Outfit 10
1964-1970 Black/Yellow/Silver Period

At the end of 1964 Meccano Limited was facing declining sales.  So how do you launch a new product?  You change the colours!  Flanged plates became black, flexible plates yellow and most strips and parts that had been green were sprayed silver.  The silver was sprayed aluminium and like the enamel paints was soft and scratched very easily!  The layout in the set had not changed since the 1958-1963 period.

The small parts boxes became clear plastic instead of the green cardboard. The plastic broke easily.  There are examples where Binns Road used green metal tins, which  have a rolled edge to the lid.  These green 'Safety' tins are actually from the end of the Light Red/Green period - around 1964. You will usually find some overlap with this sort of thing, if Meccano could save a bit of money by using up old packaging, they would.

Photographs courtesy of Martin Hanson.