[REVIEW] Lesney Matchbox Bedford Lomas Ambulance

Lesney Matchbox time is here again. The last installment featured an early casting, today’s review is a later (for my collection) model. This is Matchbox 14c, the Bedford (J1) Lomas Ambulance. This casting entered the range in 1962, and remained until 1968. This model is representative of the point of evolution enjoyed by Lesney at this time:

As one can see, this casting has quite a bit of fine detail. I estimate scale to be in the 1:65-1:70 range - the 1:1 vehicle was large, but the model is kind of chunky too. One can see this model does not have glazing, but does have interior detail - 1962 was the beginning of that feature, and the lack of glazing might have been to show it off, or perhaps stable glazing was not possible. The “LCC” decal stands for “London County Council”. I believe “Lomas” is the company that performed the ambulance conversion. From all angles, this is a precise piece for something introduced 54 years ago:

Front and rear also have the same high detail. There is substantial play value here, as the rear doors open, to reveal a detailed rear compartment. This must have impressed many a young enthusiast back in the day:

The base is basic, as usual for the time, but with more text data than earlier castings:

This one lives in a D type box:

Although this is a common casting, and yet another service/commercial vehicle as common in the earlier numbers of the range, I am glad to have it. I think I picked up for little money, later found a box for little money, and combined them. This casting had a long run, and was made during the high production era, so it is common and inexpensive. There are rare variants with silver or grey wheels, but a fine tread black wheels example like this is relatively affordable and easy to find. It is a good example of how Lesney Matchbox cars were probably the highest quality mass market diecast of the era:

A couple 1:1s, from flickr and imcdb - the vehicle in motion appears to have the similar window pattern as the Matchbox casting: