The Lesney model of the 43b Aveling & Barford tractor shovel joined the Matchbox 1-75 series in mid 1962, The first issue was painted yellow all over and is a fairly hard to find variation.
It had 16.5 x 20 black plastic wheels on dome head axles with rounded ends. The wheel size was kept the same for the life of the model.
The shovel could be raised and lowered because it was mounted on a rbarfordegular axle pin that allowed the shovel arms movement.
After a fairly short run the baseplate which inluded the driver as part of its casting was recoloured to a dark red. the body & shovel were kept in yellow.
Later on the baseplate colour was altered again when it was changed to a much lighter red, the rest of the model was still in kept yellow paint and its this variation which is the most common.
The colour scheme was altered again when the baseplate was changed to yellow and the shovel was changed to red. this variation is also fairly common.
The final colour scheme saw the tractor with a yellow body, A red driver / base and red shovel which is probably the toughest one to find.There was just one minor casting variation where two holes in the shovel arms were filled in, Presumably to add a little strength to the shovel casting,
Note that both types of shovel casting were in use for quite some time and it was not until the last two colour schemes appeared that the shovel arms casting with open holes was no longer in use.
Although the all yellow model and the one with red driver / base and red shovel are quite hard to find there are no really super rare variations.
The Aveling Barford was packaged in 'D' and 'E' type boxes, It was replaced by the 43c pony trailer in 1968.
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