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| Reissue set |
The last time I got my hands on a new TimMee Patton tank fresh out of the factory was in 2003. I was smack dead in the middle of Ohio at a Marcs Discount store and found a small bin of them tucked away in the far corner of the store. I'd been searching for months after my interest in them had been rekindled (see 'The Story of My Collection'). What I thought would be the same beloved tank from my childhood turned out to be a new cost-cutting version. Gone were the antenna, stickers and more importantly, the clip-on wheels. Also noticeable was the hard plastic and less than perfect casting. The reissues come from the same mold. According to Jeff Imel from VictoryBuy, it wasn't feasible to make any changes to the tooling ("for the time being"). He decided to go ahead with the skid version reissue based upon the
success of the tanks from the NOS bulk vehicles he acquired last
fall. Fortunately, the casting on these tanks are, for the most part, clean. The fender dimples are still there...and that's most likely due to the stiffness of the plastic used...not the casting process itself.
The color is a deep army green and is MUCH better than the green hues used during the late 80s through 2005. However, the decision to use glossy plastics is puzzling since these are, in fact, military vehicles.
After Processed Plastic Company closed their doors for good it was a foregone conclusion that we'd never see the likes of these tanks again unless they were listed on Ebay or found sitting on a table at some yard sale. Jeff Imel did what some of us wanted to do so badly. And that was to somehow bring them back from the fate that was dealt to them by the dreaded Chinese clones. I know I did. Well, we got our wish. Only now we don't have to search the discount brick & mortars to find one. They're just a mouse click away. Time to even the score.
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| The classic and the reissue |
After Processed Plastic Company closed their doors for good it was a foregone conclusion that we'd never see the likes of these tanks again unless they were listed on Ebay or found sitting on a table at some yard sale. Jeff Imel did what some of us wanted to do so badly. And that was to somehow bring them back from the fate that was dealt to them by the dreaded Chinese clones. I know I did. Well, we got our wish. Only now we don't have to search the discount brick & mortars to find one. They're just a mouse click away. Time to even the score.
7 comments:
....the 3 tank set on Amazon is around 15 bucks. What did you pay for yours at the discount store?
Thanks,
Clarence
They're only available on Amazon now. Prior to 2005 they were only available in discount stores.
..I bought the re-issue set recently and looking under the tank's bodies, some are marked with the number 2 and others with a 1. I'm assuming that at the "factory" where the tanks are made they probably have quite a few molds. It would be interesting to see the molds themselves....
I think there are at least 2 cavities in each mold. And yes, it would be VERY interesting to see that mold!
But like the helicopter reissue, no sticker, no star. Why is that? Stickers are made for the Hercules gunship. It wouldn't be that expensive to make a run of reissued decals for the tanks and copters, would it?
Having stickers applied to each vehicle in the factory would not be cost effective.
However, the TimMee Army Blog has created Reissue Stickers that could be available exclusively from us early next year depending on how much interest there is in them. The first run have already been printed and will be featured in an article sometime in January.
Oh, wow, that's great news! Looking forward.
Thanks.
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