| bc |
| Bilda-brix, the 1950s
Australian plastic brick construction outfit,
manufactured by Playmate, moulded by Moulded
Products (Australasia) Limited. Also
incorrectly known as Buildabrix, Bildabrix,
Buildabricks and Bildabricks. Set 2. |
| |
| Included in a miscellaneous box of Bilda-brix
I purchased from a friendly eBay seller in
December, 2005, was a No.2 catalogue. Until this
discovery., I'd not known that there WAS a bigger
set. Two mysterious half-bricks with central
raised circular additions had me looking to the
front of the catalogue. These were FLAGPOLE
BASES. SET
No.2 CONTENTS
|
Below are
listed regular pieces.
The righthand column lists pieces unique to this
set.
Pieces in italics I've not seen
outside of the catalogue.
208 whole blocks, red
52 whole blocks, white
104 half blocks, red
40 angle blocks, red
16 tapered blocks, red
9 roofs
2 sets of doors and windows
8 metal strips (later strips made from
circuit board) |
5 fences
2 gates
4 flower pots
36 paving tiles (2 shades, white AND cream)
1 chimney
4 clock faces
2 flags
2 pennants
1 large flagpole
2 small flagpoles
2 flagpole bases |
| SAMPLE
MODEL from the catalogue 
|
b |
This model, the TOWN HALL, from
page 12 of the catalogue, shows a number of the
special pieces, namely the large (in front)
flagpole, with the Australian flag, a small
flagpole on the clock tower, the clock faces, a
flag base (red, though it's shown as white here,
for some reason) and the paving tiles (on the
entrance verandah). The largest model in the
catalogue is a SKYSCRAPER but to my mind it's
less spectacular, being simply tiles upon tiles,
to quite a height.
There was a Set 1A, which added to Set 1, made
up to Set 2.
|
| If you want scans of other plans, email John
chiefchook@gmail.com but there will (possibly) be a lengthy
delay! LETTERS and COMMENTS (Note; /
indicates a new paragraph.)
Bilda-brix Church on Collecting Books &
Magazines Website
7/04/2008
Greetings John,
I ran across your page with the Bilda-brix church
today. It is quite a structure! How many bricks
does it take, have you ever counted? It looks
like you have some other templates on it besides
what is shown. I would love to see some pictures
with more clarity if you have any. If you like,
please check out my Flickr page as well. I have
some photos of Bilda-brix and American Plastic
Bricks. There seems to be very little on the web
for these toys and I thought I would be part of
fixing that situation. My Flickr page is at http://www.flickr.com/photos/23244445@N03/ if you want to see.
later
Greetings John,
Thank you for your reply. It is funny that I just
assume everyone else is online these days. That
is what I need to do, turn off all these gadgets
and I will have time to create something really
big with these bricks of mine! I like to do both
copying and original designs. I have some more
Bilda-brix information for my site as well. I
have three books (Jr., 1 and 2) and I have a dark
red set No.2 from Australia and a light red set
No.1 from New Zealand. They are not both made by
PLAYMATE toys! I have to pull out the other book
to remember who made the one from New Zealand. /
I just subscribed to Flickr yesterday, so I only
had three photo sets available until then. Now I
can create as many as I like and even do
collections to help folks sort through my photos
better. Thanx for the link to your photos! I love
pictures of cars and electric trains. My wife is
really into trains as well and we have a set just
for her. We need to get things fixed around so a
train table will fit on our first floor for her.
/ I surely hope the lady who built that church
knows that it is still being appreciated by folks
around the world! I am from New Hampshire in the
USA. --- David
Bilda-brix
24/10/2011
Hi John; my brother and I used Bilda-Brix for a number of years
during the late '50s - early '60s, and I still remember them
with a great deal of pleasure. We had three different red
coloured bricks. I hadn't realised there were four until I saw
your website. /
The first ones we had were dark red, and made of quite a hard
plastic - possibly polystyrene. The second lot were a similar
colour, but made of thinner plastic and with slightly crisper
moulding. The last lot I can remember were light red, and made
from the same thin plastic. We thought at the time that the
lighter colour was supposed to be more attractive to younger
kids. /
Even though Bilda-Brix were quite expensive for their day, they
were much cheaper than the later and more garish Lego. The only
advantage of Lego was that the bricks locked together more
effectively./
My brother and I didn't build all that many houses, but we built
castles, towers, and boats, which "floated" nicely on our green
carpet. With enough tiles you could even make quite a good
flight deck for an aircraft carrier. We also built small
aeroplanes, and dropped individual bricks or marbles as
"bombs"./
Lots of fun, and kept us out of our parents' hair :)
Regards,
Jim Sweeney.
Thanks for your message, Jim. It's been a few years since
anyone contacted me on this subject. Strangely enough, on the
weekend I pulled out my various collections of BB and tried to
fit them into less space! They now occupy an A4 carton and four
large shoeboxes. You and your brother certainly found more ways
to enjoy them than I did. Usually I built stations to go with my
Hornby 0 gauge wind-up trains. I expect to one day actually
build something but it may have to wait a few years yet.
Just ONE page
on the Collecting Books and
Magazines web site based in Australia.
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bc |
