Leigh’s Diecast Diary

We received a new Minichamps delivery today, which contained items such as the two 1:43 2007 Toyota F1 showcars of Ralf Schumacher (Product Code - DC27411P) and Jarno Trulli (Product Code - DC27412P), and the 1:43 Audi R8 from the Lime Rock round of the 2006 American Le Mans Series (Product Code - P061302). The significance of this car is that it took the R8’s 50th victory in the series before it was replaced by the diesel R10, and listed all the circuits at which the car had won and all the drivers who had taken victory driving it on its bodywork.

Amalgam confirmed today that the price of their 1:12 2007 Formula One nosecones will be going up to £69.99. Any of you who have already pre-ordered them from us though will be laughing, as you will be saving yourselves a significant £20 on the new retail price. We should receive the Ferrari (Product Code - AML732) and Spyker (Product Code - AML735) nosecones soon.

There won’t be an entry tomorrow as it’s the annual Grand Prix Legends management cycling trip. A 30 mile ride into Brighton tomorrow, before those of us who have survived that ride back up to Guildford on Saturday. Why we’re subjected to it every year, I’ll never know! Last year it took about a week before I could sit down again. If there’s no entry on Monday either, you’ll know it didn’t go well!

Today we received Sun Star’s second 1:12 Morris Minor replica, the cream Tourer (Product Code - SS4771). The detail is as impressive as on the first release of the black saloon (Product Code - SS4781), if not more so, as with this version you have the added intricacies of the fold-away canvas roof.

We also finally received restocks of two of Universal Hobbies’ 1:16 tractors that we had built up literally hundreds of backorders on. These are the Fordson Power Major (Product Code - J2640), and the Fordson E27N (Product Code - J2642). Both of these can now be ordered straight from stock once more.

Today Exoto blessed us with a delivery of some brand new releases. Top of the pile was Nigel Mansell’s 1992 carbon fibre version of his Williams-Renault FW14B (Product Code - GP97114). The carbon fibre finish looks very good, certainly something different for your collection. We are also offering this replica signed of course (Product Code - GP97114S), so we will try to meet up with ‘Il Leone’ as soon as possible to get that completed.

As well as the Williams we also received two of Exoto’s 1:43 classic transporters, the yellow 1936 Ferrari version (Product Code - GP001), and the scarlet 1936 Alfa Romeo version (Product Code - GP002).

As for the Turkish Grand Prix on Sunday, I think it’s incredible that in the 12 races so far the top four guys have all won three times each. Thanks to Hamilton’s puncture Raikkonen got the minimum four points back on him that he needed to stay in realistic (ish) contention for the title, but the Finn’s hanging onto Lewis by his fingernails! Not to worry though, I’m going to the next two Grands Prix, so that should be enough to scupper Kimi’s chances for good!

Good news! We actually received our delivery of Minichamps 1:12 Rossi 2007 Yamahas (Product Code - PO73046) today, when I wasn’t expecting them until next Tuesday after the Bank Holiday, so our warehouse guys were kept extremely busy working on getting all of those despatched.

As if that wasn’t enough for them to contend with, we also received our shipment of our most popular 1:18 road car of the year, Sun Star’s Ford Escort XR3. Both colourways arrived, black (Product Code - SS4972) and yellow (Product Code - SS4971).

Finally, Mattel provided us with an image of their new 1:18 Ferrari 125S from their Elite range (Product Code - HW2977). It can be viewed on the website now.

F1’s summer break is finally over, and this weekend’s Turkish Grand Prix promises to be a blinder. Have Hamilton and Alonso made up? Can Ferrari really hope to claw the sizeable points deficit back in both championships with just six races to go? There’s a lot at stake!

Normally Yat Ming’s 1:18 replicas aren’t the most exciting subjects of all time, but they’re on to a real winner with the classic 1960 Lotus Elite.

Four variations have been released, which all arrived into stock today. You can choose two road car versions, in blue (Product Code - YM92768B) and white (Product Code - YM92768W), or two racing versions, a red #37 example (Product Code - YM92769R), or a yellow #38 (Product Code - YM92769Y). The Elite has never been available in 1:18 before.

We also received a sample image of Minichamps’ 1:12 Valentino Rossi 1999 ‘standard livery’ Aprilia 250 CCM (Product Code - P990086), which has now been uploaded onto our site. We hope that we will see this replica released in the next couple of months.

We have finally managed to obtain some stock of the elusive Minichamps 1:12 replica of Noriyuki Haga’s 2004 Brands Hatch World Superbike Ducati 999 F03 (Product Code - PO40241BH).

The limited edition run of this model was just 1,001 pieces, with the Renegade Ducati team taking delivery of all of them. At Brands Hatch in 2004 Renegade Ducati ran with an exciting one-off livery to commemorate their new tie-up with Koji. Haga performed brilliantly to win both races.

All of the examples that we have been able to acquire have been signed by Haga himself, and while they are not inexpensive, we are making no more on them than any other Minichamps replicas, and you will not find these elsewhere. We have been trying to source these for two years, and they are now finally in our warehouse!

In other two wheeled diecast news, Minichamps confirmed today that we will see the dirty Rossi Mugello bike (Product Code - PO16186) and the 2006 re-release (Product Code - PO63046U) by the end of September. Next week, of course, will see the release of his 2007 Yamaha YZR-M1 (Product Code - PO73046).

