Hot Wheels

A racing Ford HT with a bunch of other cars in the background.  I was just playing a bit with contrast on very low light. I think it came out quite fine.  This green Ford GT is probably my favorite car, so I'll likely feature it more in my photos.

There are strange and weird cars. Then there's the Carbonator, an hybrid of a bottle and a bottle opener (and a car). Carbonators have been around for a while. This is the 2026 version, as awesome as ever! 

A race, shall we?  Who will win, taking bets!  Mod Mill on track number one and Nitro Rail on track number two! 

Every now and then, there's a commemorative car. This time, Hot Wheels released Pass n' Go, celebrating the 90 years of Monopoly!  This is the first time Hasbro (Monopoly) and Mattel (Hot Wheels) collaborate, so it's truly a great piece to have!  And let's face it, who doesn't know Monopoly? If you haven't played it, your parents or grand parents probably did! Oddly enough it's a 2026 set and I found it today, in October 2025...

When talking about die cast cars, there are (basically) two kinds: The more detailed and expensive, geared towards an adult audience, and the cheap an performant on a track, which are mostly made for the younger to have fun. Hot Wheels clearly fit this target, as they do roll wonderfully, even if they sometimes lack the detail for flawless display.  We cannot forget Hot Wheels has many tracks, it's not only the cars, so they do perform. A clear case is the RD-06 that I mentioned on another post. It's wheels seem to never stop, and its a mean machine for the tracks. But generally speaking, all Hot Wheels perform pretty well on a track, unless it's a very light or top heavy model, but those are the exception, not the rule.

Who doesn't remember these 80s sports machines by the name of Pontiac? I certainly don't because I live in Europe and only saw one once!  However, I did watch Knight Rider with David Hasselhoff and a Pontiac called Kitt.  I didn't think much of the miniature when I bought it to be honest, but it grew on me and became one of my favorite pocket Hot Wheels (I should have bought 2, as this is going to wear of the paint job). A great Hot Wheel in my opinion.

The Hirohata Merc is a fully customized and hand built 1953 jewel that influenced all the American builders for the 50s era. It's considered "the most famous custom of the classic era", and it's easy to tell why by its looks.

One of the amazing things about Hot Wheels, is the sheer variety of cars (and other things). Be it an American muscle car, a Japanese compact, something out of the imagination of someone with huge exhaust pipes, or some futuristic racing car, you'll have it. The RD-06 is clearly on the futuristic genre. RD stands for Racing Drone and, according to the Hor Wheels Wiki, it's powered by a 502BPH engine assisted by a jet engine. Of course, not knowing it's weight leads to mo conclusion. Still, we can imagine it at blazing speeds, or as a nimble, corner cutting drive, you name it! When I started looking at Hot Wheels, I was in love with classic cars. However, these future wonders have certainly grew up on me!

The Giulia is a great little car in the European compact tradition. Unlike American classics, which are generally large and powerful, European classics are small and nimble. The Giulia TI Super (Real Life one) was a limited series produced in 1963-1964, being only 501 produced and was properly homolged to the European Touring Car Challenge. The Hot Wheels miniature was released in 2026, has 2 color variants (white and red) and bears the painted 63 number as a reference to the year it was produced. It's a neat little model, provided with blue tinted transparencies and it's properly part of the HW Compact Kinds. On a curiosity note, the name Giulia under the casting is misspelled.

A pair of Ford Model As, customized for some dirt racing. In the real world, the Model A was the successor of the famous Model T, and I don't have any idea if anyone actually modified it for dirt racing or if this is a Hot Wheels only thing. In the Hot Wheels collection, this version (Ford Model A Custom '31) is new for 2025 and was released in the 2 colors you can see in the picture. There has been another release of the model A (2007-2009), but it was quite a different model.