Meyers Manx Buggy

The Meyers Manx buggy originated in the early 1960s when Bruce Meyers produced the first of a selection of fibreglass bodies that used VW drive train and suspension to produce a fun, lightweight and cheap on and off-road capable vehicle. The dune buggy and derivatives was born!

Hotwheels have honoured Bruce's creation in 1:64 scale diecast by producing their version of the Meyers Manx buggy. For reasons know to no-one in particular I now have a 'mere' 25 of these models residing in my collection.

Whilst not as rare as a Matchbox buggy these little diecast models are both pleasing to the eye and reasonably accurate in detailing.As with most modern Hotwheels models the Meyers Manx buggy features plenty of 'bling' to keep modern children interested yet this doesn't detract from the overall model as most real world 1:1 Meyers Manx buggies (or copies thereof) have more than their fair share of chrome and polished metal.

With such a surplus of buggies I'm happy to part with some for around £1 each, contact me and we can haggle over the price - the more you take the lower it gets! The buggy pictured above is my son's slightly worn toy.

Der Trüffel-Jäger von Zuffenhausen

The 1971 24 Heures du Mans saw the famous "Trüffel-Jäger von Zuffenhausen {truffel hunter from Zuffenhausen} or Pink Pig or Cochon Rose" Porsche 917/20 make its debut. Designed to be the synergy of all 917s it drew its fame from the colour it was painted rather than its race results. The 917/20 had a unique aerodynamic body that combined the handling of the short-tail 917K with the high speed stability of the long-tail 917L ensuring it was as stable as any 917 through corners whilst being the fastest of all 917s down the Mulsanne straight in 1971.

Reinhold Joest and Willi Kauhsen were entrusted with the car for the race andwere running 3rd overall when Joest crashed into the barriers and retirement. Despite originally being blamed on driver error the retirement was actually down to brake failure and not Joest's fault. With the 917/20 running faster than any other 917 brake wear was correspondingly high, unfortunately Porsche hadn't factored this into its race stratergy so the car crashed before having it's brakes replaced.....

Why was it pink and painted with various pork cuts? Less to do with the motorpsort division of Porsche and more to do with the marketing department. Having been called a styling 'pig' a few times in the German press it was decided by a marketing bod that painting the 917/20 up as a butchers drawing would be a great idea. The rest as they say is history, very pink and very unusual but history none the less!

The Pink Pig only raced once during it's Le Mans career so models of it are, unsurprisingly, less common than those of the 917K and other 917s. Pictured is one of two Pink Pig models I currently have in my collection. This one is the less than inspiring DEA version, although it remains very true to the 1971 race car by having Ripple rather than Rippe (as seen on the restored version) on the tail section.