Tuesday 19 March 2019

Galoob Sneak Previews Motorized Pocket Viewer Cassette


UPC: 4724604901
PRODUCT CODE: 4901
RELEASE YEAR: 1984

THE CASSETTE WAS ALSO SOLD COMBINED WITH A VIEWER THAT CAN BE SEEN HERE

Galoob Sneak Previews Motorized Pocket Viewer and Cassette


UPC: 04724604900
PRODUCT CODE: 4900
RELEASE YEAR: 1984

THE CASSETTE WAS ALSO SOLD SEPARATELY AND CAN BE SEEN HERE

Sunday 10 February 2019

Jan-Michael Vincent AKA String-Fellow Hawke - 1944 to 2019 (R.I.P)


We sadly report that Jan-Michael Vincent died today aged 74.

We will link to an Obituary if one surfaces

The airwolf facebook group now has a thread were you can REPLY and leave your condolences.

Monday 4 February 2019

Don't Get Ripped Off Over Books

I'm often really shocked at the price some airwolf stuff is sold for. Obviously some stuff is really worth the asking price due to the rarity of the item, yet other stuff just isn't rare at all and your often being ripped off by a so called fellow fan.

I have seen the "Airwolf 1" book on sale for as much as $320 and i have seen the "Airwolf 2" book going for between $80 & $150. These were not new, sealed or mint in any way shape or form, some even had yellow stained pages.

It's a sad case of fans trying to rip off fans simply because buyers trust sites they know and will pay over the odds for that level of comfort. I bet you can't guess how much i got both of these books for...


So ill tell you.

Airwolf 1 = £2.95 TOTAL INC'S SHIPPING from London to Liverpool
Airwolf 2 = £2.95 TOTAL INC'S SHIPPING from London to Liverpool
That would have often cost me in the region of £40 to £70 on eBay and around £8 shipping FOR ONE All depends on the day you look (on ebay)

What if i told you i even managed to get a copy of  Airwolf Das Buch  for a mere £10.06, this is Never cheep on ebay
THAT TOTAL i paid INC'S SHIPPING TO THE UK  all the way from a basic book shop in Germany!
That would have cost me in the region of £70 to £120 on eBay and around £8 to £15 shipping.

During my merch guide research i came across a few random places  (i will NOT link this)  That way i can not be accused of earning money OR any kinda incentives. This post is about YOU not being ripped off, not me earning referrals!

A website called  AbeBooks was what i used (amazon is a parent company) Abe is used by bog standard every day "Second Hand Book Shops" all around the world, not just collectors!
As such a book on abe for say £2.95 inc shipping is probably currently on the shelf in the shop for around £0.70 to £1.20. It's just a 2nd hand book for sale, not some kinda rare as hell asset.

To a book shop its just a 2nd hand book, however to ebay sellers its like some kinda meal ticket and your a mug for paying them prices.
I also chose abe because you do not have to store payment info, you can just type it in every time you order something. This i felt is important, if abe was ever breached.. no payment info can be stolen unless you'd stored it.

Just google AbeBooks, then search for  Airwolf, look at the prices of the books between Lowest/Highest,  then look at the prices for Highest/Lowest. You'll swiftly see the difference between a second hand book shop & scum bags tryna rip off fans.

Ide do it soon too, no doubt a vast chunk of the so called community will buy them up after reading this, and suddenly they will be worth $300+ because them scum bags will be your only option to buy one.

So before the traders and scabs in our community wipe out the current stocks from random sellers.. dig in and get ya self something :)

I could have bought 6 of each for the usual price of just one off ebay  AND I NEVER

I HOPE NONE OF YOU BULK BUY.... OUR COMMUNITY IS DAMAGED ENOUGH !

IM ALSO NOT SAYING EVERYONE SHOULD USE ABEBOOKS..
I AM SUGGESTING YOU SHOP AROUND.. AND AVOID THESE RATS WHO PLAGUE THE FRANCHISES FAN BASE..
THOSE WHO OFTEN CLAIM TO BE PART OF IT BUT ONLY HANG ROUND TO MILK IT!


o,  and your welcome......

