Corgi’s “Fit-to-Box” Top Gun Maverick 2020 – Maverick’s F/A-18 Hornet and P-51D Mustang
When we first started out twenty years ago, Corgi offered a line of affordable “fit-to-box” replicas which, for all intents and purposes, were aimed at first-time collectors, young adults and history buffs with a passing interest in diecast collectibles. While they weren’t built to any set scale, hence the “fit-to-box” moniker, they were, nevertheless, quite successful at retail and went a long way towards bringing new blood into the hobby that might not otherwise give it a second thought.
Earlier this week, we decided to bring back the series thanks, in part, to the upcoming feature film Top Gun Maverick of which two sets are based. Priced at just $19.99 per set and due out this autumn, each of these two-ship packs are ideal stocking stuffers that both rekindle a passion for the hobby as well as helping to renew interest in historic aviation. Five sets are being offered and the pre-order window for each is now open.
This week, it would appear as if all we have on our mind is Corgi. Apart from a solitary post regarding new Hobby Master products for the month of June and another covering the return of Skymax Models, it seems as though Corgi has stolen the limelight with us and perhaps with good reason.
Earlier today we learned that Corgi has joined forces with the massively multiplayer online game, World of Tanks, and intends to produce a range of diminutive tanks that you might find in the game. There is no set scale for these vehicles as is the case with their larger brethren found in the Military Legends series. Rather, they are all designed to fit a common one-size-fits-all packaging, much like their Showcase range. In fact, there’s a good chance that this may be a re-branding move on the part of Corgi, intended to leverage the popularity of the game to help propel sales and give the makers of the game and avenue into the diecast market.
This new re-branded range is not to be confused with another World of Tanks range in which all of the vehicles are produced in 1:72 scale and where several are paired to form an adversarial pack such as a T-34 versus a Panther. We are still working to procure this range under a separate working relationship and will share the news once we have something more concrete to go on.
Incidentally, the inclusion of a US-built M48A3 tank, the only post WWII-era vehicle in the series, would suggest that Corgi is preparing to bring back their Vietnam War series as they did with their WWII line. If true, this is certainly welcome news for many collectors, still eager to collect a range that sold out several years ago.
Corgi’s 1:50 scale German Sd. Kfz. 171 PzKpfw V Panther Ausf. D Medium Tank – Panzer Abteilung 2, Panzer Brigade 107, Bamberg, Northern Bavaria, April 1945
At last we’re seeing some movement on the Corgi front. Their long awaited 1:50 scale Panther medium tank (#CC60215) is now on its way to us along with their 1:72 scale Ju-87 Stuka dive-bomber (#AA32518), both of which we originally expected towards the end of 2019. The remaining items in their 2019 range for both their Military Legends and Aviation Archives series are tentatively expected towards the end of January, again barring any unforeseen issues. We expect to take delivery of the Panther and Stuka on or around the 21st, so please do not contact us ahead of that date asking about your order or when you can expect to receive it.
Corgi’s 1:72 scale German Junkers Ju-87B-2 Stuka Dive-Bomber – J9+BL, 9./Sturzkampfgeschwader 1, St. Pol, France, November 1940
We will process all of our outstanding orders for both items the moment they arrive and provide everyone with tracking information once the orders are ready to be handed off to our carrier. In the meantime, we thank you for your patience and hope you can wait just a little while longer for these goodies to arrive.
