Hey, that's fun, I see someone has posted my Toad Croaker

[badgerboy80]

I see on the Page www.buckyohare.org/toys.shtml
there are pictures of the Toad Croaker pattern.
It's labeled prototype and that is partially correct.
The documentation is the blueprint concept we would get from Design.
We had to interpret the drawings and build a pattern with draft for the injection mold.
This was all hand work back in the 80's no CNC for the Hasbro Modelshop at the time.

Here's an interesting Easter Egg, when I finished the pattern and we put the figure behind the windshield, Bucky couldn't see over it.
So we came up with a tool box that bucky would stand on, that's the little black urethane casting in one of the photos.

I had started on the tooling pattern for the ship that looks like a P38 but Hasbro canned the Bucky toy.

The pictures are from my Ebay auction

[BYWInsaniac]

That's awesome!!!

How much of the toyline were you involved with? I looked up some of your past posts and you mentioned that you have some plans for the Righteous and Bucky's Jet?

I've got a TON of art from the toyline that I've collected on ebay over the years and I'd love to pick your brain! As much as I love the first wave, it looks like the next two waves would have been AMAZING!

I've got one question off the bat: The Hasbro 1991 Catalog has a Righteous Indignation that looks like it rolls on the ground, where later pictures have it on a base that pivots around. Can you talk at all about the differences between the two versions, and what decisions went into the design changes?

Thanks!

-JJ

PS: Did those Toad Croaker plans ever sell? If not, I'd love to talk. Haha.

[Rygar]

badgerboy80 -- JJ clearly beat me to this idea, but I was wondering if you'd like to do an interview to post on the site? I am sure many people would love to hear about your experience working on the Bucky O'Hare toy line!

Also, if you want to edit/re-word some of what I wrote on the toys page, that would be awesome.

-Rygar

[badgerboy80]

Hi:
I worked as a modelmaker and patternmaker from '84 to '93
You've got to know that as a modelmaker we worked on all the toylines.
We worked My little Pony,Jem, Pirates of Dark Water, GIJoe, Playskool etc.

Whatever our Shop Lead handed us we did.
I liked working on the Preschool stuff, lot's of freeform rounded shapes. A toy called Busy Balls with ramps and such was a nice project.

The original designers at Hasbro would have all the whys and how comes on a particular toy and its pedigree.

I can tell why a part was shaped the way it was, usually due to draft and undercut considerations.

We were not so concerned about back story. Our expertise if you want to call it that was how were these designs going to turn into tooling patterns with a +or - tolerance of .003" inch.
This was all before CNC and everything was carved by hand and machined on a Bridgeport. At least we had digital readouts on the Mills which made things easier.

What I do remember is the Bucky Line was really short lived, that happened to quite a few lines including Cowboys of Moo Mesa.

I am kicking myself about one toyline especially, the Nightmare before Christmas.
I had all the original figure patterns and prototypes. But when the Movie didn't do well, Hasbro dropped the toyline and I threw out what I had.
Little did I know it would have a resurgence and cult following.
Oh well...

Toad Croaker did sell on Ebay

[cloudraker19]

Hey badgerboy80,

could you possibly help me out with some info about the Pirates of Dark water stuff? Were there any other vehicles ever designed?

And do you know what happened to the painted prototypes of the unreleased second series? Thanks so much!

[Kooshmeister]

Cool info.