Another Mustang Oddity

From another grungy box lot arises yet another weird Buckskin Mustang I feel compelled to keep….

He’s another one of those plastic oddities from the early 1970s – the surface physically feels like chalk, the plastic looks bright white in places, and he has some paint flaking characteristic of an Opaque White Plastic Chalky.

But he isn’t a White Plastic Chalky – he’s not opaque enough. And he’s not simply an exceptionally white model that hasn’t yellowed one iota from the day it was pulled from the mold, because he doesn’t have the translucency of standard, garden-variety Tenite, either.

(Most exceptionally white vintage models, I believe, were molded from fresh Tenite that was completely unadulterated by any regrind. The more regrind there is in the mix, the faster and more deeply a model will yellow.)

No, this fellow is something in between.

He was found in a collection with a couple of genuine Basecoat Chalkies and at least one other piece that might be of the same “stuff” (that one’s still grungy, so I can’t tell yet).

So he fits in with my earlier hypothesis, which is that at some point during the Chalky era, Breyer started mixing the Opaque White Chalky plastic with the standard Semi-Translucent White plastic to get this – kind of plastic I still struggle to find a proper name for. (Milky White? Bright White? Partial Chalky?)

So now I find myself in the possession of not one, but two oddball Buckskin Mustangs from the 1970s. Of all the crazy things you can find in box lots....

Dimensional Stability

I was doing a little cleanup in the office yesterday and noticed something on my research shelf of Family Arabian Foals:

The variable heights aren’t the big news here: most of us know that Cellulose Acetate is susceptible to shrinkage, both during and after molding. It’s more a quirk of the manufacturing process than a concern, unless it is also accompanied by paint discoloration, distortion, and oozing that indicate the model may be suffering from the dreaded “Shrinky Syndrome”.

What’s interesting is the composition of the tallest member of this little crew: according to his “B” mold mark, he’s molded from the Cellulose Propionate plastic.

It hadn’t occurred to me before, but that makes a lot of sense.

Breyer briefly experimented with this slightly different Tenite cellulosic plastic in the late 1970s and early 1980s, with mixed results. It was more widely available and had greater dimensional stability, but was also more brittle and difficult to finish/work after molding.

Better dimensional stability means less shrinkage and warping.

What that means for us is that this Foal is the most accurate depiction, dimensionally, of what the interior of the Family Arabian Foal’s mold actually looks like.

I now find myself almost intrigued enough by this idea to seek out other Propionate models and cross-compare them with their more standard Acetate counterparts.

Green Plastic?

There’s been a bit of talk about a couple of Green Donkeys that turned up on eBay recently. Are they real? And what’s the deal with the rather interesting prices the vendors are trying to sell them for?

On the first question, yes, Breyer did use Green Tenite for a while: it was one of the more exotic colors they purchased during the Chalky Era of the early 1970s. I’ve seen it most commonly on the Standing Donkey mold, but the Mare from the Thoroughbred Mare and Foal Gift Set was also molded in it.

There are some Classic Quarter Horse Foals that come in a very light, limey green that may or may not have been related to the more vibrant "Kelly Green" of the Donkey and Thoroughbred Mare.

Most of the other Colored Tenite of the Chalky Era came in more naturalistic colors, like gray, brown or rosy-purple-pink: the rubs on Chalkies molded in those colors are still noticeable, but they don’t stand out as much as the rubs on Green ones do.

Although they are "real", most of the Green Plastic models I’ve seen floating around the model horse community are NOT Original Finish pieces. Most appear to be Chalkies stripped of the paint they wore when they shipped out of the factory, presumably because they were in an otherwise unsellable condition.

I guess you could call them "reverse" customs: instead of paint being added to the model, the paint is completely taken away. Obviously, I think it’s improper to show it as an Original Finish piece, though it has been done.

Are there authentic unpainted Colored Tenite models from the Chalky Era out there? Yes, of course. I have an unpainted opaque white plastic G1 Saddlebred, and a couple of "test shots" molded out of contaminated regrind (with little black floaty bits!) Those Lime Green Quarter Horse Foals I mentioned above are the real deal too, though I’m not sure if they were from the 1970s or not.

There may be a few genuine Kelly Green pieces from the 1970s. But I can’t recall seeing one that I could comfortably call "Factory Unpainted".

As for those prices - yeah, wishful thinking. They’re not that rare, either painted over or stripped.

Finally, Levi Himself

And here he is, in all his true splash-spotted glory:

There’s been a small bit of controversy about Levi not being an exact replica of the paint jobs and stickers of old. His whites are Chalky or Semi-Chalky, and the sticker refers to "Cellulose Acetate" rather than "Tenite".

