[REVIEW] Lesney Matchbox Muir-Hill Dumper

Lesney Matchbox time again. The prior Matchbox review was a a fairly rare variant of a less common casting, today’s featured vehicle is the opposite. Today we examine Lesney Matchbox 2c, the Muir-Hill site dumper. This casting entered the range in 1962, and remained until 1967. This model is typical of the high quality high feature products the brand was producing by this time:

Detail is abundant from all angles - Lesney Matchbox was really coming into their own in casting quality by the early 60s. No glazing or interior, but this was maybe intentional, as this heavy truck was meant to be a hard working industrial piece - less to break. Most of these have a clean “Laing” decal, the “Muir-Hill” decal being fairly rare and desirable. All were red and green save for a few very early likely prepro models. Scale is hard to estimate, but might not be too tiny, as it is tall. It’s a fun looking little boxy dumper:

This model has huge play value, the bed which tilts to a wide angle is a fun party trick which must have pleased many customers back in the day:

Front and rear have similar fine detail:

The base is typical for the era, the frame of the truck adding a detailed touch:

This one lives in a nice D box, which in my experience is the most common type for this model. With this box and some details on the model, I suspect my example was made around 1964-65 or so. This casting was probably made in large numbers, and is not hard to find today:

This example wears its original price tag:

Not a rarity, but I am still pleased to have it. It is a quality item, and happy fun truck:

A fairly similar 1:1 from flickriver - I suspect survival rates for the real trucks were low, this was the closest I could find: