Heya guys, it's been a few years since I last posted on vintage forums. Back then I picked up a massive SW vintage lot from a deceased estate here in Australia, including a carded POTF Nikto and approx 1000 loose figures (I'm serious lol), etc. Unfortunately no vinyl capes

Basically, I was curious whether the Toltoys Vinyl cape had a specific Jawa exclusive to that figure. Didn't that open a massive can of worms lol! I'm no expert, just a collector, and was sharing my thoughts and opinions for which I was threatened, harassed and abused! I have NEVER sold vintage figures on Ebay (bought plenty, but NEVER sold) yet now I see my name associated with bad sellers due to my opinion that the Toltoys Vinyl Cape Jawa figure had unique characteristics? I lost interest after all the drama and simply moved my collecting experiences from the forums to my Facebook.

Anyway, a few years later I have once again stumbled across a nice find. I recently purchased a box of loose vintage figures, including Yak Face and a few last 17 figures. But the real treasure were the 5 Jawas and 4 vinyl capes. The seller was elderly and said the figures were packed away and stored when his son grew older. The figures were all in played condition, but are in reasonably good condition. There was a mix of weapons, capes and POTF coins in a separate small bag (none of the figures were wearing their capes, including Jawas, Vader, Obi, Leia). I have water checked all the weapons and there are no fakes or repros. Best of all, I purchased the lot for his asking price of $150.

As everyone knows, there are more fake capes then real, so I plan on sending the Jawas in to AFA for authentication. But I have a few questions:

- which blaster variant do I include? Dark or light? Smooth or rough? Bump or no bump? There were only 3 blasters included in the lot, but I have a few from my last find. Can I send them all in and have AFA match the correct one?

- do I have to send the capes attached to the Jawa? Ideally I would like to submit all 4 capes loose, with 7 loose Jawas and have AFA match the best 4 capes with the best 4 figures for grading.

- what are your opinions of the capes and figures? I have attached some photos. A close friend of mine who specialises in vintage collecting says they are fake, but considering the circumstances of the purchase, with no financial gain from the seller, I am happy to take a punt and see what AFA thinks.

Once again, I'm not here to get in another debate about Toltoy Jawas, simply looking for some friendly advise and opinions from fellow collectors. Thanks guys.

Pics. I see no pics. Can I have some pics?

Welcome back. From what I can see the capes are fine. Do all the jawas have the same leg markings & larger head?
I'd call AFA , but I'd suspect send all the jawas, capes & guns seperately- let them 'sort' it out.

Heya mate and thanks

Yeah all the Jawas have larger head, speckles (I'm not going there again! lol) and same COO. But 4 of them the "G" in Hong Kong is in line with the other "G", and the other 3 the "G" is a bit higher.

I contacted AFA but they are currently closed during holiday period. I will let you know what they recommend.

#1 & ??

Nice find

Sounds like a steal for $150 nice work

That was an awesome find.
From what I know the figures look good (the green speckling for one and the larger head), like AJ said, but I don't know enough about the capes and blasters to help.
The only thing that I know about the cape are that they are darker than the Kenner capes.
I don't know if they are thicker or have the patterned (texture) on the one side and the other side smooth like the Kenner capes?

I will be very interested to hear what you find out about the capes and the blasters.

Clint

Hi Mick, nice to hear from you again, this certainly is agreat find.Have you tried placing all the capes on top of eachother to see if they are all the same shape? this one:


[/quote]looks like it has a different cut to the collar than the other three, might just be the angle of the pic but the armholes look too neat as well :scratch: .
I don't think AFA cares much anbout which blaster goes with these aslong as they're jawa blasters.Thanks for sharing and good luck with the grading.

The cape mentioned above is questionable, does it match the others On al area's cut, collar, armholes and bottomcorners?

The others all look good imo and i am 99% conviced They are real from what i can see in the pics.

To be 100% sure, i need to have them in hands.

aussiejames wrote:

#1 & ??

Four of the Jawas with #1 COO and the other three Jawas are #4. They all have speckles and larger heads.

Commander Clint wrote:

That was an awesome find.
From what I know the figures look good (the green speckling for one and the larger head), like AJ said, but I don't know enough about the capes and blasters to help.
The only thing that I know about the cape are that they are darker than the Kenner capes.
I don't know if they are thicker or have the patterned (texture) on the one side and the other side smooth like the Kenner capes?

I will be very interested to hear what you find out about the capes and the blasters.

Clint

I have a few Obi capes and to be honest these Jawa capes look pretty much identical in colour when placed next to each other. This is what concerns me a little since I have read the Jawa cape is supposed to be darker? The thickness and texture feel exactly the same to me (smooth one side and matrix of tiny diamonds on the other).

orangpendek wrote:

Hi Mick, nice to hear from you again, this certainly is agreat find.Have you tried placing all the capes on top of eachother to see if they are all the same shape? this one:

Quote :

looks like it has a different cut to the collar than the other three, might just be the angle of the pic but the armholes look too neat as well :scratch: .
I don't think AFA cares much anbout which blaster goes with these aslong as they're jawa blasters.Thanks for sharing and good luck with the grading.