I’ll tackle the sticker part first.

The sticker was probably altered for a couple of reasons. Tenite is the brand name of the Cellulose Acetate manufactured by the Eastman Chemical Company. What brands of plastics, and when they were used, is not something I’ve tracked much at all. If Reeves is using other brands of Cellulose Acetate, using the brand name from another company may not be appropriate.

(BTW, different brands of Cellulose Acetate are basically the same, with some minor chemical differences - sort of the way all chocolate chip cookies recipes are nearly, though not absolutely identical. You’d still want to avoid mixing different recipes together because the results might be a little unpredictable, depending on the blend.)

Also, by making the sticker somewhat different from the originals, it removes the temptation to transfer the sticker to someone else.

As far as the Chalky points go, that’s a Vintage feature - most notably seen on releases such as #27 TV’s Fury and the late 1950s version of the Black Beauty Western Horse and Pony.

It seems a little odd to include in a rereleased version of the Appaloosa Mustang’s paint job, especially since I can’t recall ever seeing any Chalky Appaloosa Mustangs.

The first theory that pops into my mind is that it was done to minimize unscrupulous people in the near or distant future from claiming the items as true 1960s vintage.

There may well be some actual vintage Belgians floating around in this color. I don’t know of any, personally, but enough oddball discoveries have been made in recent years that I’m not willing to discount the possibility. (Remember the Gloss Gray Appaloosa Quarter Horse Gelding?)

As I’ve all hammered into your heads, there’s still tons of stuff we don’t - and probably will never - know about the early history of Breyer. Vintage Glossy Chalkies are scarce enough that making that addition to a new Vintage-style release at least seems like a safe bet.

There was one instance of Reeves releasing a Vintage-style item that turned out to have been released before. Though we’re still not sure whether its status was a Test Color, a microscopic Special Run or exceedingly brief Regular Run: the Charcoal Five-Gaiter.

Reeves probably didn’t know about it when they released Rhett in 2001, and I was only familiar with it because I had met the then-only-one-known Vintage Charcoal at a local live show. At the time I assumed he was merely a Test, until another turned up on eBay, which made me think there might be more to his story than that.

A much less elaborate explanation (and thus, more likely) could be this: they liked the way it looked. That was pretty much the explanation they gave us for the Red Bay coloring on the original Traditional Sham, when we protested.

The lack of eyewhites on my Levi doesn’t bother me one way or another. Eyewhites on Gloss Gray Appaloosas were more the exception, than the rule.

My Elusive Electroplated Grail

Have we seen any BreyerFest auction models yet? It feels like we’re overdue. Normally I haven’t been all that interested in those things, but since Reeves seems to have been placing more actual Test Colors in the auction lately, I’m beginning to see them more as "Sneak Peeks of Future Releases", rather than "Things I Shall Never Have". (A healthier attitude to take, I think.)

It just occurred to me this week - yes, I can be a bit slow sometimes - that next year’s BreyerFest will be the 25th one. Wouldn’t it be appropriate if they somehow commemorated the Silver Anniversary of BreyerFest with another Silver Stablemate?

That’s sort of what the original G1 Saddlebred was created for, back in 1975: it was to commemorate Breyer’s 25th Anniversary. It was a very early example of a promotional piece - one given back then to sales reps, jobbers and worthy (profitable) customers. Most hobbyists didn’t know a thing about them until 1990, when one showed up at the first BreyerFest auction, and was later featured in an issue of Just About Horses.

The Saddlebred was chosen because it was the first completed Stablemates mold, and unlike the other Stablemates molds back then, it was not paired up with another. This was important because the plastic that was used to create these Saddlebreds was ABS, not Tenite. ABS - acrylonitrile butadiene styrene, commonly called (in the hobby) Styrene - is the same stuff they use for all Stablemates today. (Except for the occasional special runs that specifically advertise otherwise.)

It was used in this instance because ABS can be electroplated, while Tenite (Cellulose Acetate) cannot.

Of course, when I heard about the Silver Saddlebred, it crushed me. The G1 Stablemates were what really put me on the road to ruin as a hobbyist. Traditional scale horses were for birthdays and holidays, but Stablemates? Stablemates I could buy myself - for just a dollar, at the Kmart down the road! I quickly became obsessed with them and completing my collection.

Finding out about the Silver Saddlebred was the first inkling that that would never happen.

I managed to hold on to the dream until the late 1990s: I kept the collection up to date and (nearly) complete until then, when the sheer weight of new releases (and new molds) finally did me in. I still buy ones I like - or I can find - whenever I can.

