Who remembers the short-lived Mattel “Speed Machines?” Very short lived, in fact; they were only made for one year: 1983. These were a series of reissues of earlier HW’s from the 70’s which were cheapened down to compete with some of the low-budget brands I talked about here! The paint was low quality, most of them were a single solid color with no decoration (though a few models did keep their tampo designs), and they had ugly plastic baseplates with the “HOT WHEELS” lettering blanked out. Although the wheels gave them away, the Hot Wheels name appeared nowhere on these cars.
Everyone knew what they were though, including the collectors, who hoarded them and are now trying to sell them for absurd prices. Your humble blogger, however, did not know better: at the time (I was 11 years old) I bought them in bulk because they were cheap and I specifically got them to play with outside! I wanted to keep all my nice cars indoors, but when I wanted to play in the dirt and mud, these were perfect! I believe Toys R Us sold them for only 68 cents or something like that; what a deal! They came in brightly colored blister packages with shorter cards than Hot Wheels.
I’m sure you can surmise that, as a result of this, few of my Speed Machines survived, but actually, I still have most of them. One is missing, one of my favorites: the American Victory racer, which means I now have to go and put that one on my “GET-BACKS” list. I don’t know what happened to it, I know I kept it. What you see here are the 5 others that I still have: the Z-Whiz, the Packin Pacer (which is really beat, the roof is damaged and both the axles have come adrift), the Hair Splitter (hood still in-tact!) the Mustang Stocker, and the Rock Buster.
There were, however, a trio of these that escaped the outdoor play fate; I liked these enough to keep with my inside cars, so in near mint condition I have another Rock Buster and probably the best car released as a Speed Machine, the Second Wind, a car I always loved. The Vega Bomb, though in good overall condition, shows several chips on the body; this damage resulting from quiet indoor play shows how poorly the paint on these cars was adhered; they weren’t designed to last.
How many of these are hidden in your collection today, dear readers? Did you keep yours indoors, or did you beat them in the dirt like me? Like everything associated with Hot Wheels, they’re worth some money today! Had we but known!
I really like this and I do remember the speed machines. I think I had some given to me when I was a boy. Again, very cool to see and, I think, worthy of adding to the collection!