Very Scarce 1 Chrome Famous 1960 BZ Chassis for Batmobile and more used

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Now that you have made it to the Bat Cave. I have compiled a great little story for you about the BZ Batmobile I am offering in this auction.For this listing I am offering (1 Chrome Chassis) this is the correct Chassis for either the Batmobile of others by BZ Mfg 1/24th, 1/25th scaleNote: needs wire drop arm, easy to make.These chassis was featured on several of the BZ cars like the Batmobile, Ford GT, Black Beauty "Green Hornet" Ferrari 275P/LM, Banshee, Little Red Wagon Dodge Wheel stander Pick-up and Porsche 906.The BZ Batmobile was created by the famous George Barris.I have several items signed by George Barris in my store and I have included a few pics with the signature in my store. All pics are for "Viewing Only" and are not in this offering.INFO below for your pleasure.Batmobiles. What is the real story?Lots of reproductions of the original BZ Batmobile body out there. Lots of misrepresentation about such thin Lexan bodies mounted over original or Charlie Almond produced chassis copies. What to believe?Lloyd Asbury built both the BZ (Beck & Zimmerman) forming tools, (See Picture of them below) but also a couple for use by the Lancer company. The visual difference is in the license plate on the back of the car, smooth on the Lancer, engraved "BZ1966″ on the BZ tooling.All the BZ bodies were made of thick, 30-thou butyrate, and they were always sold completely trimmed and ready to use including the side mounting holes, in either clear or painted form. Of course BZ used most of them to build their RTR cars, the famous Batmobile RTR:Many have survived in fair to excellent condition, a few with their original and fragile clear plastic 2-piece box, the same box used by K&B for their late-issue RTRs, the same as used by Western Hobbies for their RTR cars, and this box was also used by another couple of manufacturers for various purposes. In other words, the plastic company which made the box tooling had a good salesman. Current market value of these BZ RTR cars, mint in mint original box with the yellow and blue insert, the car unused with its original "white-line" Riggen-produced rear tires, oscillates between $450.00 and $1250.00 depending on how many bidders there are and how bad they want one. The original bodies sell factory painted for as much as $100.00 and clear for as much as $60.00.Meanwhile, Lancer also produced the body (sans license plate) also in butyrate, also trimmed, but sold in the usual white and blue Lancer boxes. These generally go for about $40.00 but are actually rarer.When the BZ company collapsed like most of the larger-volume slot car manufacturers did in 1968, one of the body tools was in the Lancer shop for repairs and never made it back.Lancer eventually closed their doors in 1969, and all the body tools were unceremoniously piled into two large 100-gallon drums and left outside the vacuum forming plant in San Bernardino, CA. In 1973, Robert E. Haines (REH) was offered the tools by Lloyd Asbury's former "partner" (as usual, Lloyd got the short end of the stick) and bought the tools for a song.Since then, REH has pulled thousands and thousands of bodies, using thin Lexan (and not butyrate) as a material. Lexan being very hard on epoxy tools, most of these are now seriously worn out and much of the original fine detail is gone or seriously diminished.This means that EVERY SINGLE "Batmobile" body made from LEXAN (VS thick butyrate) is a reproduction, most made from new demand in the late 1990′s to now.There were a total of 4 licensed "Batmobile" produced as slot cars in the 1960′s: the Aurora HO, the 1/24 BZ, K&B and Classic. Of these, the K&B is by far the most scarce, and it very seldom comes to auction. It sports a peculiar injection molded cockpit affixed with "melt-on" tabs onto the vacuum formed body. It is also the only one with a working dome light. Here is a picture of the rare beast inside its original packaging:And a picture of the chassis featuring a function... read more

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