The Lesney model of the Fordson major tractor took the number 72 spot in the Matchbox 1-75 series in 1959.
It was always painted a darkish blue with silver trim to the radiator grille but the shades of the blue do vary some,
The steering wheel and tow hook were both cast in as part of the body casting and are quite delicate and are often missing altogether.
Lesney did not cast in the air intake or the exhaust to the bonnet (hood) at all and this was probably because of how often these parts broke off during assembly of the earlier tractors.
The early models had regular grey or black plastic wheels at the front with grey or black tyres on orange or sometimes yellow wheels at the rear.
Later the front wheels were changed to match the rear wheels, ie tyres on wheels, the orange wheels are common but the yellow wheels are quite rare and the orange hubs had a smooth inner face so could only be fitted one way around but the yellow hubs were identical on both sides so could be mounted either way around,
The axles were always dome head with rounded ends, There was one casting modification to the base where the split rivet joined the two main parts together, on the early models there was a platform around where the rivet came through the base, on later issues the platform was done away with and the rivet head had a flat base around it.
Fairly early in it's life part of the die broke and models appeared with infill above the right side of the engine, The model did look quite a mess until the damaged die was repaired, I have not included the infill model in the variation table but if anyone should be interested it was the variation with orange rear wheels and 11 x 24 black plastic front wheels. Except for the yellow hubbed models which are quite rare the Fordson is a fairly common toy. It was packaged in 'B', 'C' and 'D' type boxes and was replaced by the 72b Jeep CJ5 in 1966.
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