None of the capes are perfectly flat, so its hard to place them exactly on top of each other. But if I lay all 4 together and place their bottoms on a flat surface it appears that none of the 4 capes match the exact size and cut of the others. This has me a little concerned.

I have another friend who has 2 vinyl caped figures which he claims to have bought in 1985 when he was living in South Australia. He assures me that he has been the only owner and they have never swapped hands. I am seeing him today and will compare my capes/figures with his. Will be interesting to see if his capes are perfect identically the same in size and shape. I will take some pics and let you know.

Btw, AFA replied and said sending all the blaster in is fine and they will sort it out.

Congrats on the find Mick, if they all turn out to be legit it would be the find of the year in my opinion.

Looking forward to see how this all pans out, keep us posted mate.

Ok went to my mates place yesterday and compared my figures and capes with his.

Firstly, the COO on his figures are both different! #1 and #4 from the chart. And both his figures have speckles on limbs and larger heads.

Both his Jawas wear their capes all the time, so we carefully removed them and first thing we noticed was that his arm holes were bigger then those on my capes. But he said he has taken them on and off a few times whilst he has had them.

Next we compared his two capes on top of each other. Once again hard because of the fold in the necks, but they do not appear to be exact in size and shape. We compared his 2 on top of my 4 and there is clearly a slight difference in size, but still very close.

Next we look at the corners on his capes and they seem to have the same appearance as mine.

His capes felt the same as mine, with one side smooth and the other textured (but still no noticeable difference to Obi capes). The colours were also the same. One thing I did notice is that one of his capes the textured side was on the outside and the other was on the inside. But I assume he may have put it on backwards some time when he was younger.

He only had 2 blasters, but 5 Jawas all up (other 3 are cloth), but I took pics of them anyway. They are the dark blue, smooth with bumps. But still no gurantee that they belong to the vinyl caped Jawas.

Overall, I'm a little more confident after comparing my vinyl Jawas with his. I have attached some pics, and I guess next step is to send them in.

Btw, what method do you guys recommend to give the capes and figures a clean? I noticed they are quite dirty under magnifying glass and macro pics lol.

I just use baby wipes to clean the loose figures when I get hold of them from a sale if they are dirty. With 3 girls (9 to 13) and my wife, there is usually no shortage of baby wipes in the house for them to remove makeup with. They are supposed to be gentle on the baby's bottom, so they should be good for my toys? I've never had any adverse affect from using them.

AFA do provide a cleaning service & the sceptic in me tells me this may assist the grade

mickfett wrote:

I'm no expert, just a collector, and was sharing my thoughts and opinions for which I was threatened, harassed and abused! I have NEVER sold vintage figures on Ebay (bought plenty, but NEVER sold) yet now I see my name associated with bad sellers due to my opinion that the Toltoys Vinyl Cape Jawa figure had unique characteristics? I lost interest after all the drama and simply moved my collecting experiences from the forums to my Facebook.

Hi Mick,

First of all just on behalf of most people posting in the thread you mention here, mate you were never abused for your opinions or thoughts. The discourse was centred around you challenging the opinions of a lot of folks who'd looked at the same subject for many, many years, pooled their knowledge on it, and then come up with a consensus. It just seemed that you weren't willing to accept anyone's opinion other than your own more often than not.

In terms of these figures though, I can guarantee you that it's impossible to say with absolute certainty whether or not the figures are real based on images. Anyone authenticating them needs to a) be able to authenticate them, and b) have the capes in hand to do this.

Judging from the pics alone, there's clearly problems with at least one, based on what I can see here, and possibly all of them.

The one thing I am confused by though, is your story of how you got these. You weren't the guy that found them I believe, and you paid more than the $150 a piece - a lot more. It was another gentleman in Sydney who'd been trying to sell them for around a month prior to you posting them here, I know this because they were offered to a friend of mine, and now the seller is saying that he passed them on to you.

That said, I'm happy to look at them for you to determine authenticity, or to recommend that you send them to AFA.

Hi Ben, long time. Hope your collecting is going well and good to see some things never change

But yes it is true, I was not the original guy who purchased these for $150, that was done by a friend of mine. And I have made an arrangement with him to purchase these upon certification from AFA. If they are knocked back or fake, all I lose is the time and cost to submit them for grading. I'm not 100% convinced they are genuine and that is why I posted here. I know everyone will have their own opinion, but unlike some, I am open and happy to listen to the thoughts and opinions of others.

Jealousy is a wicked curse and the reason I didn't mention my friends details is because I didn't want 'others' to try and cut in on our arrangement behind my back. I'm not selling them, not forcing any opinions, simply looking for some friendly advice as to whether I should go ahead with the AFA submission.