Corgi’s 1:72 scale USAAF Boeing B-17G Flying Fortress Heavy Bomber – 42-31322 “Mi Amigo”, 364th Bombardment Squadron, 305th Bombardment Group, Chelveston, England, February 22nd, 1944
As we hinted at last week, Corgi revealed it’s latest line up of military aircraft and vehicles at the 2020 Hong Kong Toy Fair. Frankly, there weren’t any huge surprises in the mix, the only new tooling being a 1:48 scale Bristol F2B fighter of WWI renown. Anyway, we’ve listed all of their newest aircraft and military vehicles in their respective sections and are now accepting pre-orders. Most are expected towards the latter half of the year. Here’s the list of what’s on the horizon from the folks at Corgi:
Corgi’s 1:50 scale German Sd. Kfz. 171 PzKpfw V Panther Ausf. D Medium Tank – Panzer Abteilung 2, Panzer Brigade 107, Bamberg, Northern Bavaria, April 1945
I’m not sure why Corgi has run into issues getting some of their most eagerly anticipated items out the door and into the hands of their dealer network but the fact remains that several products may still make it under the tree for the holidays. According to Corgi, a bunch of collectibles are “on the water”, meaning they are currently en route to them and will hopefully get turned around to us in time so that we can fulfill some outstanding orders. The following items are affected by this last-minute shipment:
Corgi’s 1:50 scale British Cromwell Mk. IV Tank – “Blenheim”, 2nd Armoured Battalion, Welsh Guards, 6th Guards Armoured Brigade, 1944 (1:50 Scale)
As we gear up for the holiday season, Corgi seems to be hard-at-work harvesting their latest crop of diecast delicacies. Here’s a quick look at what you can expect from the English modelmaker in the month of September:
As an aside, we were curious as to why the inboard panels of each engine cowling and panel forward of the windscreen was painted green instead of the natural metal finish shown throughout the aircraft’s exterior. This appears on both the Corgi B-17 shown here as well as the upcoming B-17 from Air Force 1. Apparently, after the bare metal finish was adopted by the USAAF, it was discovered that the glare from the metal finish forward of the cockpit and on the inboard sides of the engine cowlings was blinding the pilots inside the cockpit. As a result, khaki green shields were repainted on these selected parts.
Sample packaging for Corgi’s upcoming Military Legends Series
Ever since they elected to back out of the diecast military vehicle market several years ago, retailers and distributors alike have been lobbying Corgi to make a valiant return, thereby upholding a tradition that stretches way back into the 1960s. As it turned out, 2019 marked the 75th Anniversary of the D-Day landings and served as a perfect way for Corgi to return to the war front both on the ground and in the air.
Beginning in September, eight repurposed 1:50 scale WWII-era vehicles will be released, each paying homage to the men and machines that fought so courageously towards the closing days of the War in Europe. So, without further ado, here’s what you can expect to see in the latter half of 2019 and hopefully serving as the tip of the spear for the coming year.
CC60418 – The best known American halftracks were the M series made as a standardized design by Autocar, Diamond T, International and White. The M series had a similar front end to the White M3A1 Scout Car but used more powerful engines: a 147bhp 6.3-liter White AX in the Autocar, Diamond T, and White, and a 143bhp 1HC in the International. Each version had four-speed gearboxes with two-speed transfer boxes and drive to the front axle as well as the tracked bogie. The M series halftracks were widely used by US forces in most theatres of the war, and were also supplied under the Lend-Lease Program to Great Britain, Canada and the Soviet Union. A total of 41,170 were made.
Corgi’s 1:50 scale British RAF Bedford QL Supply Truck – RAF 2nd Tactical Air Force, 1943
CC50309 – The Bedford QLD lorry was the most common British-made 4×4 truck produced, with over 52,000 supplied to the British Forces between 1941 and 1945. Many of these later continued in service with the British Army in Cyprus, Korea and Malaya. The first Bedford QL trucks rolled off the assembly line at Vauxhall’s Luton factory early in 1941. They were powered by the reliable GM 3 ½-litre six-cylinder petrol engine.
Corgi’s 1:50 scale German Krauss-Maffei Sd. Kfz. 7/1 8-Ton Semi-Tracked Personnel Carrier/Prime Mover – Unidentified Unit, Tunisia, 1943
CC60013 – Development of the Sd. Kfz. 7 can be traced back to a 1934 requirement for an 8-ton half-track. The vehicle first appeared in 1938 and was destined to be used mainly as the tractor for the 8.8cm flak gun. The Sd. Kfz. 7 was an extremely useful vehicle, employed both as a weapons carrier and prime mover by the Wehrmacht. They also saw service as observation and command posts for V2 rocket batteries. The vehicle could carry up to 12 men and a considerable quantity of supplies, as well as pulling up to 8000kg (17,600 lbs) of equipment. Most were fitted with a winch, which enabled them to pull smaller disabled vehicles out of mud or other quagmires. A mainstay of the German Army, the Sd. Kfz. 7 was even admired by the enemies of the Reich. In fact, the British tried to make exact copies of captured Sd. Kfz. 7s and some vehicles were appropriated for use by the Allies after World War II.
Corgi’s 1:50 scale British Cromwell Mk. IV Tank – 2nd Armoured Battalion, Welsh Guards, 6th Guards Armoured Brigade, 1944
CC60613 – The Cromwell tank was used by the British Army during the later stages of World War II. The Cromwell was ordered in 1941 and intended to replace the lightweight Crusader “cruiser” tank by being more heavily armoured, and, it was hoped, more survivable in battle. Its greater weight was to be driven by a 600-horsepower Rolls Royce Meteor engine, a derivative of Rolls Royce’s line of aircraft engines. Initial models, however, were powered by other engines and were designated Cavaliers and Centaurs when they entered service in mid-1942. The first genuine Cromwells with Meteor engines entered service in early 1943.
Corgi’s 1:50 scale British Churchill Mk. III Infantry Tank – 6th Scots Guards Tank Brigade, Italy, 1943
CC60112 – The “Churchill” began life as a 1939 requirement that envisaged a return to trench-warfare, and was therefore slow and heavily armored like the Russian KV-1 series. That said, the final Churchill prototype was much lighter than had first been thought acceptable, although it still resembled a World War I tank in appearance. Rushed into production at a time when a cross-channel invasion seemed imminent, it suffered early reliability problems and was not fully introduced until 1943. Early combat experience during the ill-fated Dieppe raid in 1942 was disappointing, but the vehicle proved more mobile in the rough terrain of North Africa. The tank excelled in its specialized variants, which include the AVRE, Crocodile flamethrower tank, bridgelayer and more. In fact, it wasn’t until the 1960s that the last Churchill was finally retired.
Corgi’s 1:50 scale US M4A3 Sherman Medium Tank – Unidentified Unit, Luxembourg, 1944
CC51031 – By all accounts, the M4 Sherman medium tank was regarded as the workhorse of the US Army during World War II. In fact, virtually all of the Allied armies employed the Sherman in their armed forces, including the British, who developed an upgunned variant called the “Firefly”. Eleven different US plants manufactured six basic models of the Sherman, and by June 1944 over 49,234 battle-ready vehicles had been produced. While it was no match for the German Panther or Tiger tanks, the Sherman soldiered on, using its weight in numbers to wrest control of Europe from the Wehrmacht.
Corgi’s 1:50 scale German Sd. Kfz. 171 PzKpfw V Panther Ausf. D Medium Tank – Panzer Abteilung 2, Panzer Brigade 107, Northern Bavaria, Defense of the Reich, April 1945
CC60215 – In many respects, the Panther tank was viewed as the finest armored fighting vehicle of the Second World War. Based in large part upon the Soviet’s highly successful T-34 medium tank, the PzKpfw V Ausfuhrung G (Type G) was built by several manufacturers including MAN, Daimler-Benz, and MNH. Mounting a fearsome 7.5cm KwK42 L/70 cannon and two 7.92mm MG34 machineguns, the Panther Ausf. G represented the third and certainly the most impressive installment in the Panther series.
Corgi’s 1:50 scale German Sd. Kfz. 181 PzKpfw VI Tiger I Ausf. E Heavy Tank – schwere Panzer Abteilung 502, Russia, 1942
CC60513 – The German Waffenamt issued an order to design the VK4501(H) (as the PzKpfw VI Ausf E was then known) in May 1941, just one month prior to the commencement of Operation Barbarossa. Interestingly, Henschel und Sohn of Kassel was charged with building the heavily armored chassis while Krupp, by far the largest munitionwerks in Germany, was given the task of developing the turret. The PzKpfw VI Ausfuhrung E (type E) was one of the first German tanks to feature a torsion bar with eight interleaved wheels, which was designed to support the mammoth 57-ton tank. The Ausf E mounted a huge 8.8cm KwK36 L/56 cannon and featured two MG34 machine guns for close support against enemy infantry. By war’s end, 1,354 vehicles had been produced, some rolling off the Wegmann assembly line.