But that Silver Saddlebred eluded me then, and will probably always elude me. He became a "Grail Model" for a lot of hobbyists, and when they do (on occasion) show up on the market, the prices are several degrees beyond my comfort zone.

(That’s part of the reason why, in spite of my adoration of Peter Stone Chips, I simply cannot collect them in any meaningful way, either. I love that little mule!)

Allegedly they made about a 1000 of those silver-plated curiosities, so it’s still possible that I could find one: that’s not super-duper rare, in the scheme of things. Most Special Runs from the 1970s and early 1980s had significantly smaller runs. Maybe I might get lucky some night on eBay, with a late night Buy It Now, or something…

If they do go that route and make another Anniversary model, I’m not particular: almost any mold will do. As long as it comes with a velvet-lined box - or even better! - a teeny tiny velvet bag.

My Awesome Thing, Revealed

Behold my awesome thing:


No, it’s not a cash register drawer. It’s a Vanity Organizer, manufactured by the W.F. Goodell Co. of Louisville, Kentucky. Says so right on the front:


The most exciting part of this object is not what it says on the front, but on the back:


It's the old Breyer logo! Told you I wasn’t imagining it!

One of these Vanity Organizers came up on eBay several years ago, but I was outbid, and not by a small amount. The vendor who listed it mistakenly identified it as Bakelite, or Catalin, or some other buzzword that vintage plastic collectors lose their minds at the mention of.

Fortunately, the vendor on eBay who listed my newest treasure actually did his research, and even went into some detail in his listing about the likelihood of this being a Breyer-molded piece. I’d like to think that my earlier blog post about it might have been part of that research, but I haven’t gotten around to asking him yet.

This thing isn’t just huge - 13 by 15 inches - it’s heavy, too: it weighs almost exactly two pounds. If it’s not Tenite, it’s something with a similar density - you could definitely do some damage to someone with it. It’s a little hard to tell from the photographs, but the color is sort of a slightly mottled, swirly brown - think burled wood, not tortoiseshell. It’s not too different from my clock with the same mold mark.

I haven’t found much information about the W.F. Goodell Company, yet. If you Google the name, you’ll find a couple of pictures of a William F. Goodell in the University of Louisville’s online archive. The pictures are from ca. 1930-1932, and mentions that he was a manager for Equitable Life of Iowa, an insurance company.

I don’t know how or when he took the leap from insurance to manufacturing. Or why he would have chosen a custom molder in Chicago over someone more local.

Breyer might really have just been the closest, or the closest one with the lowest bid. More local molders might have turned him down for various reasons. It could have been a friend of a friend thing, too. I really don’t know. There weren’t a lot of custom molders back then to choose from - according to Jeffrey Meikle’s American Plastic: A Cultural History, there were only about 370 molding and fabricating companies operating in the U.S. by 1946.

You might have noticed that each compartment on this tray is labeled for various vanity-type objects - combs, brushes, manicure equipment, curlers and pins. You can tell that a man designed this thing: there are not one, but two separate compartments for "miscellaneous" items! Was Mr. Goodell too embarrassed - or too intimidated - to ask the missus for a little advice about the average contents of a lady’s vanity?

(Her name was Gladys, by the way. Her picture is in the University of Louisville’s online archive, too.)

You know what this latest acquisition means, don't you? I’m only an International Harvester steering wheel and a couple of Money Managers short of a totally rad "Before Breyer was Breyer" Collector’s Class entry.

Acetate, Butyrate and Propionate - Oh My!

As I mentioned in my previous post, Breyers haven’t always been made of Tenite Acetate. I’m not talking about the Stablemates and Little Bit/Paddock Pals, both of whom made the transition to ABS (acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene) some time ago. There have been a couple of times in the past when Breyer used other types of Cellulose Acetate.

The first known incidence of this is from the early to mid-1970s: the Chalky Era. Since Tenite was expensive, and in short supply, Breyer went overseas to purchase the off-brand Cellulose Acetate they needed to continue production. It might not have been "Tenite," but it was still the same stuff chemically - more or less. It’s not the color this stuff came in that made the difference: the pigments used to color Cellulose Acetate have little effect on the plastic’s basic properties. It’s the formula itself: every manufacturer has their own, subtly different recipe for Cellulose Acetate.

Because each brand of Cellulose Acetate is slightly different chemically, it’s generally not a good idea to start mixing them together - just like it’s not a good idea to mix different brands of the same kind of paint together. So the brittleness some Chalkies are known for may not just be a result of a different "recipe," it could also be the result of a slightly incompatible regrind mix.

