In case you didn't know, The Sir Topham Hatt ERTL Wind-Up appeared in a episode from The Sooty Show, and there were some of the die-casts in Chucklevision, Special Attraction. The ERTL diecast do show up in other TV shows as little easter eggs.
@Isles of Foreign Rails The ERTL models of Thomas and James appeared in the Full House episode, "Be True to Your Preschool"; Nicky and Alex can be seen playing with them when Uncle Jesse shows Aunt Becky the application for the Bouton Hall Preschool. An ERTL sticker face Thomas appears in the Bill Nye the Science Guy episode, "Structures", during a "Nifty Home Experiment" segment, where it can be seen crossing a bridge made out of drinking straws (at the time, Bill Nye aired alongside Shining Time Station on PBS).
Generally though, I must say they improved as they went on. Gordon always looked too stretchy to me, which may be more accurate to his real life proportions but resulted in him being shorter than most others. Also Edward's face, ugh. Otoh, 199 was terrific, so were Wilbert and 16, and as a kid who always felt sorry for Smudger, I was overjoyed to get him with a more sympathetic face.
Interestingly the Mini line had quite a bit of releases. Before keyrings and the Lego style sets I remember owning some playsets. Each set came with a piece of the world and a character. You could combine these sets and make a larger playset which at the time was pretty substantial. I remember them being super nice quality and definitely a ton better than those Lego ones
That’s really cool. I was shocked that the mini line had a ton of stuff because I just didn’t understand the appeal but reading some people explain to me the appeal has made me realize why this line was a thing
Ertl had so many fire items! I didn't know they made so much I only knew about a few of these. I'm also grateful to Ertl for kicking off Thomas merch (it would've probably happened anyway but it was the first when the show was made so I see it as the kick off.) Truly an amazing merch line that I can't help but love despite its flaws
@@joshuaW5621 I think its really cool that they made some Tugs characters in Ertl as well as Thomas ones! You should definitely make those edits! I'd love to see them!
Lately I’ve started doing edits of ERTL on Deviantart. This includes modify the characters to be more consistent and accurate. It also includes adding more characters and even the Tugs range they did.
4:39 The image you used is from, what I like to called, the O gauge Thomas pull backs. There were only 2, Thomas and Percy. 9:11 Those must be prototypes, because the one I remember had sticker faces.
The ERTL wiki didn’t say they were prototype unless I misread it. I couldn’t find them anywhere because if you search up ERTL Thomas Preschool toys you don’t really get anything
@@DianaSttar Okay, so I was wrong about the sticker faces, but those are prototypes as the faces in the retail versions are a bright orange, where as these are pale yellow.
Man, I loved these when I was a kid. My mother and grandparents got me a lot of the early season toys. Sadly most of mine have a lot of chips and paint damage or missing buffer stickers because they would bang against each other in the container I kept them in. I remember having to be careful with the coaches and trucks because they were just hollow plastic unlike the engines, vehicles and characters. Although I only remember seeing these on the shelves for about 5 years. I don't know if we ever saw any characters beyond season 5 here in Australia.
Still have all my old Ertl Thomas trains, and 4 of the miniature world playsets (where a hinged door on the bottom let you store the miniature trains in them) - I don't think I'd ver get rid of them...
ERTL Thomas toys were my favorite. I had the following: Thomas, Edward, Henry, Gordon, James, Toby, Duck, Donald & Douglas, Oliver, Diesel, Mavis, Bill & Ben, Bertie, Trevor, Harold, Duke, Skarloey, Rheneas, Sir Handel, Peter Sam, Rusty, Duncan, Stepney, D199, the Diesel from 'Bowled Out', Wilson, 16, Culdee and Godred. Also had Henrietta, a milk truck, an oil truck, 1 red coach, 1 green coach, the breakdown train and the Dragon.
I had them all. Still got most but 1 fuel tanker, Mavis and tiger moth got lost moving house and donald, carolije, george, harold and trevor were broken
I have the thomas with sticker face i was a fan idk where i got it from, i didn't get it when i was a kid i got it few month ago, i think either i got it from flee market or outside store
Ertl Gold Rail was not the only connection between Bandai and Ertl, as Bandai released Ertl the Thomas die cast line in Germany in the late 90s (1996-7/8), some points of note were that it had RTL2 on the packaging and had Teer and Milch instead of Tar and Milk respectively. Bandai also released Thomas Wooden Railway and My First Thomas in Germany around the same time too.