The Westland Lysander (nickname the “Lizzie“) was a British army co-operation and liaison aircraft produced by Westland Aircraft used immediately before and during the Second World War. After becoming obsolete in the army co-operation role, the aircraft’s exceptional short-field performance enabled clandestine missions using small, improvised airstrips behind enemy lines to place or recover agents, particularly in occupied France with the help of the French Resistance. British Army air co-operation aircraft were named after mythical or historical military leaders; in this case the Spartan admiral Lysander was chosen.
In August 1941 a new squadron, No. 138 (Special Duties), was formed to undertake missions for the Special Operations Executive to maintain clandestine contact with the French Resistance. Among its aircraft were Lysander Mk IIIs, which flew over and landed in occupied France. While general supply drops could be left to the rest of No. 138’s aircraft, the Lysander could insert and remove agents from the continent or retrieve Allied aircrew who had been shot down over occupied territory and had evaded capture. For this role the Mk IIIs were fitted with a fixed ladder over the port side to hasten access to the rear cockpit and a large drop tank under the belly. In order to slip in unobtrusively Lysanders were painted matte black overall (some early examples had brown/green camouflaged upper surfaces and later examples had grey/green upper surfaces); operations almost always took place within a week of a full moon, as moonlight was essential for navigation. The aircraft undertook such duties until the liberation of France in 1944.[citation needed]
Lysanders flew from secret airfields at Newmarket and later Tempsford, but used regular RAF stations to fuel-up for the actual crossing, particularly RAF Tangmere. Flying without any navigation equipment other than a map and compass, Lysanders would land on short strips of land, such as fields, marked out by four or five torches. Or to avoid having to land, the agent, wearing a special padded suit, stepped off at very low altitude and rolled to a stop on the field. They were originally designed to carry one passenger in the rear cockpit, but for SOE use the rear cockpit was modified to carry two passengers in extreme discomfort in case of urgent necessity. The pilots of No. 138 and from early 1942, No. 161 Squadron transported 101 agents to and recovered 128 agents from Nazi-occupied Europe. The Germans knew little about the British aircraft and wished to study one. Soldiers captured an intact Lysander in March 1942 when its pilot was unable to destroy it after a crash, but a train hit the truck carrying the Lysander, destroying the cargo.
Lysanders also filled other less glamorous roles, such as service as target-towing and communication aircraft. Two aircraft (T1443 and T1739) were transferred to the British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) for training and 18 were used by the Royal Navy′s Fleet Air Arm. All British Lysanders were withdrawn from service in 1946.
In with the New: Corgi’s 1:50 scale German Sd. Kfz. 171 PzKpfw V Panther Ausf. D Medium Tank – Northern Bavaria, Defense of the Reich, April 1945
We recognize that the 75th anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge is fast approaching but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything connected with the winter campaign will instantly sell well. Case in point Corgi, who initially chose a captured German Panther tank as one of its core entrants for its resurgent diecast military vehicles. We’ve been doing this for quite a long time and I can tell you that based upon past experience captured schemes don’t sell nearly as well as regular liveries, even if the vehicle has a storied past.
Out with the Old: Captured German Panther Ausf. A Medium Tank – 4th Btn Coldstream Guards, Cuckoo, Netherlands , 1944
Fortunately, “cooler” heads seemed to have prevailed with Corgi choosing an entirely different scheme and vehicle to bolster its military line up. This time around, the Company has decided to go with a D variant as opposed to a type A version, and elected to go with a more subtle camouflage scheme that bears the German balkenkreuz instead of a whitewashed Allied insignia. Bravo to Corgi for recognizing the error of their ways and choosing a vehicle that better represents the end of the Reich and one of its most feared battle tanks.
