Hot Toys Avengers Iron Man Mark VII Arrival!

So gonna try to make up for a post. Giving you guys two today! That means I'll only owe you guys 3 after today. 

Today I picked up a package at the post office. Finally have it in my hands! The Hot Toys Avengers Movie Edition Series figure. The figure?  Iron Man Mark VII Armour! Had this thing on preorder for 8 months and finally its on my door step. ExpeExpect a review soon. Its still Hot Wheels Elite Week so gonna give you one of those reviews tonight!

Hot Wheels Elite 1/18: Ferrari 599 GTO

Non-stop Ferrari Hot Wheels Elite gonna keep blitzing forward.

Today, I present to you my favourite Hot Wheels Elite. Not only is it my favourite in my Hot Wheels Elite collection, but it's a model of one of my top favourite Ferrari's ever. Within that list would probably include the 458 Italia, F430 Scuderia and the F40 (obviously).

The 599 GTB Fiorano was Ferrari's flagship GT car for the time being and only recently was replaced with the F12 Berlinetta. The 599 was a great platform, but there was something missing. It looked really beautiful and a great Gran Tourer, but it just didn't seem hardcore enough for me. The body lines of the car and the grunt was lacking something insane.

Up comes the GTO version. At the time, the Ferrari GTO was their fastest road car ever. It was even faster than the Ferrari Enzo. Previously, the "GTO" namesake was provided to cars that Ferrari produced for homologation in racing series. These were cars that they wanted to enter into very specific classes of motorsports and one of the requirements to enter these segments was a minimum number of the factory version of the cars had to be produced. So Ferrari would produce these hardcore versions of their road going cars designated with "GTO" and produce the minimum required so that they could enter the race version of that car in the homologation segments.

Overall, the car was just a beast and I can't quite put my finger on what attracts me to this car. it just seems like a great package overall and something I feel I could live with.

Onwards to the model review. Up until this one, the Elite's were pretty good. But this model takes it to another level. The Elite's made after this one seem to not even stack up against it. Very few mistakes were made a lot of details were added.

First, the overall shots of the car. Unfortunately my camera skills blow and I couldn't capture the liquid classic Ferrari Rosso Corsa Red. It looks really drowned out. But I can ASSURE you that the color is amazing in person.



The first thing that sets this model apart is the carbon fiber decal's. The car's entire skirt and under tray is littered with these fine decals. It's not molded, 100% applied or pressed onto it. Also the interior has carbon fiber to match where it is on the real car.


Another nice touch is the photo-etched metal license plate and the rear emblem. They are cut and shaped very finely. You can see the 599 GTO embossed into the license plate metal. The GTO emblem is on the right side and they bothered to paint the Prancing Horse logo a matte black.


The front of the car shows some great parts too. The grill is absolutely stunning. It's 100% photo-etched and the pattern is very specific. If you look on the top left there's even a hole cut differently to resemble the real car. The purpose of this hole, I have no idea.


The wheels also look great. The brakes are molded very well and you can even see the brake dust cover/shield over top of half the wheel. I'm surprised they bothered to put that in, but it is a very noticeable detail on the car!


One thing I've felt that has been lacking are the Elite's cars tail pipes. The exhausts just aren't that nice and look very plasticky. Fix this up, Hot Wheels!


Trunk is small. Barely opens up. But probably not putting shit in there anyways.


Interior looks awesome like all the elites so far. Above and beyond. The metal plate on the floor, carbon fiber interior. I particularly like the tachometer in this one.


More carbon can be seen in the center console and cup holder area.


Hood vent detail and dash shot:


Engine bay is pretty good. Lots of metal is used throughout to bring the realism out of the big intake covers. But over all, the real car doesn't have much to show in the engine bay because of the massive cooling plate.

Hot Wheels Elite 1/18: Ferrari 599 GTB Panamerican 20,000

Second day of  "Hot Wheels Elite Ferrari Week"
Today, I present to you a Ferrari 599 GTB in it's "Elite" format. Full metal disc brakes, detailed interior, great engine bay. SHITTY DECAL-LING. SO SHIT DECALS.

If you are wondering why this car is decked out in decals. Short excerpt taken from the Hot Wheels Elite Ferrari site:

These two Hot Wheels EliteTM models reproduce the two 599 GTB used during the latest and most persuasive test of Ferrari. On an often grueling, 15-leg journey, a team of forty-eight journalists took turns driving from Belo Horizonte in Brazil to the Argentinean pampa; over Andean plateaus and through mountain passes some 13,000 feet above sea level; through the Central American tropics and across Mexico and the United States , with a final stop in Canada before reaching the final destination in New York. 

Why the hell would anyone drive a Ferrari through this crappy terrain you might ask? Well. Easy answer. To prove that these cars can be reliable. They were 100% stock except for some reinforcement plates and thankfully they made the entire trip. It's called the 20,000 because they drove for 20,000 miles. That means your Ferrari...will survive. For at least 20,000 miles! Hurrah! Money well spent.