Finally today, we took delivery of Revell’s 1:32 Jim Clark 1965 Lotus Cortina slotcar (Product Code - RV8398). We’re assuming no-one is going to be disrespectful enough to race a beautiful replica like this round a Scalextric circuit, while Jim Clark still has a huge following so we had plenty of pre-orders built up on this one.

Today we received our first 1:43 replica from the 2007 Le Mans 24 Hours, impressively just two months after the race itself. It is from Spark and of the Peugeot 908 of Villeneuve, Minassian and Gene (Product Code - SPK1272). Although the car didn’t finish the race, there are a lot of JV fans still out there so this model is selling quickly.

We also received what has been one of our most popular ever Minichamps 1:43 road cars, the 1976 Ford Fiesta XR2 in metallic silver (Product Code - P085160).

Mattel confirmed today exactly ‘which’ red their 2007 Ferrari Formula One replicas will come in. For the first four races of the year the team ran in a more orange Marlboro shade of red, before switching to a darker metallic red from Monaco onwards. Mattel’s replicas will be the shade of red used in the early part of the season.

What is interesting though is that Ferrari have won 197 Grands Prix in their illustrious history so far, and will surely notch up their 200th before the end of the season (hopefully via Raikkonen!) I can’t see Mattel letting an event like that pass by without a special commemorative model, so hopefully we will also see at least one replica from them in the metallic red.

What with Goodwood, the Donington BTCC and the European Grand Prix I thought I’d used up my quota of wet motorsport days this year, until I went to Brands Hatch for the BTCC yesterday and got completely soaked through to the skin once again. It was great racing though, and with the now universally recognised equation of the greasier the track, the more exciting the racing, it can surely only be a matter of time before sprinkler systems become fitted as standard at all the leading circuits!

Anyway, diecast. It was one of those days today when a replica arrives that has been so long in the offing that everyone in the building couldn’t help themselves but rejoice at the sight of it. I am of course talking about the 1:18 2006 pre-season test orange McLarens, which I am happy to say are now in stock. The Raikkonen version (Product Code - DC2603T) is limited to 2,304 pieces, the Montoya version (Product Code - DC2604T) to 1,104.

The other new release today was the 1:18 Schumacher 2006 Monza special (Product Code - DC2605M), which we took our first delivery of. Some assembly is required with this one, as you have to screw the podium step with the Schumacher figure on it to the presentation’s leather base yourself. Two screws are provided but you will have to source your own screwdriver!

After a week of talking about forthcoming announcements I actually have some new release information today!

This week’s Minichamps delivery has now all been booked in and the good news is that, having received our second (and final) shipment of the 1:43 Hamilton 2007 McLaren showcar, have a few left over after fulfilling all of our remaining backorders. We are offering these to diary readers first, but are only accepting telephone orders for them, the number is 0870 460 3456. Our code is DC27402P. Move quickly if you want one!

The other new items for the week came through as expected, Mansell’s 1:43 1987 Williams (Product Code - P870005) and Kagayama’s 1:12 2005 Suzuki (Product Code - PO52271) the highlights. We also received Spark’s 1:43 replica of the insane Ford Transit Supervan 3 (Product Code - SPK283). I’m surprised that we’ve seen that released before Supervan 2 (Product Code - SPK282).

We also had a new delivery from Autoart, which contained two colourways of the new 1:18 Porsche 997 GT3 RS. We received orange with black stripe (Product Code - AA77991) and silver with orange stripe (Product Code - AA77993). We have been told to expect the last version, green with black stripe (Product Code - AA77992) in September’s shipment.

The long-awaited 1:18 Jaguar XK Cabriolet (Product Code - AA73636) was also on the delivery, but it has come through in silver instead of the black that was originally advertised.

Going back to forthcoming releases, Minichamps announced a price hike this morning on ALL the yet to be released 1:12 Rossi figures, from £22.99 to £26.99. This has been attributed to increasing production costs in China and the complicated decoration on the helmets. As ever, pre-orders we have already taken on these will be unaffected. If you ordered all 11, you’re quids in!

There were some more new announcements today, from Spark and their ‘luxury’ brand Red Line.

The new Spark subjects are Alex Zanardi’s 1:43 2007 WTCC BMW (Product Code - SPK406) and, in 1:18, the winning Peugeot from the 1993 Le Mans 24 Hours of Brabham, Bouchut and Helary (Product Code - SPA180015).

Red Line have announced some new 1:43 Ferraris, ranging from the beautiful 250 GTOs that finished second (Product Code - RL115) and third (Product Code - RL116) at Le Mans in 1962, to this year’s Formula One Ferraris. They will be replicating Kimi Raikkonen’s winning F2007 from Australia (Product Code - RL140), and Felipe Massa’s winning F2007 from Bahrain (Product Code - RL141). As with other recent replicas of Marlboro sponsored cars and bikes, we do not expect to see any Marlboro graphics reproduced on the F2007s.

While these Red Line replicas are not inexpensive, their releases are incredibly highly detailed and usually extremely limited. We will not be holding any stock of their items because the subjects are quite niche, so when they are released we will fulfil our backorders and then discontinue them. I’ve already ordered a Raikkonen Ferrari but that’s for me!