Even though it appears as if their ground offensive has stalled by several months, that hasn’t prevented Corgi from initiating their 2019 aerial attack on the world at-large. Four new aircraft are currently winging their way to us and should be ready for shipment to our clientele by the third week of May. In no particular order, here’s what you can look forward to adding to your aviation arsenal in just a couple of weeks:
Corgi’s 1:72 scale German Heinkel He-111H-16 Medium Bomber with Fi 103 (Doodlebug) – A1+HK, 2./Kampfgeschwader 53 ‘Legion Condor’, Air Launch V-1 Flying Bomb Unit, Late 1944
When World War I ended, the German Air Force was disbanded under the Treaty of Versailles, which required the German government to abandon all military aviation by October 1st, 1919. However, by 1922, it was legal for Germany to design and manufacture commercial aircraft, and one of the first modern medium bombers to emerge from this process was the Heinkel He 111, the first prototype of which an enlarged, twin-engine version of the single-engine mail-liaison He 70, which set 8 world speed records in 1933 flew in February of 1935. The second prototype, the He 111 V2, had shorter wings and was the first civil transport prototype, capable of carrying 10 passengers and mail. The third prototype, He 111 V3 also had shorter wings and was the first true bomber prototype. Six He 111 C series airliners were derived from the fourth prototype, the He 111 V4, and went into service with Lufthansa in 1936, powered by a variety of engines, including BMW 132 radials. The first production models had the classic stepped windshield and an elliptical wing, which the designers, Siegfried and Walter Gunter, favored. That said, AA33716 is a German Heinkel He-111H-16 Medium Bomber ferrying a Fi 103 (Doodlebug) under its fuselage. It was attached to 2./Kampfgeschwader 53 ‘Legion Condor’, an Air Launch V-1 Flying Bomb Unit operating during the latter half of 1944.
Corgi’s 1:72 scale German Messerschmitt Bf 109G-6/U2 Fighter – “White 16”, 1./Jagdgeschwader 301, July 1944 [75th Anniversary of the D-Day Invasion]
Numerically the most abundant fighter produced by either side during WWII, the Messerschmitt Bf 109 formed the backbone of the Jagdwaffe on both the eastern and western fronts, as well as in the Mediterranean and North Africa. Of the eight distinct sub-types within the huge Bf 109 family, the most populous was the G-model, of which over 30,000 were built between 1941-45. Despite its production run, only a handful of genuine German Bf 109s have survived into the 1990s, and with the serious damaging of the RAFs G-2 at Duxford in October 1997, only the German-based MBB G-6 and Hans Ditte’s G-10 (both composites) are currently airworthy. AA27108 replicates a German Messerschmitt Bf 109G-6/U2 Fighter known as “White 16”, that was attached to 1./Jagdgeschwader 301 during July 1944. Note that it is part of Corgi’s 75th Anniversary of the D-Day Invasion collection.
Corgi’s 1:72 scale RAF Hawker Typhoon Mk. Ib Ground Attack Aircraft – MN625/MR-B, No. 245 (Northern Rhodesian) Squadron, Homesley South Airfield, Hampshire, June 1944 [75th Anniversary of the D-Day Invasion]
The Typhoon was a British single-seat strike fighter, produced by Hawker Aviation starting in 1941. Intended as a replacement for the Hawker Hurricane in the interceptor role, it suffered from performance problems, but eventually evolved into one of World War II’s most successful ground attack aircraft. AA36512 depicts a RAF Hawker Typhoon Mk. Ib Ground Attack Aircraft that was attached to No. 245 (Northern Rhodesian) Squadron, then deployed to Homesley South Airfield, Hampshire, England during June 1944. Note that it is part of Corgi’s 75th Anniversary of the D-Day Invasion collection.
The Handley Page Halifax was one of the British front-line, four-engine heavy bombers of the Royal Air Force during the Second World War. A contemporary of the famous Avro Lancaster, the Halifax remained in service until the end of the war, performing a variety of duties in addition to bombing. The Halifax was also operated by squadrons of the Royal Australian Air Force, Royal Canadian Air Force, Royal New Zealand Air Force and Polish Air Force. AA37209 represents a RAF Handley Page Halifax B.III Heavy Bomber known as “Expensive Babe”, that was attached to No.51 Squadron, then deployed to Snaith, England, during March 1945.
