Cool toy engineering

Jul 17, 2026 4:55 PM

Huor

Views

15759

Likes

399

Dislikes

8

We had one of these when I was a kid! It seemed a bit like magic

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I remember those. I had a few.

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Anyone remeber these? Put the string in, pull it driving a flywheel. The car would get serious speed, smash against my moms expensive cabinet, then all wheels, roof, doors would fly off.

1 week ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

I had those and the color change ones!

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I miss those so much, I wish i still had them

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I had one of these. A Pontiac looking thing of some sort

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Dude… I HAVE those…

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Yellow, silver, black, white… not the cop tho

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I definitely had a few of these. Great fun

2 weeks ago | Likes 15 Dislikes 0

Had these as a kid. Eventually the plastic hood would break off, and the crash mechanism would jam into the "crashed" state.
Perhaps we were crashing them too hard.

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I had a bunch of these as a kid. They were some of my favorite toy cars. Certainly made playing with hotwheels tracks a lot more fun

2 weeks ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

I had a few of these

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I remember those

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Core memory

+1

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

had a bunch of those as a kid; never had the course, though

2 weeks ago | Likes 9 Dislikes 0

I forgot all about these. Thanks for the reminder.

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

I had the white car!

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Crack-Ups

2 weeks ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

The commercials were awesome.

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I owned that police car!

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

I used to have a "Battle Damage He-Man" that used this to add… well, you'd never have guessed: Battle damage!

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Those were amazing! I loved those. Lots of fun to crash into each other.

2 weeks ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

I remember those! The springs wore out after a while. Is there nothing like that anymore?

I also really liked the ones that would change color in cold water or when heat was applied.

1 week ago | Likes 5 Dislikes 0

I used to run those through the HotWheels portable Service Garage! So much fun.

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

I didn't have the service garage. I had to rotate the parts back with my fingers, like a sucker.

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Uphill, both ways! :D

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Back when Matchbox and Hot Wheels had moving parts. I had some with opening doors and hoods... forget Corgis, they even had trunks that opened... I think they were the ones with the rhinestone headlights too. I had a 007 Aston Martin DB5 with an ejection seat.

2 weeks ago | Likes 28 Dislikes 0

And then there were the models of the Thunderbirds and Joe90 in the late 60s. The ones available now are placky and not as good.

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Corgis?

1 week ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corgi_Toys ...it was a British diecast toy company that produced toy cars similar to Matchbox... they may not have been available that readily in the U.S. in the 60s and 70s. I lived in NYC, so maybe that's why I had them.

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Ohhhh never even heard of them!

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

The same engineering was adapted into a few He-Man battle damage armor figures, also by Mattel

2 weeks ago | Likes 123 Dislikes 0

1 week ago | Likes 9 Dislikes 1

1 week ago | Likes 26 Dislikes 1

yes

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Yup, I had the Skeletor one

2 weeks ago | Likes 10 Dislikes 0

1 week ago | Likes 7 Dislikes 1

yeah, that's the one. There were 3 levels of damage and a wheel on the back to reset it.

1 week ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

I remember them being extremely touchy, where any kind of jostling would activate the battle damage, making it hard to keep the figures in a "not damaged" state.

1 week ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

They've fixed them since then. The new origins series has a lot of improvements along these lines while looking damn near exactly like the originals.

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

They were fine at first but became easily triggered the more you played with them. I have some old crash test dummies that will fly apart if you even think about picking them up now.

1 week ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

Mmm-mmm-mmm-mmm

1 week ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

I had some of those!! I remember the silver car and the green truck, maybe even the police car! BLAST FROM THE PAST, and I have been trying to remember what the brand name was, so thank you!

2 weeks ago | Likes 67 Dislikes 0

Still have the silver one... except it's red.

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

I always wondered... after you 'crashed' one, flipped the moving part, and crashed it again, were you stuck with a car whose part was cracked on both sides?

2 weeks ago | Likes 5 Dislikes 0

If I undsrstand your question correctly, the part has two sides: one nice and one damaged. Initially it's with the nice side visible. When you hit it, it rotates and you now see the damaged side. No matter how much you hit it, the damaged side will stay out. You have to manually rotate the part back to the nice face to reset it.
Most lilely it had a spring with a little pin, like a mouse trap: hit it, the pin jumps and the part turns around. Hit it more and nothing happens.

2 weeks ago | Likes 6 Dislikes 0

OHHHHH... thanks!

2 weeks ago | Likes 3 Dislikes 0

I forgot this existed, but yeah, I had a couple!

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

Heck yeah, I had a bunch. Guess what: We're old.

2 weeks ago | Likes 14 Dislikes 0

Username does not check out

1 week ago | Likes 1 Dislikes 0

Yay us! They were fun tho

2 weeks ago | Likes 4 Dislikes 0

No. No! NO! We're .. Vintage. Yeah, that's it. Vintage

2 weeks ago | Likes 6 Dislikes 0

From fine old kegs. A very good year.

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0

It was the best of times (Top-load VCR), it was the worst of times (Nintendo Blister)

1 week ago | Likes 2 Dislikes 0