Matchbox Superfast MB25-d Ford Cortina GT

The regular wheels Ford Cortina joined the SuperFast range early in 1970 as the Ford Cortina GT - the only casting to have its name amended upon transition. It was packaged initially in an ´F´ box just in time for Christmas 1969 in the USA before the ´G´ box designs were produced and it can also be found in USA and Canada blisterpacks with copyright dates between 1969 and 1971.
Metallic brown regular wheels bodies were used up for a proportion of the F box run and these fetch good prices reflecting high collector demand. Most SuperFast Cortina GTs were painted in a bright blue clearcoat over silver primer although one often overlooked scarce run was made using the dark blue clearcoat officially specified for the common #64 MG 1100.
There is a more common in between metallic blue Cortina GT shade that matches the hard to find lighter shade from the #64 MG1100!

All #25 Cortina GTs were fitted with the smallest size of thin Superfast wheels which have a diameter of 9.5x2mm with 5 slots and were mostly hollow ,but solid on a minority. It was given the rivited plastic sprung suspension in red,brown or light grey that became the standard for all early 1970s SuperFast cars (but not commercials).
The only casting modification during 1970 was the deletion of the inside roof rivit that secured the clear plastic glazing unit once it was realized that the seats held it in place without the need for the rivit. Although early regular wheels metallic brown Cortinas are found with engraved boot channel lines, all SuperFast issues in both colours have standard raised profile boot outlines.

The Cortina was, alongside the #53 Zodiac, the first 1-75 series casting made with the future standard more realistic but time consuming engraved rather than raised demarkation body casting lines, and the modification to the boot edges during regular wheel production makes both these castings unique hybrids featuring both design methods.
Although outside the scope of this site, the tooling for this casting was briefly used for a production run in Hungary and then settled down for the 1980s in Bulgaria, where examples in a rainbow of enamel and metallic colours were made featuring red or black seats and silver or black painted baseplates with wide 10mm dot dash wheels and no sprung suspension.