1/87th Vehicles

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Ron! That red Ambulance, awesome! I have the white & orange one. I also picked up the camper, though I've removed the cabs from both with intentions to replace them with Busch cabs. The Cargo truck would be a nice find. I've also bought the ice cream trucks from both matchbox & Hot wheels, and an off-road, desert style, race truck from Matchbox. Heck if I cna find decent replacement wheels for the last one though.
 


My latest addition to my layout, is another John Deere tractor, made by Siku in 1/87 scale. It comes with a harrow. Its the 9630 model, making 530 horsepower.
In the photo is a smaller John Deere tractor, the yellow one is a JCB, the red one is a Massey Fergusson, all made by Siku.
Ron
 
Wow!! The Walmart in our area has had these for 2 years now. Advantage of having a 5 year old boy I guess. They also have construction equipment to scale. We have 2 Walmarts in my area and only one has the scale vehicles, so not sure if all will carry them?
 
I don't have a layout yet but I'm buying trains and gear as I can afford it. I read this thread and thought I might as well buy a few 40's to 60's cars for my layout when I can. I went to both of our local Wal-marts and neither had Matchbox or Hot Wheel cars in 1/87 scale. I went out to a large flea market we have here and there was a guy with a booth filled with both types of cars. I asked him if he had any 1/87's and he said the companies come out with them about every 4-5 years and he didn't have any. He said the train model guys usually swoop down and buy them all when they do appear. Next I'm going to try Toys-R-Us.

Reid in NC
 
I noticed on my trips over to Pennsylvania, that school buses are a really common sight,if they are not out on the roads, then they are parked up in clusters waiting for the next school run.
So when I saw these Matchbox school buses, I bought them straight away. So far, I,ve only painted extra details on one,headlights, flashers,and mirrors, I,ll do the rest this weekend. I,ll also have to paint the underside black, as part of the casting shows silver, under the front bumper.
Ron
 
Dropped by the Toys-R-Us tonight and they didn't have any 1/87th vehicles that I could find. I also couldn't find anybody to ask so we left. We also went to the K-mart and they only have construction vehicles like the ones I bought form WM. The only difference is they were not as detailed as the ones I bought and they were only about $4 each...compared to the $9 I paid.

Question: Will the Matchbox cars have "1/87th" on them? I've seen a lot of Matchbox cars but nothing with that label.
 


Reid, except in very rare cases, you'll never see a scale on a Matchbox model. You just have to guess. If I'm doing some serious shopping, I take a known good 1:87 vehicle with me so I can do a quick compare. Some Matchbox mosels are very close (especially if you change out the wheels) but many are far too large or too small.
 
Ronzzr11 said:
I noticed on my trips over to Pennsylvania, that school buses are a really common sight,if they are not out on the roads, then they are parked up in clusters waiting for the next school run.
So when I saw these Matchbox school buses, I bought them straight away. So far, I,ve only painted extra details on one,headlights, flashers,and mirrors, I,ll do the rest this weekend. I,ll also have to paint the underside black, as part of the casting shows silver, under the front bumper.
Ron
Click to expand...
Man I hope I can find those buses! I'd like several myself.

UP2CSX said:
Reid, except in very rare cases, you'll never see a scale on a Matchbox model. You just have to guess. If I'm doing some serious shopping, I take a known good 1:87 vehicle with me so I can do a quick compare. Some Matchbox mosels are very close (especially if you change out the wheels) but many are far too large or too small.
Click to expand...
Jim, Matchbox used to put the scale on the chassis, in the 90's. They're rare now, but occasionally they re-run the vehicles that had a scale printed on them.

However you're right in saying they're rare cases, now...
 
I painted up my school buses today, matt black on the underside of the chassis, headlights, turn indicators, and the large flashing lights on the front and rear of the body.
At just $1.60 each, these were just too good to miss.
The other picture shows some of the other Matchbox vehicles I,ve been buying, none are marked up for scale, but look to be close enough to HO for me.
Ron
 
They look plenty good enough for me too, especially as background type vehicles. One of the things I would try is using a fine point black marker and making a thin line down the rearview mirrors, where they meet the cab. That will give the illusion of the mirrors being separate pieces instead of a blob of metal on the side.
 
Exactly. If you try to keep those vehicles away from a group of real HO scale vehicles. There is no frame of reference to the eye and they wont look out of place. What line of Matchbox are those yellow buses part of?
 
ChevelleSSguy said:
Exactly. If you try to keep those vehicles away from a group of real HO scale vehicles. There is no frame of reference to the eye and they wont look out of place. What line of Matchbox are those yellow buses part of?
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The buses are from the 2009 range of vehicles, I,ve thrown out the blister packs, so I can,t give you the number, but I,ve found a Matchbox forum http://www.mboxcommunity.com/forums/showthread.php?t=64960&page=2
which shows the buses, plus some of the other Matchbox vehicles I,ve seen.

Ron
 
Is there a guage or measurement for 1/87th vehicles? How can you tell if a vehicle, that is not marked 1/87th, is the right scale? I saw some today but didn't want to buy them in fear that they were too small or too large.

I tell you what....there are some really GREAT looking 1/64th scale cars out there. They are tempting to buy and lie about them on my layout.
 


The best way to know if something is the correct size is keep a scale ruler on you at all times. I think as time passes you get an eye for what is the correct size. I say if you can return an item get it and if it's out of scale you just return it but if you can't return an item then be sure of yourself. That's how I judge items I'm not sure about.
Dave
 
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