In the late 1970s, Breyer again was forced, due to cost, to switch to a different type of Cellulose Acetate. This time it was Cellulose Acetate Propionate (CAP.) CAP is most definitely not compatible with plain old Cellulose Acetate: the literature from the Eastman Chemical makes it very clear that mixing the two is a very bad idea. (Oddly, it can be mixed, to some degree, with the third form of Tenite - Cellulose Acetate Butyrate, or CAB.)

The "B" mold mark was added to molds during this time period - ca. 1979-1982 - to help distinguish the Propionate-molded models from the Acetate-molded ones, and prevent regrinding accidents. It’s assumed that the "B" mark was added to most Breyer molds in production during that time period - but we don’t know for certain. I’ve been casually keeping track of that data point just to confirm or verify. And who knows? Maybe a surprise or two will show up. (I keep track of all sorts of crazy data points. It’s a wonder I get anything done at all!)

But why did they use a "B" mark - shouldn’t it have been "P" for Propionate, instead? I wonder if they originally decided to go with the Butyrate form of Tenite instead, and only switched to the Propionate at the last minute. The molding properties of the Butyrate form of Tenite are more similar to the Acetate than the Propionate.

It’s probably only a coincidence - maybe it was just a "B for Breyer" thing, or a random mold stamp they picked up. Or maybe it was just an artifact of their internal production process: they may have simplified things for the workers by referring to the two different plastics by letter, rather than by name. If Acetate was "Plastic A," then Propionate could have become "Plastic B." No clue.

In general, both Propionate and Butyrate are more dimensionally stable, and can hold detail better than Acetate. However, these properties come at a price: less flexibility. That lack of flexibility results in this sort of thing happening more often:


A lot could have been done to manipulate Propionate and Butyrate to behave more like Acetate - either by changing the plastic formula (adding or subtracting plasticizers) or recalibrating the molding process (manipulating the heat, the pressure, or the injection speed.) It must have been too much of a hassle: they opted to go back to Acetate once it was feasible to do so.

While most molds had the B mold mark removed by 1982, it lingered on for years afterwards on a small number of molds, most notably the Rearing Stallion. Some molds seem to be more rare than others with the B mark, but I don’t know of many hobbyists who collect them the way, say, Chalkies are collected.

As far as I know, Traditional-scale Breyers are still made from Cellulose Acetate - though I am unsure if it is specifically the Tenite brand. I haven’t seen the word "Tenite" in any of the promotional literature lately, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. As the saying goes, the absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence.

The Unique Properties of Cellulose Acetate

You’ve probably heard by now about the demise of Giant Butter Jesus. The drive to Kentucky this year will not be the same without the dairy-like Divinity’s presence. You would have thought, though, that for the amount of time and money they invested in him that the church would have gone the extra mile and upgraded him to sturdier stuff than wood and styrofoam.

(Big Lex is going to be fiberglass, right? Right?)

Now, onto the stuff our stuff is made of: Tenite.

Tenite is the brand name for a family of cellulosic plastics created by the Eastman Chemical Company of Kingsport, Tennessee. It was formerly known as the Tennessee Eastman Corporation, a subsidiary of the Eastman Kodak Company. There are actually three different forms of Tenite: Cellulose Acetate (CA), Cellulose Acetate Butyrate (CAB), and Cellulose Acetate Propionate (CAP.) Breyers are usually made of the Cellulose Acetate form of Tenite; that’s not always been the case, but we’ll get to that in the second part of this discussion.

Cellulose Acetate was developed as a more stable and less flammable substitute for Cellulose Nitrate, or Celluloid. It was first used to manufacture photographic film and textiles: it’s the stuff Rayon is made of. The solid, moldable form of Cellulose Acetate was put on the market in 1932, and it basically made the plastic injection molding industry possible: prior to that, most plastics were either extruded, cast, or formed by hand, which made mass production labor intensive and time consuming.

Other plastics hit the market not long afterwards, including Tenite II, or Cellulose Acetate Butyrate, in 1938. Other companies came up with their own varieties of Cellulose Acetate, often with their own unique brand names.

Here’s the cover to a promotional brochure for Tenite, ca. 1940; one could easily imagine it sitting on someone’s desk at the Breyer Molding Company way back when. There were other booklets available on molding, and one on its properties/specifications, but I don’t happen to have either one in my archives - yet.


The brochure is lavishly illustrated; although we’re still several years before the model horse boom, there are some equine-themed items among the products displayed, including Bergen cowboys, and a Lone Ranger Yo-yo!



The brochure goes into great detail about what an ideal material Tenite is for toy manufacturing:

"Tenite is also used for game pieces and toys. Chessmen, mahjong pieces, and poker chips may be injection molded complete in only a few seconds, eliminating hand-carving, machining, and polishing operations. Toy trains, airplanes, and automobiles are safer and less expensive to produce in Tenite than similar articles made by swedging nitrocellulose sheeting. Jackstones, toy soldiers, whistles, and babies’ teethers of Tenite are practically unbreakable, light in weight, and colorfully attractive."

Little wonder why Breyer decided to stick to Tenite when they began to mass-produce the Western Horse, eh? (Well, there weren’t a lot of other plastics to choose from, either - might as well go with what you know.)

Though the original form of Tenite has largely been eclipsed by more modern plastics, and by other forms of Tenite, there’s a reason why it’s still the go-to material for the model horse industry: it feels good! Or, as the brochure also explains:

"Because it is a low conductor of heat and takes an exceptionally smooth finish, molded Tenite is very pleasant to the touch."

It’s no coincidence that the other uses for Cellulose Acetate today include toothbrushes, eyeglass frames, and tool handles: all of these surfaces come in close, regular contact with the skin.

The text also notes that "in certain formulas, Tenite is virtually odorless and tasteless." An important consideration back then, but amusing today: isn’t the aroma part of the charm? Who among us hasn’t taken a long, deep sniff after deboxing a brand new arrival? I know I’m not the only one who’d be willing to buy a "New Breyer Horse" scented car air freshener.

Bacon Resistant, and Mayonnaise Proof!

You wouldn’t think that it’d take over two years to paint and wallpaper three and a half rooms, would you?

Since it probably won’t be until the end of this year before this process is apparently done, I’m going to have to soldier on without access to some of my research materials. They’re not in any apparent danger: I literally cannot reach them without moving half the contents of the room. And I can’t do that, lest I anger the gods of painting and wallpapering.

I’ll focus my attention today on one of the documents I do have access to: it’s PP-101B, Tenite Acetate - Chemical Resistance. If you want a copy for yourself, it’s available as a PDF from Eastman, the company that manufactures Tenite. I’ll give you a moment to find it via your search engine of choice, if you’d like to read along.

(Trust me, it’s worth it!)

Most of us who’ve had any extended experience with Breyers in general know that while they’re durable, they’re not indestructible. They can yellow, warp, stain, shrink, crack, ooze and all sorts of unpleasant and unattractive things. Some of it is beyond our control - the result of a bad batch of plastic, too much regrind in the mix, machine (or human) error. And other times, it’s a previous owner’s bad decisions that lead to the damage - chain smokers, we’re looking at you!

Over the years many of us have developed techniques to fix some of the more fixable damage. If I happened to have an otherwise unsalvageable horse, I wouldn’t hesitate to subject it to whatever I happened to find around the house. (Within reason, and usually in the garage.)

Silly us. All we really had to do was ask the company that made it.

This document lists several hundred chemicals, commercial and household products, and what the "Observed Condition of the Plastic" was after being exposed or immersed in it for a given period of time.

Most of the stuff that was tested was of an industrial nature - hydrocarbons, acids, esters and alcohols that most of us wouldn’t be keeping anywhere near the house or garage in the first place. The results for some of those tests are quite predictable, too: it dissolves in a solution of 10% Nitric Acid within a week. Duh!

Some of the results were a surprise: apparently mothballs (naphthalene) are not good things to keep around your horses. The results "Showed considerable plasticizer exhudation" after only 24 hours. Yikes - that sounds like oozing to me! Though I have to admit that my curiosity is now piqued; I’m tempted to toss a body in a sealed box with some dollar store mothballs to see what would happen.

The most amusement comes from the "Commercial and Natural Products" section. Everything from Jet Fuel to Coffee Grounds was tested. Toothpaste, Horseradish, Chocolate Syrup, Lard and Blood(!), too.

The reason for this eclectic mix of test subjects is that Tenite Acetate is also used in food and chemical handling and storage - the machinery that processes it, and the containers that it’s stored in. You’ll be happy to know that if you accidentally lose a model in a vat of mayonnaise, or drop it in a bowl of bacon drippings, it’ll be fine. (Unless you happen to have dogs in the house.)

Not so fine: Lipstick, Kool-Aid, Lysol, Lighter Fluid, Budweiser Lager, and Vicks Decongestant. (Sound like an interesting party to me!) Catsup, Mustard and most Gasolines also leave stains.

I could go on - the document is 13 pages long, and full of win. Who would have thought technical documentation could be so entertaining?