Anyway, onwards to the review pictures:

First impression. Great looking model. The ride height looks a bit off to me. The car sits a bit high and the tires look a bit "meatier" than I expected on a Ferrari model. Should be running more lower profile tires and bigger wheels. But the wheels are detailed pretty well and finished nicely.

Close up of the wheels. The metal disc and the callipers are one of my favourite parts of the model. I tried to have the light give you guys an idea of the metal disc used.


Okay. I take back the shitty decals part. The decals are actually applied quite well. But the guy that did mine fucked up ONCE. Only one mistake...could happen. But it was a crucial mistake. The hood emblem is WAY OFF from the centre. what the HELL. Look at the metal mesh grill. That's some fine work. Individual pieces of metal and the individual photo etched Ferrari prancing horse logo on that grill. That centre vertical line, is the very centre of the car. Now look at the hood emblem. GOD DAMN IT. SO OFF.



Rear decals are pretty nice. Italian and American flag on the trunk. Italian for the car's heritage. USA for the final stop of the Pan-american run.


One of the other details I really liked was the little luggage set it provided. They sit in the flocked trunk just great and they are pretty well detailed. They even bothered to mould the carbon pattern on the top.


Another shot of the rear. You can see mesh for the grill, the great disc and calliper and also the metallic Pininfarina emblem on the rocker panel there.


Interior looks great as usual. The top of the dash is painted gunmetal like the real car. The vents, paddle shifters and centre console have a very aluminium-like finish. I also like the real metal kick plate on the passenger side.


The driver side uses metal plates for the pedals including the dead pedal which is a nice touch. The steering wheel looks great. I like how it's got the two tone colour from the wheel itself vs. the air-bag cover.


Front shot of the car.


The hood has this printed on it indicating the final stop of these cars in New York City. Also re-note annoying messed up positioning of front emblem decal.


Rear trunk you can see the metallic Ferrari emblem as well as the prancing horse emblem.


The roof has the map of the route they took through the Americas.


Here's a reference pic of the route. If you care. But you probably don't:

Obligatory engine shots:

Engine looks great. I really liked the metal parts on the valve cover and the separate metal emblems and lettering used on the cooling plate in the front. Also the caps are replicated really well and have the proper warning decals on them.


Another shot of the interior so you can see the finish on the seats and the moulded cup holders/accessory parts on the centre console. Looks great.

Hot Wheels Elite 1/18: F430 CHALLENGE TROFEO PIRELLI TEAM MOTOR RACING #4

Back to model reviews.

For the last little while, I've shown you guys a lot of AUTOart's which are a pretty high end model and also Maisto/Bburago. With this huge gap in quality, detail and pricing Hot Wheels has stepped up and kind of slotted itself in between.

Hot Wheels has two different tiers of car models. The lower tier is called Hot Wheels Foundation which resemble Bburago/Maisto quality but contains cars that the other companies couldn't get a sponsorship/endorsement from such as Ferrari, Saleen, Maserati...etc. So if you want Ferrari, you gotta stick to the Hot Wheels. The price point for the foundations are around $30

The second tier are called Hot Wheels "Elites". These models are very very close to AUTOart in detail, but are quite a bit cheaper. AUTOart started off as a $80-$120 tier, but today they are between $150-$250 depending on the "hype" surrounding the car as well as the complications in manufacturing them. Because of this hike in price, Hot Wheels Elite have slotted themselves in that old area and these models are much cheaper than AUTOart but exhibit some insane detail as you will see below.

I have quite a few of these Ferrari Hot Wheels Elites and in the next few days I'll be showing you guys some of them.

The first here is a Ferrari F430 GT. I could have bought the regular F430, but I saw that the GT race built purpose ones for the Ferrari Challenge series of races had a bunch of really nice detail I couldn't skip out on.

Mesh is used everywhere much like the AUTOarts. The little details on this car are what got me:



Mesh is seen even in the rear grill. You can see that the emblem is a separate piece of metal, but it was applied on a bit sloppier so there's a bit of over glue on the edges.


The wheels weren't as nice as I expected. The edge of the wheel seemed to be cut not as precise as most AUTOarts, so the wheel appears very plasticy. Also the finish isn't perfectly smooth.


You can see here the lights are in properly and a lot of mesh is used in the upper grill, lower grill and side grills. Also the tow hook is a nice touch and around the tow hook its covered in carbon fiber decal.


The front of the car uses the same mesh and also has a tow hook.


The engine bay is great. The metal badging, emblems and knobs are all really nicely made. The chrome exhaust looks great and the cover has crystal clear glass with mesh surrounding the edges of the bonnet.


The Seat! This seat absolutely nailed it home for me. The seat is flocked and shaped really well. I've never seen an AUTOart chair this detailed. The Sabelt harness is cut and scaled precisely and they were able to replicate the 5 point harness seat belt lock with photo etched metal as well as the belt buckles and length adjustment clips.


Interior was also detailed very well. It was decked out in carbon fiber and lots of nice metal plates were used on the floor pans and heel plates.


The metal was used for console plaques too as seen below in this picture. You can see the centre console and gauges are wrapped in fine carbon fiber decals.


Other side of the cockpit. The roll bars are replicated really well and the steering wheel is very accurate.


Another shot of the sick seat