Popped in with my Christmas parcel from our upcountry family in 2019 was this lovely £1 bag of plastic soldiers and tanks.
They are the remnants of a playset style bag from a charity shop, picked up pre-Lockdown in late 2019. They were popped in alongside our Christmas presents as padding or packing in the Christmas parcel before posting. Who needs bubble wrap?
Please note: These were photographed in the poor light of Winter 2019 / 2020. I don’t think I posted these then for some reason.
Larger copies of familiar Airfix figures in two colours
Figures seen here in size order compared to the size of an original 54mm Airfix WW2 British Infantryman.
Again the slight size difference in the same bag of the same poses is interesting … two different factories? Two different mould tools?
Arriving without a header card, a bit of web research and toyshop browsing reveals that these Airfix figure and tank copies are HTI figures, made in China.
Similar bags are still available July 2020 in toy shops, post offices and seaside stores or from online suppliers such as here at Amazon, including with good copies of the Airfix pre-assembled OOHO Centurion tank.
I think that’s enough publicity for buying these here from Amazon (July 2020) for one post.
Buy them where you see them and certainly support your local toy shop.
Just seeing the wonky mixed scale content of these playsets so attractively photographed gives me simple childhood joy.
How have sizes changed from the Airfix originals?
I posted some comparison shots here:
I really like the running infantryman figure, it originated as the advancing Airfix German infantry man with rifle but in the process of copying over forty to fifty years has become more generic, simpler and smaller. It now has more of a traditional toy soldier look, especailly if painted up in gloss toy soldier paint style.
I can never have enough of these running plastic toy soldier figures!
How do they measure up as they get smaller?
The smaller running rifleman or standing rifleman is just under 38-40mm from base to the top of his helmet (or if you measure to the eyes about 35-36mm)
The larger running rifleman is about 42mm from base to top of helmet, 38mm to the eyeliner, which is the usual size that I have encountered these before on these smaller figures. Quite a size drop from the 54mm Airfix originals.
This brings these broadly into line with 40mm Prince August figures for example.
Blog posted by Mark Man of TIN, January / July 2020.
Pound Store Plastic Warriors 
I love the way that your LRDG crews have cut their plastic windscreens down to stop glare from the sun giving them away, Mark! The jeeps work well as stand-ins for larger Chevvys with the few simple add-ons that you have put on.
Do you not find that being easily pleased is the secret to happiness in life? A fine Trockenbeerenauslese, or a Pukka Pie. Why choose; they go together nicely? 🙂
Regards, Chris
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The cut down screen is not only more accurate but also solved the slight out of scale issue with old Airfix version 1 1960s 8th Army – it was a brilliant suggestion from one of my blog readers. Military models they may not be but as game pieces, yes they work well enough. (Would Featherstone approve? Probably yes)
Being ‘Easily pleased’ is the secret to happiness in life. As is dual citizenship with Poundland. Why stress about the elusive perfection? Mmmmm. Pies . Now there’s a thought.
The original comments were here https://manoftinblog.wordpress.com/2020/01/12/more-desert-kit-and-equipment-from-scratch/
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The Range are doing a bigger pack of the above, four tanks, two jeeps, two sandbag emplacements, one tent and three or four barbed wire, plus about 90 infantry for £4.47 🙂
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Brillant. Thanks for the tip off. That’s really good value for children – of all ages!
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I’m asking myself why I bought two 😉
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