Guisval Airfix derived metal figures

Beside the seaside …

An interesting box of metal Airfix clones … and the original Airfix Commando figures.

I saw these strange metal mash ups of Airfix figures from the 1970s in a seaside antiques and craft market. I couldn’t identify them other than the plastic box marked Guisval.

Guisval is a Spanish based diecast vehicle company established in 1962.

Defenders? Invaders? On a seaside wall “somewhere in England” …

The figures seem to be attached to military trucks and tanks, which are a marked Guisval Fabricado en Espana. They appear to be the equivalent of the British Matchbox Lesley and Dinky.

I remember that the Matchbox military offerings  sometimes had accompanying soldiers from or similar to the Matchbox OO/HO range of figures. http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/ShowFeature.aspx?id=91

Majorette diecast figures (on my Ebay recce / research) also had random plastic copies of Airfix figures.

Not much shows up when researching Guisval metal military figures until I found one Flickr site – RMJ68.

A quick web search of Guisval diecast vehicles revealed few useful photos of this type of military figures, except for a Flicker album of diecast vehicles by RMJ68 https://www.flickr.com/photos/41049565@N08/albums

RMJ68’s figures by Guisval – the only other Guisval figures I found researching on the web.

Please note: RMJ68’s photos are Copyright to their Flickr site – I have included them with credit to the author as part of my research into the figures I bought.

http://www.flickriver.com/photos/41049565@N08/5332760731/#large

https://www.flickr.com/photos/41049565@N08/5332760731/in/album-72157625149638314/

 

This set of Guisval related photos by RMJ68 shows these figures with tanks and lorries. Reading the Flickr comments,  I am not sure that the plastic landscape and palm trees are Guisval issue or linked. Manufacture seems to be 1970s to 1980s.

The box they come in seems purpose built clear plastic lid with yellow plastic base with strange base clips to attach them in transit and slide / release them. A similar  type of clear box can be seen in RMJ68’s photos of Guisval military vehicles. Some tank or vehicle box bases have a plastic stud in the middle of the figure bases that appears in some of my figures to be broken off and still attached to the base.

Airfix version 2 British Commando and the Guisval clones.

Another Airfix British Commando and the Guisval clones.

My figures fit well with the figure types shown in RMJ68’s Guisval photo albums. They are  similar strange blend of Airfix British commando second version poses – seen here at

http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/Review.aspx?id=386 –

and German or modern US ‘Fritz’ style helmets adopted by various NATO countries. This Fritz helmet was seen in the Airfix modern US / NATO infantry sets http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/Review.aspx?id=431

The figures could be intended to be Spanish army wearing stalheim German style helmets? http://www.warrelics.eu/forum/axis-militaria/spanish-wwii-helmet-553819/

An idea of where some of these Guisval poses began as Airfix British Paratroopers, much cloned …

Familiar or classic poses  of the Airfix British Paratroops are featured too – such as my  smaller radio man and kneeling firing figure, rather  than the Airfix second version Commando radio operator. In the RMJ68 photo examples are several of the much copied or pirated  Airfix British Para poses which were never issued by Airfix in smaller sizes. These may have been  pantographed down in size and then helmets altered.

They are cast or painted in two colours – a dark bronze to browny black and a shiny silver metal. These might be different sets joined or intended,  as in Green and Tan Army Men type toy soldiers, to be enemies (attackers and defenders) in different colours with the same poses.

I hope that RMJ68 enjoys my pictures of these curious little Guisval metal figures.

Blog posted by Mark Man of TIN 17 April 2019.