Leigh’s Diecast Diary

Today’s news is all about 2010 Formula One replicas.

First up, Minichamps has supplied us with sample images of their 1:43 Michael Schumacher 2010 Mercedes showcar (DC210403P). Hopefully this means that the release date for the end of May is still on target.

Last thing today Mattel announced a new 1:43 two car set, commemorating Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa’s Ferrari 1-2 in the 2010 Bahrain Grand Prix (DC210408B2). This was Ferrari’s 80th 1-2 victory, and the set will be limited to just 3,000 pieces worldwide. I love it when specials are announced from races that I’ve been to!

Today we received our first Amalgam replica from the 2010 Formula One season, which was the 1:4 Ferrari F10 steering wheel, as handled by Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso (AML1009).

There were also some new Norev announcements today. You can click here to see them all, the highlights being the 1:18 2010 Renault R30s of Robert Kubica (DC21011) and Vitaly Petrov (DC21012). Minichamps has only announced the 2010 Renault showcars in 1:18 so far.

Today we received the new Minichamps delivery for the week. Everything on it was in 1:43 scale, the highlights being Romain Grosjean’s 2009 Renault R29 (DC29408G) and the Aston Martin V8 Vantage in metallic red (P137425).

Some of you will have noticed that the webcast has now lost its place at the bottom of the front page of our diecast site. Now that we have our new turntable that shows images of the models all the way around, this has effectively replaced the webcasts, which showed you the same thing. So, all you need to do from now on to continue to see all-encompassing views of the latest releases is to visit the ‘New releases’ section on our website.

We were excited today to find that we had a few spare of the Minichamps 1:12 Valentino Rossi 2008 Barcelona figure (PO80086). We are offering these to loyal diary readers first through our Orderline on 0844 887 8888. Of course, we are only charging the original RRP of £39.99, when there are some unscrupulous Ebay sellers charging twice that!

There were a few new announcements from Sun Star today, the highlight being their latest 1:18 Ford Escort rally car, of Ari Vatanen from the 1982 Rally of Ireland (SS4449).

There was also a new modern rallying subject in the form of Mads Ostberg’s Subaru Impreza WRC from the 2010 Rally of Sweden (SS4481), and a new roadgoing Ford in the form of a Ford Escort XR3i saloon in red (SS4981).

Minichamps also announced a new road car replica today, which was the 1:43 2010 Alfa Romeo Giulietta in white (P120000).

Some of you may have noticed that a few Spark models which have been due to be released by now have still not arrived with us. There are a couple of deliveries that have been stuck in Hong Kong because of the fallout from the volcanic ash cloud, but we hope to see these models released soon.

Spark also confirmed a release date of towards the end of May for some more of their 1:43 replicas today. These include Mike Spence’s Lotus 25 from the 1965 Dutch Grand Prix (SPK1619), and Stefano Modena’s Tyrrell 020 from the 1991 Monaco Grand Prix (SPK1732).

I realised today that I never discussed the AUTOart 2010 announcements in this blog, having had them available to pre-order on our website for some time now!

My personal highlight was the Pagani Zonda R in a ‘carbon fibre pattern’ (AA78261). I think that’s AUTOart’s way of telling everyone that the actual 1:18 model won’t be constructed from carbon fibre!

There is also what is essentially a re-release of the sold out 1:18 1991 Le Mans winning Mazda 787B of Herbert, Gachot and Weidler (AA89142), although AUTOart has got around that with this ‘new’ limited edition also coming with a replica of the winner’s trophy as well.

It is also interesting to see AUTOart taking on CMC with the 1:18 Bugatti Atlantic, in blue (AA70942) and black (AA70941).

This being AUTOart, however, we will not know what the final retail prices are going to be until the models are almost released. And, also with this being AUTOart, it will probably be next year before we see any of these new announcements released anyway!

We were spoilt with new deliveries today, receiving new replicas from Minichamps, Kyosho and Mattel! You can click here to see everything that we received.

