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REFERENCE WORKS
(Books described as available may no longer be so. Revision coming soon.)
The problem with collecting robots is that they are expensive. Consequently any mistakes you make when buying or selling are likely to cost you money. What you need is INFORMATION. Is a robot rare? Should I buy this one now or wait until a cheaper/better condition one turns up? Are all the parts present? Is it fully working?Regrettably not many robot guides are successful at telling you what you need to know. The most widely used reference works are just pages full of pictures. Kitahara and Boogaert's books are the Bibles of the hobby but they only illustrate what's available.
The first reference to give an accurate indication of rarity/value was 'Battery Toys' by Brian Moran. It's still in print and is good value. It's a pity that it doesn't cover enough robots to be definitive. It's 6-point rating system is a reliable starting point.
New books have appeared recently but none of them have altered my belief that the Great Robot Reference Book is still waiting to be published. Meanwhile here are the main works on the subject. Getting hold of some of them is not too easy, though!
| TITLE
(Currently available books are marked Available) |
DETAILS | |
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Available Blast Off! S Mark Young, Steve Duin and Mike Richardson. Dark Horse Books 2001 |
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Robots, space ships, space figures, BucK Rogers, Flash Gordon. A superb readable reference book. Highly recommended. |
| Joe Knedlhans |
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A detailed listing of robot articles that have appeared in various publications over the past 25 years - and it's growing! See it here then start searching for the articles.! |
| Reissued 2001 as "Robots and Space Toys" |
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One
of the two main original reference works. Great pictures with a universally
acknowledged numbering system. Buy it here (reissue) |
| Robot and Space Toys Collection Takashi & Kinya Morita. World Mook 242 (Yes, Mook!) |
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Fast becoming my favourite. Absolutely brimming with a wide variety of robots and space toys. Well worth tracking down. Update: Available from Ray Rohr at Cosmic Artifacts |
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The other classic reference work. Not such good pictures, but a wider range of space toys with an alternative numbering system (now largely defunct). Long out of print. |
| Future Toys: Toni Emchowicz Hardcover - 227 pages New Cavendish Books; ISBN: 1872727689 |
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A
picture book with plenty of variety and an accurate desirability scale.
Recommended and available now. |
| Vintage Toys : Robots & Space Toys by Jim Bunte, Heinz Mueller, Dave Hallman Paperback Kraus |
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Great
artwork and layout. Good value and available now. The price guide is
way too high, though, and it's full of mistakes. |
| Battery Toys, Brian Moran |
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One
of the best toy books ever. Great value. Rare robots and other battery
ops. There's also an accurate rarity scale. Recently updated.
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| Yesterdays Toys, Teruisha Kitahara 1988 352 pages |
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Three books in one make this great value. Contains the robots from the out-of-print Robots and Monsters (see below) plus plenty more toy info. A very useful reference work. Price $29.98 Click here for more info |
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The catalog for the sale of the late F.Griffith's collection. Prices proved "reasonable". A wide range of robots and space toys. |
| Space Toys Of The 60's by James H. Gillam Collectors Guide Publishing, Inc.; ISBN: 1896522378 |
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Matt Mason, Zeroids and Colorform Aliens - rather than tin robots. Not the mainstream tin space stuff, but an area that plenty of you collect. Click here for more info |
| Marx Toys : Robots, Space, Comic, Disney & TV Characters : With Values (Schiffer Book for Collectors) Maxine Pinsky |
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Quite a few interesting robot and space toy entries - many Linemar items. Click here for more info |
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Covers
some of those strange and wonderful plastic robots of the 60s - Great
Garloo and the Robot Commander among others. |
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Superb pictures of rarities. See yesterday's Toys above - it contains the large robot section. |
| Ray Gun by Eugene W. Metcalf, Frank Maresca, Charles Bechtold |
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Not
robots, but their weapons arsenal. A great rerference work by Gene.
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| Boys' Toys of the Fifties and Sixties : Memorable Catalog Pages from the Legendary Sears Christmas Wishbooks 1950-1969 $19.95 |
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A
trip down memory lane. Remember getting your hands on the catalogs and
planning Christmas? Well, it's all here, along with all those robots
that you could have bought for $10 but didn't! Mr Atomic was only $7.95!!!
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Glossy photos with emphasis on Japanese super hero toys. Very useful. |
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Again, the emphasis is on the Japanese market. Covers pieces that the other works miss. I love it. |
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A compilation of several hard-to-find toy catalogs from the 1960s. There's information on the whole range of Japanese tin, and robots and space toys feature prominently. Poor quality black and white photos, but priceless information. Out of print. |
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This is a compilation of the three early Kitahara books: wind ups, robots and cars at a bargain price. The robots are one per page, and the effect is impressive. Great value for money. |
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A high quality catalogue picturing some great robots and space toys amassed by an early collector. There is a real indication of value (HIGH!) |
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Many rare space toys. Half of this catalogue features many of the more common robots, the tin and plastic variety. The sale prices of some of the common pieces attracted suspiciously high bids. |
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At last a book covering plastic robots as well as tin ones. German text. |
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Glossy art photographs of many robots. A bit like a robot pin-up calendar. |
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Some pictures of interesting newer robots including Transformers. Most of the older tin robots are just copies of the Kitahara photographs. |
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Only 36 pages, but I'm still surprised at the amount of useful information crammed inside. This covers space toys from the 30s to the 80s. |
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I told you to buy one when it came out. A large collection ranging from the cheap to the horrendously expensive, all in glorious full colour. For a while it was used to provide reference numbers for robots. |
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Showing its age now. Some information and line art, but many of the photos are eccentric rather than useful. There is an accompanying booklet of 1980s prices. |
| Collecting the Space Race, S. Schneider. Schiffer 1993 |
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| Baby Boomer Toys and Collectibles, Carol Turpen. Schiffer 1993 |
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Contains
a 33 page section on tin robots and space toys. Ignore the 2 star Amazon
review - it's much better! |
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Only six volumes of this very promising magazine saw the light of day. At last someone was beginning to give the details! What a shame that it folded. Come on, Ernie, let's have Issue #7! |
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Familiar pieces from the Kitahara collection spiced with a few more rarities. The inclusion of some cheap modern plastic pieces creates an odd effect. |
| Japan Toy Club 1983 |
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Quite honestly a disappointment. Poor quality photos and very little that isn't covered better elsewhere. Rare in its own right. |
| Dan Simmons |
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Available on the continent (Europe) but not easy to get elsewhere. Eccentric photos of robots in unusual settings. |
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A
separate area of robot collecting, and gathering speed as yesterday's
kids get the money to buy them back. |
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What a TURKEY! Sorry I ever spent money on this one. (No I'm not - it's the best laugh I've had in ages). The author has little knowledge of robots. He invents names, misidentifies just about everything and puts ludicrous prices on the toys. | |
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Not
toys - and no apologies for including a superb looking sci-fi reference
book. Full of beautiful pictures of those great pulp magazine covers,
posters and book covers. Expensive but worth it. |