Toy cars made of wood or tin were manufactured in Turkey already in the 1940s. Between 1960 and 1980, the most important producers of tin toy cars were Gürel, Nekur, Alasya und Ufuk. Most of these models were generic, but for instance Gürel released simple models of cars which were manufactured or popular in Turkey (Renault 12, Mercedes-Benz and others). Plastic toy cars were also made in Turkey, e.g. by Uçar Oyuncak and Ekinci. The Turkish companies Meboto and Orfey took over castings from the Italian manufacturer Edil Toys and released copies of its detailed 1/43rd scale diecast models in the 1970s, but in a distinctly cruder finish. From 2004 on, the Turkish bus manufacturer Temsa commissioned Kalyon Model, a hobby and model car shop in Istanbul, to produce 1/87th scale plastic promotional models of its Safari and Diamond buses. The Temsa Avenue city bus was modelled by Rietze in 1/87th scale in 2012. Iconic Replica from the USA have also listed several 1/87th scale Temsa buses in their catalogue. Since 2010, a 1/18th scale diecast model of the Fiat 124 by IST Models has been available not only in the Italian original version, as a Spanish Seat and as a Russian Lada, but also in the Turkish version called Murat 124. The original car was built in the Tofas factory located in the city of Bursa between 1971 and 1994. Another Tofas car, the Murat 131, was later released as an Istanbul taxi in 1/43rd scale in the French and Spanish partwork "Taxis du monde/Taxis del mundo" by Altaya. Autocult also released a model of a Turkish prototype in summer 2016, a 1966 Anadol A1 made of resin in 1/43rd scale. Since the mid-2010s, Birlik Oyuncak has produced inexpensive toy cars made of diecast in 1/32nd to 1/36th scale after Turkish prototypes (among others, Anadol A2, Tofas Sahin and Kartal, Renault 12 Toros, Mercedes-Benz Sprinter in Turkish emergency versions) in China for the Turkish market. These models feature pull-back action, opening parts, and sometimes light and sound effects.
Turkey