The Minichamps highlight was Fernando Alonso’s 1:43 2009 Renault R29 (DC29407), which leaves only three 2009 1:43 Formula One race cars to be released; Piquet (DC29408), Grosjean (DC29408G) and Kobayashi (DC29410K).

Kyosho’s highlight was its 1:18 replica of the #25 Ferrari GTO from the 1963 Le Mans 24 Hours (KY8434A).

Mattel had two interesting new 1:18 replicas on its delivery, which were the Ferrari Mondial 8 3.2 (HW9889) and, most exciting of all, the Tom Selleck Magnum P.I. Ferrari 308 GTS (HW9908).

Having received so many new releases today, I hope that doesn’t leave me with nothing to talk about tomorrow!

Today Shelby Collectibles announced an exciting new subject in the form of a 1:18 Stirling Moss car.

It is Moss’s 1959 Aston Martin DBR1 from the World Sportscar Championship (DC559B). In that season he won the races at the Nurburgring and Goodwood.

As you would expect, we are also offering this 1:18 Aston Martin DBR1 signed by Stirling Moss (DC559BS).

We hope to take delivery of the replica during the summer, and should be able to get Stirling to sign it for us pretty much straight away, so there will be a minimal time lag if you do opt for the signed version!

Welcome to this week’s Diecast Legends Podcast, which brings you the latest releases in the world of diecast models. This week we have new releases from AUTOart and Sun Star. Highlights include AUTOart’s 1:18 2008 Nissan Skyline Super GT, and Sun Star’s 1:18 1991 Lancia Delta driven by Juha Kankunnen and 1979 Ford Escort Mk.II driven by Hannu Mikkola.
Keep the comments rolling in. You’ll need quicktime installed to view the video on this post.

 

 Diecast Legends Podcast - 03/05/2010 [3:53m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1315)

You can also view this podcast on youtube by clicking here

The diecast models featured on this weeks podcast are;
AUTOart 1/18 #12 2008 Nissan GTR Super GT
AUTOart 1/18 Porsche 911 2.7 RS
AUTOart 1/18 Porsche 911 GT2
AUTOart 1/18 Alfa Romeo Montreal
AUTOart 1/18 Ford Mustang Bulliitt edition
AUTOart 1/18 Porsche 924 Carrera GT
AUTOart 1/18 Mercedes C63 AMG
AUTOart 1/12 Ducati Paul Smart 1000
Sun Star 1/18 Clark 2008 Ford Focus WRC
Sun Star 1/18 Ketomaa 2009 Subaru Impreza WRC
Sun Star 1/18 Mouton 1982 Audi Quattro
Sun Star 1/18 Duval 2008 Ford Focus WRC
Sun Star 1/18 Kankkunen 1991 Lancia Delta
Sun Star 1/18 Mikkola 1979 Ford Escort Mk.II

Remember you can subscribe to the podcast by clicking the purple podcast icon at the top right or use this link if you wish to subscribe via itunes.

I hope you enjoyed watching the podcast. Please feel free to leave any comments on what you thought of it or anything you would like us to feature in future shows below.

Today Amalgam announced their first replicas from the 2010 Formula One season. These are for the McLaren and Ferrari teams.

The good news is that this year is the first time that Amalgam will be replicating both drivers for each team, rather than only picking one driver and then disappointing fans of the ‘forgotten’ team-mate!

So, you can now pre-order 1:12 2010 McLaren MP4/25 nose cone replicas of both Jenson Button (AML1004) and Lewis Hamilton (AML1005), as well as the 1:4 McLaren MP4/25 steering wheel (AML1006).

It’s the same story with Ferrari, so you can also now pre-order 1:12 2010 Ferrari F10 nose cone replicas of both Felipe Massa (AML1007) and Fernando Alonso (AML1008), and the 1:4 Ferrari F10 steering wheel as well (AML1009).

We hope to see these pieces released as early as next month. Fingers crossed!