I have wanted to do this post for a long time.
Anyone who has known me for awhile knows that the Hot Wheels Datsun 510 is one of my all-time favorite castings. I fell in love with it the second I saw it on the pegs, and it is the model that opened up a whole new world for me when it came to JDM and classic Japanese cars in general.
So as is the case whenever I go gaga for a model, my ultra-completist collecting tendencies kick in, and I go after everything. My pursuit of the 510 got so bad, and quite well-known among HWC regulars, that I had people sending me customs, errors, and even a 510 poster signed by the model's creator, Jun Imai.
Collecting the 510 has been an adventure. Like most Hot Wheels models over time, hard-to-find variations do emerge, but with a little diligence and luck, I have been able to acquire them all. I finally got myself up-to-date last week, when a collector friend of mine up in the Northwest was able to find the very elusive chrome trap-5 variation of the 2012 grey model that was only found in a few Gift Packs.
Well, now that I have them all, why not show them off?
This is everything. Or at least everything official. There are plenty of errors, shade variations, and even a small casting glitch that made an extra line appear in the rear pillar. But here we will focus on each distinct version and wheel/tampo variations.
Those of you who collect the 510, and I know there are a lot, how up-to-date are you?
(If you have a few to add, head here
to find what you still need...)Hot Wheels Datsun Bluebird 510:
2009 New Models blue w/chrome-rimmed OH5 (common)
2009 New Models blue with chrome OH5 (rare, only found in Target 2-pack)
2009 New Models black with chrome-rimmed OH5 (common)
2009 New Models black with chrome 5-spokes (extremely rare)
2009 New Models copper with silver stripe (transition from black version, extremely rare)
2009 New Models copper with white stripe (common)
2010 white (common)
2010 yellow (common)
2011 Vintage Racing John Morton (highly sought after)
2012 red FTE (common)
2012 red chrome OH5 (somewhat rare, found in Target Valentine 5-packs in occasionally on blisters)
2012 grey FTE (common)
2012 grey chrome trap-5 wheels (rare, found in occasional Gift Packs.)
2012 grey with gold J5 wheels (somewhat rare, found in Gift Packs and Target Racing blisters)
2013 '71 Datsun 510 Wagon (Boulevard)
A few highlights:
5 sets of variations:
The rarest vari of them all:
And the two premiums, far-and-away the highlights of this batch:
