Cult_Of_Skaro Posted December 30, 2013 Posted December 30, 2013 I've seen a couple references to the M-Tron set 9401 M-Tron team which was supposedly released 1993. However, there appears to be no information about it anywhere on the web. What happened to it? What was it? Why did, apparently, no one buy it? Quote
deraven Posted December 31, 2013 Posted December 31, 2013 As far as I know, 9401 was a value pack and not a separate set. It contained the small, inexpensive sets 6811 Pulsar Charger and 6833 Beacon Tracer. My bet is that, if anything more than an inventory number for ordering from SaH at the time, it would have just been a cardboard backing sleeve that they were shrinkwrapped to and, of course, wouldn't have had any specific instructions of its own or anything else to survive to help identify it now, 20 years later. Quote
Cult_Of_Skaro Posted December 31, 2013 Author Posted December 31, 2013 Ah, that makes a lot of sense. I should see if waybackmachine goes that far back...See if I can find something. Quote
deraven Posted December 31, 2013 Posted December 31, 2013 I can't seem to find that specifically (not entirely sure what year it's from and not in a position to dig out my full catalogs from that era right now), but I think this is basically what it was: http://www.peeron.com/catalogs/1992/medium/11/?id=86 See the Value Pack on the right hand side of the page with its own set number but just 4 distinct, individually-numbered sets included. 9401 might have even been for a holiday promo or something. I am pretty curious now, though! :) Quote
Cult_Of_Skaro Posted December 31, 2013 Author Posted December 31, 2013 Very interesting. I forgot Peeron had some catalog scans, so may have to take a look at that... Nothing in small or medium 1993 catalog, though the latter appeared to have bits ripped out... Quote
jonwil Posted December 31, 2013 Posted December 31, 2013 Nothing on Peeron for 1990 (first year that M:Tron sets appear) or 1991 either. Its very possible that the value pack in question was a retailer exclusive or promo item and was never printed in any catalog. Maybe someone with a connection to the TLG archives can find out just what this set was... Quote
deraven Posted December 31, 2013 Posted December 31, 2013 Yes, I poked around a bit in '91-'94, but don't have access to all the catalogs. Definitely could have been just an internal reference number for a retailer combo pack as jonwil said. Perhaps Lego Historian or someone else with TLG connections could help. It's a minor mystery, but now I'm definitely wanting it solved. ;) Quote
Cult_Of_Skaro Posted January 2, 2014 Author Posted January 2, 2014 Yes, I poked around a bit in '91-'94, but don't have access to all the catalogs. Definitely could have been just an internal reference number for a retailer combo pack as jonwil said. Perhaps Lego Historian or someone else with TLG connections could help. It's a minor mystery, but now I'm definitely wanting it solved. ;) Help me, Gary Istok, you're my only hope! Quote
LEGO Historian Posted January 4, 2014 Posted January 4, 2014 (edited) Someone contacted me... I'll get onto this tomorrow... going out before our big USA snowstorm.. coming Saturday... need to get the house ready for being snowed in... But just a heads up on many of these value packs... some have a group value pack set number... others are in a value pack with just individual set numbers. The 9401 number sounds outside the "special set" number range which is usually in the 1400-1999 range. But I have to do some more checking about this one. Stay tuned! Edited January 4, 2014 by LEGO Historian Quote
deraven Posted January 4, 2014 Posted January 4, 2014 Stay safe and warm… and then let us know what you turn up! ;) Always love all your interesting insights into Lego history. Thanks! Quote
Cult_Of_Skaro Posted January 5, 2014 Author Posted January 5, 2014 Thanks so much! I'm really interested to see what you turn up. :) Quote
LEGO Historian Posted January 5, 2014 Posted January 5, 2014 OK... first of all, I would love to see an image of this set... I've checked the number range... and there are no LEGO sets of any kind in the 9400-9439 range, so that would tell me that this is likely not the number to this value pack. Then I did some investigating... and it seems that value packs seem to run in several variations... 1) where all the sets are in a single box... and all sets have the same number... such as the #1974 set of 1989... 2) where all the sets are in a single box... and all sets have separate numbers... such as the #1476 set of 1991... (containing the #1477, #1478, #1479, #1480, and #1481).... 3) where several different numbered sets are separately packed in 1 value pack with 1 unique set number... such as #1616 (contains #1620 and #1621). 4) where several different numbered sets are separeately packed in 1 value pack WITHOUT a unique set number... such as this 1985 Canadian set consisting of #6604, #6621, #6630... If the set in question WAS produced (with a #6811 and #6833 M-Tron sets)... then it could fall into this last category. Now I am curious to see what this set looked like... Sometimes a set image will become available... to a set that was not released... such as this 1526 set... which just exists as a mock-up! Quote
Cult_Of_Skaro Posted January 5, 2014 Author Posted January 5, 2014 (edited) OK... first of all, I would love to see an image of this set... I've checked the number range... and there are no LEGO sets of any kind in the 9400-9439 range, so that would tell me that this is likely not the number to this value pack. Then I did some investigating... and it seems that value packs seem to run in several variations... 1) where all the sets are in a single box... and all sets have the same number... such as the #1974 set of 1989... SNIP 2) where all the sets are in a single box... and all sets have separate numbers... such as the #1476 set of 1991... (containing the #1477, #1478, #1479, #1480, and #1481).... SNIP 3) where several different numbered sets are separately packed in 1 value pack with 1 unique set number... such as #1616 (contains #1620 and #1621). SNIP 4) where several different numbered sets are separeately packed in 1 value pack WITHOUT a unique set number... such as this 1985 Canadian set consisting of #6604, #6621, #6630... SNIP If the set in question WAS produced (with a #6811 and #6833 M-Tron sets)... then it could fall into this last category. Now I am curious to see what this set looked like... Sometimes a set image will become available... to a set that was not released... such as this 1526 set... which just exists as a mock-up! SNIP Interesting as always! And I am so going to reverse engineer 1526. I wonder where such images surface? Does LEGO have an archive of images like this? Maybe someone could get access to said archive. Edited January 5, 2014 by Cult_Of_Skaro Quote
Junpei Posted January 5, 2014 Posted January 5, 2014 Very interesting! Cult_Of_Skaro, I think I remember it being mentioned somewhere by LEGO Historian that the Billund archives are missing who-knows-how-many sets. I don't know of anything official online, but I can't be sure it doesn't exist. Where do these images surface? Only Gary Istok knows.... I wonder who contacted him.... Good luck, TLH Quote
Cult_Of_Skaro Posted January 5, 2014 Author Posted January 5, 2014 I knew they were missing some early stuff (First Automatic binding bricks in the 40s). However, by the eighties and nineties, we have images of multiple planned but unreleased sets, such as this one: Which makes me think there's less stuff missing from the archives from the 90s. I could be wrong, though, as I'm not sure of the original source of these images. Quote
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