No. 902 Cargo Plane (Convair R3Y Tradewind Flying Boat) - UPDATE 2nd Version Identified, is Now No. 850:98

Four days ago I posted a lovely Eldon No. 902 Cargo Plane I believe was based on the Convair R3Y Tradewind Flying Boat. Over the years I had acquired two of these, each with a different set of vehicles. Since then I've come a cross some information which helps solve a little mystery. Enjoy! Opa Fritz

Disclaimer: I took the photos of the toy nearly two years ago before investigating this thing in detail. As a result there may be a disconnect in my photos and what I've learned actually comprised the two sets.

Based on several catalog pages and ads, it appears as if these planes were initially released with three vehicles that didn't actually fit inside the plane, despite what the catalog would have one believe. The catalog page you see here also states the plane is 20"L while mine only measures 11 1/4"L. I find it hard to believe Eldon would totally revamp its tooling in just a couple of years to accommodate the vehicles. It's more likely this was another artists rendering showing the proposed product but somewhere along the line Eldon had to change their plans and went with a smaller sized plane instead. Unless someone out there in the collecting world can show an actual example of this larger 20" plane, my guess is that Eldon sold the smaller plane with larger vehicles in some form of display box. Later, they would re-package it under another stock number with smaller vehicles. Just a working theory of course waiting for validation.

Set No 902 Cargo Plane

I am now convinced the set above would NOT have had the cardboard wrap as shown in these two-year old photos.

Set No. 850:98 U.S. Navy Cargo Plane

In the previous post, I speculated that the smaller vehicles shown in the photo below, were included in a latter set. Guess what? I was right!

The Jeep is missing from my set.

Perusing through files on my computer I came across this page from the 1961 Supplee-Biddle-Steltz Co. catalog (ad culled from eBay). From the looks of the page it appears as if this company was a distributor, not a retailer as it shows how many items are packed to a carton. Retail catalogs typically don't reflect that type of shipping information. 

It lists the plane as a "U.S. Navy Cargo Plane" - not just a "Cargo Plane" as the earlier catalog lists it. The SBS page also says it's Navy blue in color - vs. the multi-color aircraft shown in the earlier catalog. Also, the vehicles shown are clearly smaller and of different types than the earlier catalog lists them as. The SBS page doesn't show the ramp, but I'll make another educated guess that it was most likely part of the set. I am missing the Jeep as shown in the SBS ad.

Below: The additional information confirms that the small vehicles came with the airplane which had this simple cardboard wrap. The wrap clearly states it's a "U.S. Navy Cargo Plane" as reflected in the SBS ad. AND it no longer is identified as No. 902. The wrap shows this set to be "Stock No. 850:98". The ramp and vehicles are all small enough to fit into the fuselage of the plane.