If you were a Hot Wheels collector back in 2006, you undoubtedly would remember the brouhaha over the 2006 Mainline Corolla AE86. Variations were a very hot ticket at that time, and the grey FTE and red 5sp AE86’s were on everyone’s want list. Soon after the 3-spoke Corolla was discovered, and the craziness happened all over again.
If you were lucky, you could take this photo:
I was lucky. I took this photo. And then a year later I got rid of them. HUGE REGRET! I have tried to rebuild this 3-car collection, and have had luck with the grey FTE, but am still after the other two. My forehead gets a nice “shoulda had a V8” slap to the head every time I think about it.
Well, back to the task at hand. Since it’s debut in 2006, the AE86 casting has been used sparingly, until last year when it appeared looking mighty fine in the Decades line, and then this year in an Initial-D-looking outfit (and from what I hear, will reverse the tux for a nice recolor soon).
And with the AE86 back, I am happy to report there is another variation to pursue. Just recently a small 5-spoke version has been found in 9-car Gift Packs. And when I say small 5-spokes, I mean Mad Manga small:
An added bonus. It looks kinda cool with these wheels. Slam the body and you might have something in 1:1 scale that you could park on the shores of Long Beach in September and cause a nice stir. I have no idea if this was a fun little prank by a factory worker in the HW factory, or like most wheel variations, some wheels that were thrown on to keep the machine from stopping. Either way, we have a cool variation to pursue…
The only other release of the casting not mentioned was the one in a Tuners 5 pack from a couple years ago.
It indeed looks interesting w/ the x-small wheels, and in a way more fitting to the casting. Great find man!
-doomus
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Don't know why but almost all 2013 AE86 that I saw have poor quality paint finishing
http://mono-diecast.blogspot.com/
X2 on the poor quality paint. Why is Matchbox SO much better at tampos?
The small wheels look like hellaflush or drifter wheels, or whatever the kids are calling it these days.
Nice find,the Corolla looks awesome like this,a true rendition of what's running around out there,today.Asian youth/culture inspired,imho.
Would look sweet with a tiny set of Dayton wires.
As far as finding errors on these ToyoTorques,found a few with reversed windows.1 to watch for.
As an aside is there any plans in the works for a 1973 or so Corona Mark III?
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Have you checked the rivets on that 86? Looks like somebody wanted those MC5's so bad and replaced them with some little bitty 5 spokes. And, they must have repacked it and took it back to the store. Now that might not necessarily be the case here, but it happens with Gift Packs all the time.