Auto World Vintage Muscle - 1964 Pontiac Grand Prix CHASE!

I never find anything good!  *sob*

Then a random find, Wednesday night.  My nephew asked for some crap Power Rangers toy.  Like a good uncle(depends on who you ask), I check the Toys R Us nearby.  No Power Rangers, but look what I find amongst fresh stock of Auto World!

Red chase!!!

I already have the blue one, but I must say, this is a beautiful piece.  As usual, flawless Auto World detailing.  :)

Tomica LImited Vintage NEO: LV-N125a Isuzu Gemini Patio('87) + LV-N126a Nissan Skyline 25GT-X Mobile Investigation Vehicle('00)

First of all, special thanks to fellow TLV collector Jarrod, aka Spacegoat for letting me use these pictures.  You can check out his gallery here for his latest cars.  

What led me to ask Jarrod for this favor were these wheels.  Both latest Tomica Limited Vintage cars, but observe:

First, plain wheels of Isuzu Gemini.  Very minimal detailing without any paint or openings.

Then we get this Skyline with open spokes & brake rotors peeking behind them.

Very nice, but WTF is going on with this company.  Supra wheels were the same way.  First sets had ugly plain wheels.  Second wave had "openings" painted in black & looked much better.  I personally expect lot more than that from TLV.  Speaking of WTF, I found this in Jarrod's Flickr gallery:

lmao

Hot Wheels Hall of Fame Legends Larry Wood Evil Twin + Saleen S7

I want to say that Evil Twin was a freebie thrown in with something else.  I can't remember.  Sorry to say, couple of forgettable releases for me.

Johnny Lightning 60s Sizzle '69 Chevy Camaro SS

Putting up some old pics of old cars.  I wish I kept this one carded.  Cool packaging.

Hot Wheels Car Culture Series - Japan Historics: Nissan Skyline HT 2000GT-X, Toyota 2000GT, '71 Datsun 510 Wagon & Nissan Skyline 2000 GT-R Kenmeri Police

So I have the Mazda RX-3 posted by itself here.  RX-3 by far was my favorite.  I'm not the biggest fan of 510 wagons by Hot Wheels, but it's my second favorite in the series.  I doubt it'll touch the $uper Treasure version, or the TLV wagon, but it's still cool.

Skyline & 2000GT were 'meh' for me.  Still quite an upgrade over the other Hot Wheels premium line I've been seeing which were consistently "ugh", or "zzz....".

First the Skyline:

Toyota 2000 GT

Very bumpy/grainy looking surface painted in green.

510 Wagon:

My favorite angle.  Great looking rims & tires.

Last one: Kenmeri Police.....  I think this one had the potential to be the best in the series, but in my opinion, it lacked couple of things.  First the good:  Great casting & killer rims/tires.

Now the two points deducted:  1) Whenever the roof mounted police light's missing, you deduct a point for that.  Those things cost money to produce, I understand, I still deduct a point.  2) White fender flares.  See the shot with the Tomica counterpart for example.  To those who are familiar with Japanese "patrol cars"(Japanese name for police cars, 'patocar' for short), breaks/gaps those white fender flares create are strange sight.

Click here for the Tomica Kenmeri patrol car.

It'd been nice if Mattel actually had better distribution channels to get these to your local stores($4 a car).  I check a lot of stores, many different chains & I witnessed exactly one casting(Kenmeri Skyline police).  It was defective, so I left it.  Many collectors paid the markup & shipping from online resellers.