And at this stage I'm happy to take a punt and submit them for authentication. Thanks again for all the advice and I will let you know the outcome in about 8 weeks or so

mickfett wrote:

Hi Ben, long time. Hope your collecting is going well and good to see some things never change

But yes it is true, I was not the original guy who purchased these for $150, that was done by a friend of mine. And I have made an arrangement with him to purchase these upon certification from AFA. If they are knocked back or fake, all I lose is the time and cost to submit them for grading. I'm not 100% convinced they are genuine and that is why I posted here. I know everyone will have their own opinion, but unlike some, I am open and happy to listen to the thoughts and opinions of others.

Jealousy is a wicked curse and the reason I didn't mention my friends details is because I didn't want 'others' to try and cut in on our arrangement behind my back. I'm not selling them, not forcing any opinions, simply looking for some friendly advice as to whether I should go ahead with the AFA submission.

And at this stage I'm happy to take a punt and submit them for authentication. Thanks again for all the advice and I will let you know the outcome in about 8 weeks or so

Hey Mick, that makes sense, and I suspect you've definitely done the right thing by making that particular deal with your guy. And yes having an open mind to advice and opinion is definitely part of the process when authenticating anything, I know this particularly well in relation to this figure, since it wasn't accepted by anyone outside of a handful of collectors here in Australia right through to the early 2000s.

Just in terms of ensuring that no-one cut in behind your back though, the proper way to go about that would be to contact folks by email privately. This way you would avoid alerting the entire collecting community to the figure's presence in the first place, which has now been done. It wouldn't take much for anyone with a contact or two to hunt them down now I'd wager.

That said, it's not widely known, but there have been decent fakes of these figures floating around the place since the late 1990s though, made by different guys in Sydney and Melbourne - they are discernable from the originals, but will pass unnoticed by most collectors.

I'd advise anyone purchasing loose VC Jawas here in Australia to attempt to do something similar to what Mick has done with his arrangement. Because of the money involved in the current market, there's a lot at stake, and a lot of impetus as a result for anyone who is dishonest and willing to make forgeries.

Bjamin_S wrote:

It wouldn't take much for anyone with a contact or two to hunt them down now I'd wager.

Yes, no thanks to you spilling the beans!

But seriously, thanks for the heads up and warning. You are right, the smell of big money attracts sharks and we all know there are plenty of those in the SW collecting community.

I did share these pics privately at first between my network of friends, with mixed results. That is why I posted here for advice from those I do not know. Knowledge is everything. However it's good to know that everyone agrees on one thing... to submit them for authentication and that's the verification I was looking for.

Fingers crossed!

There's also another test I use for establishing a reasonable balance of probability when purchasing a 'childhood' collection which contains a possible vinyl cape Jawa. Essentially it boils down to this: If the Jawa has a vinyl cape and the Ben is missing his = 99% chance you're looking at a fake.

Good luck with the authentication though!

This reply is 3 years late, but better late then never

For those curious, only 1 of the 4 capes I submitted was graded by AFA (got a big fat 80 which is rare for Toltoys VC Jawas).

As per the original deal, I did get a refund from my friend, and he had no trouble selling them off (with the AFA note I assume).

The 3 capes weren't marked as fake, but the explanation for being refused was that the cut of the cape did not match that of other samples.

Since then I have purchased quite a few Toltoys VC Jawas over the years and it's become an obsession. I now know a lot more then I did, and honestly looking at the photos they seem to tick all the right boxes! Which makes me wonder whether they actually were genuine or not...

Anyway, now that AFA has currently suspended CiB authentication, I have noticed an increase in the number of vinyl cape Jawas being sold. I was almost certain these 4 were genuine and was lucky to get a refund, but I know of others who have been stung and not been so fortunate. Good luck Jawa hunting and remember to be extra careful when purchasing them loose and ungraded.

I still want a toltoys jawa, but prices on all vintage lately has put me off. I won't be adding on anytime soon unless the price comes way down.

trappedtexan wrote:

I still want a toltoys jawa, but prices on all vintage lately has put me off.  I won't be adding on anytime soon unless the price comes way down.

me too

mickfett wrote:

This reply is 3 years late, but better late then never
For those curious, only 1 of the 4 capes I submitted was graded by AFA (got a big fat 80 which is rare for Toltoys VC Jawas).

I do remember this thread... thanks for the update!

Still looking for a VCJ myself - Toltoys or Kenner, and like trappedtexan and hellhippie... the historic highs have delayed that acquisition. I'd like to think I can kick up another local score sometime soon.

trappedtexan wrote:

I still want a toltoys jawa, but prices on all vintage lately has put me off.  I won't be adding on anytime soon unless the price comes way down.

I've actually just secured a trade for one. And suffice to say the cost was way more than I paid for the Kenner. Ugh....