going for right now, A boxed version I would think is insane, I passed on a loose version at WW05 for roughtly $250,  I was tempted but at the time it was more than I wanted to spend.

Tamer:
I loved theser carded versions and used to drool over em in the stores. I had most of these as I recall. Daggone if I just had my childhood toys. I couldn't afford the bigger ships, but mom would break down and get me one of these every once in awhile. I remember these being heavy as all get out, but so detailed it was amazing. I am not sure today's titanium line is still as detailed as I recall em. Anyone care to debate me there who still has both?

Mr. Black:
Well, I have some titanium T/Fs, T/Is, T/Bs and the X-1 (Vader's T/F) and they are more detailed than the Kenner ones. I really like 'em. I might look for more OT ones. Would be fun to have an X-Wing or two to go with them.

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