Ok, here is my Red Baron. I had one of these around 36 years ago, it was a friends older brothers car and I had to have it. From memory it cost me about 5 cars! I remember showing it too my dad when I got home with it, he was pretty upset that I’d swaped so many but I just thought it was so cool. I think it was the first Hot Wheels I saw or at least the first one that grabbed me. Dad always got Matchbox or Corgi for me as they were more accurate representations of the subject and HotWheels didn’t do that kind of thing. Thinking about it now as I’m writing this he also hated rock n roll, real hot rods and all other cool things. Anyway that Red Baron was lost a long time ago and when I saw this one at a junk shop about 15 years back I bought it without even a test drive.
It was made in Hong Kong in 1969. Got those funky redline wheels. A pair of cowl mounted machine guns! A PAIR OF COWL MOUNTED MACHINE GUNS!! WW1 (thanks shop-teacher for schooling me!) German helmet inspired roof! In line 6 cylinder engine and a heap of other nice details. I belive it’s based on a real vehicle from a famous California hot rod builder, I’m to lazy to google it and I think this is a well known model in the die cast world?
Not sure if the drop axle is factory or if someone stepped on it at some stage, either way I’m fine with it.
One thing I noticed for the first time ever was the wierd offset going on at the rear. The body is fine but the diff and fuel tank are offset to the right slighty. Now I can’t unsee it!
