Darklord Dave
Super Freak
- Joined
- Sep 3, 2005
- Messages
- 19,029
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I'm sure many of us have the Hot Wheels 1:18 Batmobile which came out a couple of months ago. I was so excited about it that I accidentally ordered it from 3 different places.
At SDCC 2007 Hot Wheels had an exclusive 1:18 Batmobile that is flocked like one of the show cars that traveled around. That one was $300 and I bought it.
I'd forgotten about the other 2 versions of the car that have been released - the "Elite" and the "Super Elite." Apparently I had ordered the Super Elite because it showed up on my doorstep the other day. I don't have the Elite, but I believe it's about $80. The Super Elite is $250-300, depending on where you buy it. There seems to be a mystery about it's edition size too - I've heard that it's only 1966 and that it's as high as 5500.
The other car is the basic, which was about $30.
Nice sheet metal stand - this is unique to the Super Elite I believe. The car is secured with 4 screws. Hot Wheels makes it extremely difficult to free the cars from packaging. I was never able to figure out how to completely free the fuzzy Batmobile from it's cylindrical case.
The box is nice - thick cardboard that flips open. There are 2 side inserts that are taped down that must be removed to get the stand out of the box.
The trunk has a rubberband holding it closed, but you can open it enough to cut the band so you can open the trunk. The front hood wouldn't open at all, I was sure it was supposed to. After unscrewing the car from the stand I found that the hood was twisty-tied closed to the front axle. I could have seriously damaged the finish by trying to open the hood - they need to have some instructions for this kind of thing.
It's obviously the same mold for all the cars and the cost is in the details. The elite has tiny signs on everything just like the real thing. The chutes in back are leather rather than molded plastic. There are rockets in the rocket tubes, the details on the cockpit items are all different molds - far more detailed. The seats are more detailed and there are seat belts with real bat-shaped buckles.
From what I've seen of the elite, it has a lot of these things - the trunk interior is the same as the super elite, and the jet engine under the hood is there, but isn't as detailed as the super elite. I don't know that it's worth 3 times the cost though for the details and fancy stand of the super elite.
At SDCC 2007 Hot Wheels had an exclusive 1:18 Batmobile that is flocked like one of the show cars that traveled around. That one was $300 and I bought it.
I'd forgotten about the other 2 versions of the car that have been released - the "Elite" and the "Super Elite." Apparently I had ordered the Super Elite because it showed up on my doorstep the other day. I don't have the Elite, but I believe it's about $80. The Super Elite is $250-300, depending on where you buy it. There seems to be a mystery about it's edition size too - I've heard that it's only 1966 and that it's as high as 5500.
The other car is the basic, which was about $30.
Nice sheet metal stand - this is unique to the Super Elite I believe. The car is secured with 4 screws. Hot Wheels makes it extremely difficult to free the cars from packaging. I was never able to figure out how to completely free the fuzzy Batmobile from it's cylindrical case.
The box is nice - thick cardboard that flips open. There are 2 side inserts that are taped down that must be removed to get the stand out of the box.
The trunk has a rubberband holding it closed, but you can open it enough to cut the band so you can open the trunk. The front hood wouldn't open at all, I was sure it was supposed to. After unscrewing the car from the stand I found that the hood was twisty-tied closed to the front axle. I could have seriously damaged the finish by trying to open the hood - they need to have some instructions for this kind of thing.
It's obviously the same mold for all the cars and the cost is in the details. The elite has tiny signs on everything just like the real thing. The chutes in back are leather rather than molded plastic. There are rockets in the rocket tubes, the details on the cockpit items are all different molds - far more detailed. The seats are more detailed and there are seat belts with real bat-shaped buckles.
From what I've seen of the elite, it has a lot of these things - the trunk interior is the same as the super elite, and the jet engine under the hood is there, but isn't as detailed as the super elite. I don't know that it's worth 3 times the cost though for the details and fancy stand of the super elite.