Happy Halloween everyone, well All Hallow’s Eve or whatever you wanna call it. We had a potluck lunch today so many awesome foods, beverages and deserts, it was amazing (Sorry you missed it Señor!) Someone had a great idea of dressing up today, and talked a few of us into doing the same, heck everyone’s gonna do it right?! WRONG! A few of the brave and the bold with great halloween spirits dressed up. Needless to say when I arrived at work this morning all Luchador’d out, and saw people coming in to work not dressed up, I felt a little out of place. But low and behold, my friends were there to back me up! Hoo-rah! Have a Happy and Safe Halloween everyone!

Once again we bring you something out of the deep, dark closet of projects that weren’t quite ready for prime time.

…and it’s not even Halloween yet.

We were informed recently that our Maisto Tech: Jeep Wrangler Rubicon 1:16 Scale R/C was featured on the About.com toys section as a School Age Kid Toy Top Pick!  Click Here to Read More!

Well, we were awaiting for the official word that this was live – it is,  so, let us be the bearer of awesome news, the first ever maisto/bburago sponsored dream sweeps!

thats right, enter diecast x magazine’s (http://www.diecastxmagazine.com/)  sweepstakes, with prize packages sponsored by your truly, and you have the chance to win one of 4 prizes, including the grand prize, a 1:18 Lamborghini Murcielago made with CRYSTALLIZED Swarovski Elements. some of you might remember the Murcielago, we wrote about it before in the double d

- here is a link to the original post

http://maisto.wordpress.com/2009/02/05/118-lamborghini-murcielago-lp640-made-with-crystalized-swarovski-elements/

in case you can’t read the fine print, other than the grand prize, first prize is $700 (retail) of maisto/bburago die-cast, 2nd prize is $500 (retail) of die-cast, and 3rd prize is $300 (retail) of die-cast. the graphice shows all the prizes in all their glory.

we are thrilled that diecast x magazine selected us to sponsor this sweepstakes. remember- it is their game, so you have to play by their rules. here is a link to their page with all the specifics:

www.diecastxmagazine.com/dreamsweeps

they promise to have all of their promos up on their sights soon, with links to ours, we’ll be linking to theirs, so it is an out and out love-fest. thanks to ben and allen for all of their support, and good luck to everyone!

Do you wonder where you could get such a fine collection of Maisto and Bburago stuff? Check back with us tomorrow and will have all the details for you.

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These just arrived at our warehouse in California so they should be available at retail soon.

Pedrosa and Dovizioso are the riders.

This is my thank you to the Firefighters, EMT’s, Police Officers and Port Authorities who payed the ultimate sacrifice on that day. The call numbers on these vehicles represent those we lost.

The 343 represent the 341 New York Firefighters and 2 FDNY EMT’s we lost.

The 23 represents the 23 NYPD we lost.

The 37 represents the 37 New York Port Authority Officers we lost.

Thank you to ALL of you who risk your lives for ours on a daily basis.

To ALL the families who lost friend and family on that day, my heart and prayers are always with you.

What time of year, you may ask?

oh, that time of year. Costco is in stock on their assortment of Maisto 1:18 cars. The red package is a first for us – looks pretty good, I think. As they say, get ‘em while they last…

Starting with a Maisto 1:12 1964 Chevrolet Impala R/C car, Jevries has built an outstanding fully functioning model.

Jevries sent these photos and wrote:

Basically I started out with the original Maisto ride, swapped wheels with the wire wheels I created in resin and modified the electronics using a picture of the IC connections I found on the internet. By adding more channels/ functions I was able to makes this ride lift the front and rear, make it go sideways, three wheel and hop the front of the car hitting the back bumper. I also added extra LED lights. It was a big hit when I showed it at the Bangkok motor show in 2007.

Later on I swapped the modified electronics and used professional equipment for proportional control. I showed this ride at the Vegas lowrider show in 2007 and earlier this year in Japan and people loved it. I recently redid the paintjob and added a theme: The Lost Angel by Mr. Cartoon. Graphics are done by scaling pictures I found on the internet and printing them on clear Decal paper. Next step is a interior and one of the other Maisto ’64’s I will turn into a convertible with working top.

Dig the sparks when the rear bumper scrapes. See a video of the car in action:

See his website at http://www.jevries.com/

Here’s the Maisto R/C car that he started with.

Although this looks like a black-and-white photo, it’s in color. Before a die-cast model is made, we hand make one from plastic resin that is 1-1/2 times larger than the finished car. This tooling model serves two purposes: 1) it lets the tooling people know that all of the parts will fit together the way it was planned, and 2) we submit it to the licensor (Ford, in this case) so they can be assured that it looks accurate before we make the steel tooling for the production models. It may look a little strange to see the chrome, windows and tires in primer color but the purpose of this model is show the shapes and the way that they fit together, not colors. Plain cylinders represent the wheels and tires — CAD drawings are sufficient for these so it isn’t cost-effective to make a model of them.

Here’s the pre-production sample. You can see a slim area where the paint didn’t cover below the bumper ahead of the front wheels. That was fixed on the production models that are just arriving in stores now. In addition to the Highland Green Metallic color shown, it’s also available in Candy Apple Red. The SKU is 31166.