I've had Several Die-cast toys over the years. I've slowly developed a HATE for the stuff.
It's incredably cheap as far as materials go. Another name for the material used to make "die-cast" products is pot-metal. The Actual metal is made from zinc, copper, aluminium, magnesium, lead, pewter and tin based alloys. It's VERY VERY dense, and VERY VERY Heavy. It's VERY costly to get set up, but fairly inexpensive once you've got your die's set up.
it tends to be rather soft on details, and Dosn't hold paint very well at all. in fact, the more you handle something that is diecast, the more likely it is that the paint will chip and/or flake off.
generaly, if unpainted, diecast will quickly oxidize into a brownish-black in color. Resembling petrified po op.
in other words, it's ****. it's weight gives an "illusionary value" to schmucks who equate things being heavy to things being valuble, and so they can charge more.
Hasbro made transformers out of it in the 80's and sold said transformers for less than 10$
Matchbox cars are STILL made from the stuff, and are less than 5$, and that factors in vehicular liscensing.
Though, I guess Barnam did say there is a sucker born every minite.