Heres a shot from ABE Books


4th February 2019







Thursday 31 January 2019

Airwolf, 1/64 scale ERTL 1 Piece Toy Set Die-Cast Model (1984-91)


We sadly lack a release date for this product and we're also unable to attach some rotor blade and tail codes to some countries packaging.

Each toy contains a code which can be seen through the packaging. In this release, it is often under the tip of the main rotor OR under the tail boom.

The code defines the date the toy was manufactured and the single letter defines which plant.

The problem we face however is this, we have codes from unwrapped toys and we have card images with no codes for the toy. In turn this has complicated adding packaging art to some release screens because the packaging and dates are actually different.

Some are made in  "British Crown Colony of Hong Kong" and some are made in "Macao" it also appears they were later released as  "Made in China" and the china release appear the most common, however the Hong Kong appears to be a genuine 1984 release.

We need to no what codes are tied to what country so we can add the right country's box arts and chart manufacturing counts by the codes.

For the 1 piece blister card release in our software database we can confirm 1975W and 1051Q,  we can also confirm seeing genuine 1984 releases wearing the codes 3294W and 3564W

Codes dates via the Julian calendar, as such the first 3 digits are the day in the year and the last number is the year it's self, as such the 3564W is 1984, the 1975W is 1985 and the 1051Q is 1991, we've also seen a 1091Q, proving at-least 2 product runs in 1991, this 1991 production run is not long after Das Buch was released in germany and RTL re-aired the show for the first time since 1984.

These codes don't just help us date each release, they also help us understand how many production runs this toy got and on what dates.

NOTE MANY FANS POST IMAGES OF THIS TOY AND WHEN I ASK FOR CODES "MOST"  DON'T EVEN REPLY. I HAVE NO IDEA WHY THIS IS BUT AS OF NOW IM DONE LOGGING ERTL MANUFACTURE CODES FOR THIS RELEASE.. CONGRATS...  

HERE IS WHAT WE HAVE SO FAR

1/64: = 3294W (British Crown Colony of Hong Kong)
1/64: = 3564W (British Crown Colony of Hong Kong)
1/64: = 1505W (British Crown Colony of Hong Kong)
1/64: = 1975W (1985 China)
1/64: = 2045W
(1985 China) 
1/64: = 2465W (1985 China)
1/64: = 2645W (1985 China)
1/64: = 0836G (1986 China)
1/64: = 1467G (1987 China)
1/64: = 1001Q (1991 China)
1/64: = 1051Q (1991 China)
1/64: = 1091Q (1991 China) 
1/64: = 1121Q (1991 China) 
1/64: = 27178 (19?? Macao)

It's also been brought to my attention that sometimes a Card back has 1121Q but the toy itself has 1051Q.

If you wish to help, Please provide us with the Rotor Code or the Code Under the tail boom & the country of origin if you still have the packaging for it. Even a single code is useful as some blister card backs are hard to read. I will update this post as we receive more codes to keep an online real-time updated list (outside of the merch guide app) for simplicity.

We have most of the releases found so far above in the merch guide (so if a loose toy is bought) you can look up the code under the tail or the rotor and look it up in our guide to se its packaging & origins. If the codes not in the guide & its not on this page then we need the code ;)

We've managed to pair up some photo sets from misc online sellers, so a products code screen can actually show you a sealed blister card and also the loose toy (as they match that packaging with no iffs or butts) due to the manufacture code rather than the UPC or Product code ;)

You really do have to under stand the merch guide to truly see just how cool it is when it comes together from varied sources.

Note the rack hanging hole also changed at some stage, i have yet to see a China release with the triangle type hole and as such i have arranged the following images in order of what i  ASSUME  is the order of releases between 1984 and 1991

Hong Kong
Macao
China
LINKING NOTE:
Sadly this blog link might change once we confirm a release date, as that post date change will then alter this pages current link, again this is why the Blog is way behind the app right now. This post shouldn't be sitting in the January 2019 section of the blog.

Airwolf, 1/64 scale ERTL 3 Piece Toy Set Die-Cast Model (198?)


We sadly lack a release date for this product and we're also unable to attach any rotor blade codes or tail codes to a country of manufacture.

Each toy contains a code which can be seen through the packaging, in this set, it is often under the tip of the main rotors. Sometimes maybe under the tail.