There was also special red variant of Sir Topham Hatts that came with a red livery and with the message “Happy Holidays” at the back. Not only this is like the third oldest range of Thomas merchandise next to the likes of Hornby and Wooden Railway, but also one of the most interesting pieces of merchandise in the show’s history.
I once owned a ertl metallic thomas but the being an idiot i was back in 2017 (or 2018) what to being the little idiot i was back then i completely ruined it
I'm such an idiot...I loved My ERTLs so much & had them for years but one time I got really bored & started to cut off all of buffers & couplings etc. Of course now as an adult I regret it so much because of how rare they now are...
I love the content (since I grew up with ERTL's toyline), but man your voice was too soft and low. Might want to consider mixing the audio a bit better for later, since I could barely hear you.
It gets a good amount of attention I just don’t see it as often as others like Wooden Railway or TrackMaster. That’s just me though I’m not in the ERTL community so your probably right about ERTL getting too much attention lol
I confess that I really want a Bear, but every time I look at his model I'm so disappointed in the lack of texturing on the face. I mean, 199 was friggin perfectly made years beforehand. 7101 seems to sell for over 100 dollars these days, so I tend to content myself with a very fine spiritual successor model, Derek.
So fun story about that video actually. I’m working on that video with a friend who knows a whole lot about Thomas dubs and he is helping me out with it. Idk if we are going to include the illegal dubs because that is how it started but I think we will mention them
@@DianaSttar Ok please do mention them as the illegal Dubs are very rare there is only some illegal Dubs that are known to exist like the Persian dubs the uyghur dub and the basma channel dub so if you want to find any of these dubs, just search them up on RU-vid, also in that video can you also add lost dubs
ERTL made some really cool stuff and it stinks how their potential is just not used. But I doubt any of the old toy designers are still at the company. Also I agree with you John Deer toys can just be so trash
@Gannons Post I also want to make a custom Godred. I want to smash one Office Space style to make a Snowden Mtn Linda the real Godred. I love how happy the toy is even though it's real life fate is to be destroyed horribly and cannibalized... it's a very nice thought. 😊
Just to talk about some of the stuff you discussed.. 1. Maybe the reason Smudger and Bertram had different faces was because they didn't want children to be confused and think both were the same character. 2. I think the reason due to ERTL's worldwide discontinuation (Outside of the UK I mean.) was due to a Learning Curve merchandise contract. Note how Take Along (Released) and Wooden Railway (Updated) in 2002, a year after ERTL's discontinuation in other countries. Sorry if I'm being rude, but I just wanted to inform you on... stuff.
That’s not rude at all thanks for informing me. I get where you are coming from with Smudger and Bertram’s faces but I don’t agree I still think Smudger’s face is just wrong and it doesn’t even look close to what it is supposed too.
I can explain the minis as someone who was a child during that time and owned them. It was the days of Polly Pocket where the appeal was a playset you can carry anywhere especially play during long car rides.
Sadly it is. Bluebell was originally gonna be more accurate to the RWS/rl Bluebell but ERTL then decided to be lazy and just repaint Thomas for some reason. Strangely this later inspired a Hornby model of an E2 in SECR green, which while not historically accurate does look pretty cool.
I personally don’t believe that the Silly Vans were ever UK exclusives. I think this because there was a Leokimvideo collection video from 2011 and at one point in the video, one of the Silly Vans was featured. I mention this because Leokimvideo lives in Sydney Australia.
The silly trucks and spiteful brakevan are dated 2001, suggesting they were planned to come out earlier than they did. This would be interesting if they did come out in Australia, unless he just ordered them online.
@@Alzaar_The_Gunzel maybe the previous owner got them from Britain? Being from the nearby country, we never got Take Along Rusty but my mom got him in New York. There’s always the possibility right?
@@Alzaar_The_Gunzel l just found out that you were right. ERTL did continue in Australia in 2002. Some say it lasted there in 2003 and 2004, but we can’t be sure yet.
Surely someone on here knows why the scaling is off⸮ It is pretty obvious why! You make Gordon too big - he’s too long to go around the curve tracks. Engines are designed to fit with it’s accessories. Different gauge engines need to be compatible with other gauges for flexibility.
