Started in 1968, by
Mattel's co-founders Elliot and Ruth Handler,
Hot Wheels cars are
die cast metal toy collectable cars made at a 1/64 scale. Initially with only 16 models, there have been over 10,000 Hot Wheels model cars made over the years. The first Hot Wheels cars were replica
Chevrolet Camaros and sold for $.59 cents each (That’s about $3 today…). Over the course of several model lines, Mattel has included such details in the die cast cars such as
spoilers, rubber tires,
flake metal paint jobs and
chrome fittings. There are 25 specific types of tire designs: white walls, three, five and seven spoke, off-road, dragster, Indy style, etc.
The biggest appeal with Hot Wheels collectables is certainly the track sets. Sections of track you can connect together yourself... loops and ramps, straight-aways, launchers, intersecting pieces, the "Criss-Cross-Crash". Make your own track and loop it over ad through several rooms in the house. Especially if you had friends with tracks, connect em all together and that was a pretty good time.