The code defines the date the toy was manufactured and the single letter defines which plant.

The problem we face however is this, we have codes from unboxed toys and we have box images with no codes for the toys inside. In turn this has complicated adding box arts to release screens, because boxes are actually different at times.

Some are made in  "British Crown Colony of Hong Kong" and a similar set were marked on the back as "Made in China"

We need to no what codes are tied to what country so we can add the right country's box arts.



For the 3 piece sets we have three positive code matches. we can confirm 0135W, 0385W and 0775W all belong to the 3 piece sets. We know this because the SA 206B wasn't sold separately.

NOTE MANY FANS POST IMAGES OF THIS TOY AND WHEN I ASK FOR CODES "MOST"  DON'T EVEN REPLY. I HAVE NO IDEA WHY THIS IS BUT AS OF NOW IM DONE LOGGING ERTL MANUFACTURE CODES FOR THIS RELEASE.. CONGRATS...  

I assume there are more codes related to this set and ide like to tie off this section with the help of more codes and what country release they are from.

These codes i'm looking for won't just help us date each release, they also help us understand how many production runs this set got and on what dates.

HERE IS WHAT WE HAVE SO FAR

1/64: = 0135W (unknown country Its a 206B santini air heli from a 3 piece set) 1985
1/64: = 0385W (unknown country Its a 206B santini air heli from a 3 piece set) 1985
1/64: = 0775W (unknown country Its a 206B santini air heli from a 3 piece set) 1985
1/64: = 0785W (unknown country Its APPARENTLY an airwolf heli from a 3 piece set) 1985

With those 3x  206B codes we know the plant ran off at-least 3 manufacture runs

We have managed to identify a 3 full piece set (though we lack a box code from the box top left)

1/64: = 0435W (1985 3 piece set hong kong) Jeep
1/64: = 0775W (1985 3 piece set hong kong) 206B
1/64: = 0785W (1985 3 piece set hong kong) Airwolf

the jeep could be from a different set, we have no idea as the set had been opened 

If you have an OPEN set, we could also do with more JEEP codes (we assume its under the roof or the base)  but to provide us with Santini Air Helicopter and Airwolf Helicopter codes all's you need to is tilt the box & look under the tail boom or the main rotor for 3 numbers & a letter.

We need the codes & the country off the back of the box to make our guide more search friendly, so "loose toys" can be identified by date and maybe offer a visual of the packaging you never got with it.

Here are the two box backs, i assume the colour difference is only due to the lighting of the image and i assume both releases looked the same (besides the manufacturing country noted on the back)

China

Hong Kong
So what makes me so sure we are missing information ?

Well its like this...

1/64 Airwolf (3 Piece Set) Product Code 1230
and
1/64 Airwolf (single blister card) Product Code 1231

Notice the three piece set has an Earlier product number? and yet the only 3 piece manufacture date codes we've managed to obtain are from 1985.  We have records of a lot of 1/64 airwolf single toys on a blister card that have codes spanning from 1984 to 1991. So just were are the 1984  3 piece sets?

We have loads of pictures for the 3 piece sets and no idea whats what, i certainly can't and wont attach china or hong kong box artwork to the wrong codes just so the screens look nice as thats sharing round bogus information  ;)

I did ask someone who flaunted 2 boxed sets and a loose set, unfortunately he totally blanked my comments on his post while casually replying to everyone else, so i blocked the ignorant f..   This appears to happen a lot, im unsure if im just generally hated or if every time i ask in public someone messages them to spread a lil BS.. for what ever the reason though this project & the software is becoming a real fkn drag... and its holding back the blog posts.... because theirs NO DATE to file stuff under.. APP just needs a prod code or upc, the blog ideally needs a date right? a time line..

REMEMBER You don't need to open anything to provide us with these codes & our guide is FREE... so lets try and make it a great COMMUNITY project.... and a fantastic free resource!

LINKING NOTE:
Sadly this blog link might change once we confirm an initial  release date, as that post date change will then alter this pages current time line blog link. Again this is why the Blog is way behind the app right now. This post should NOT be sitting in the January 2019 section of the blog, it should be back down in 84 or 85 somewhere.