There are 36 Piston Cup racers listed here with just a few missing screen shots. The rest are the prototypes displayed at Comic Con. That leaves 7 “mythical CARS” un-accounted for – who did I miss? (Like NASCAR, 43 cars should be on the starting grid as they announced at the beginning of the movie).

(I also did not bother with photos of the CARS most people already have or have been out a while).

Thanks to the Blu Ray disc CAR FINDER, we know the names of the 36 racers …

Tow Cap (#4) – Rusty Cornfuel

Dale Jr. (#8)

Nitroade (#28) – Aiken Axler

Mood Springs (#33) – Chuck Armstrong

Trunk Fresh (#34) – Dirk D’Argostino

Shifty Drug (#35) – Kevin Racingtire

Tank Coat (#36) – Eugene Carbureski

View-Zeen (#39) – Ryan Shields

Dinoco (#43) – Strip “The King” Weathers

Easy Idle (#51) – Ruby “Easy” Oakes

Leak Less (#52) – Claude Scruggs

Faux Wheel Drive (#54) – Johnny Blamer

Fiber Fuel (#56) – Brush Curber

Octane Gain (#58) – Billy Oilchanger

Vitoline (#61) – James Cleanair

Transberry Juice (#63) – Lee Reukins

RPM (#64) – Winford Bradford Rutherford

N20 (#68) – Manny Flywheel

Gasprin (#70) – Floyn Mulvihill

Rev-N-Go (#73) – Misti Motorkrass

Sidewall Shine (#74) – Slider Petrolski

Vinyl Toupee (#76) – Crusty Rotor

Retread (#79) – Paul Inngas

Creme Filled Gask-its (#80) – Sage Vanderspin

Shiny Wax (#82) – Darren Leadfoot

Apple (#84) – Mac iCar (yes, Matthew Overtaker from Blu Ray trailer has been changed in final BR disc to his new name, Mac iCar … )

Re-Volting (#84) – Davey Apex

Hostile Takeover Bank (HTB) (#86) – Chick Hicks

Bumper Save (#90) – Ponchy Wipeout

Sputter Stop (#92) – Murray Clutchburn

Spare Mint (#93) – Earnie Gearson

Rust-Eze (#95) – Lightning McQueen

Tach-O-Mint (#101) – Greg Candyman

Lil’ Torque Pistons (#117) РRalph Carlow

Clutch Aid (#121) – Kevin Shiftright

No Stall (#123) – Todd “The Shockster” Marcus

Add’l Photo at ComingSoon.Net

“SPEEDWAY OF THE SOUTH” BOX SET

Now scheduled for late Spring or early Summer 2008, all the Piston Cup Racers will be available in one giant box set and perhaps only available online at the Hot Wheels Collectors Club. You can sign up as a free member to get emails and see offers for “special” cars only available to collectors but to buy – you have to buy a membership. Yearly memberships are $25 and besides getting a (Hot Wheels) car & other goodies, the most important reason people sign up is, “Priority Window for Purchasing: Red Line Club™ members will again be given the first shot at picking up each of our 12 HWC™ Exclusive cars.”

… And other items. If they didn’t charge a membership fee, people would simply sign up 50 times and try and buy something 50 times – so hence, the $25 entrance fee. Now, if you collect Hot Wheels or are thinking about it, it’s a fine deal but if you’re just interested in CARS and in the “Speedway of the South” set, you might hold off buying a membership until the deal is announced (there is usually an announcement of a week before the special Hot Wheels car goes on sale).

WHAT IS OUT OR ANNOUNCED

The following Piston Cup racers are already out or are announced in a two pack:

Lightning McQueen
Chick Hcks
The King
Leak Less
Nitrorade
RPM
Dale Jr.
Octane Gain
Vinyl Toupee
No Stall
Tow Cap
Gasprin

Accounting for 12 of the 35/36 Piston Cup racers – leaving 23/24 that may or may not get a release BEFORE the Speedway of the South set from Mattel in June 2008.

MY THOUGHTS

My opinion is that these CARS will be all available in various box sets before or after and that the Speedway of the South will merely be a “special” re-packaging – nice and certainly worth trying to get but in my opinion, other than having them all in one box, I seriously doubt the Piston Cup Racers will not be available in other configurations … why?

CARS is a mass market line – Mattel has said so and it seems evident by their actions. No treasure hunts, no chase CARS, no purposeful variants other than the NEW & “blank” packaging variants or at least on a minor scale like the TUF GUE/TUF GUY license plates on TJ, the Green Hummer, … 99% of CASUAL buyers will not care … yes, I’ll try and buy both versions but 99% of casual buyers, no … different paint, yes – which Mattel does with Hot Wheels and maybe even different wheels & rims but for the minor stuff, most people will not care …

36-43 CARS in the set will work out to be maybe $199 or more? That is going to be limiting once you cross the $75 threshold. Even if Mattel supplies every person who is willing to buy one, honestly, how many people willingly will shell out $249 (with shipping, taxes, etc …) for 43 CARS? Now, people will easily spend that much on 20 separate trips to Target, WM & TRU but all at once – too giant of a bite! How many can Mattel sell? 1,000? 5,000? Or even some wild in the pie thing like 25,000 sets at $200? That is floor filling for Mattel. They sold (and recalled) something like 425,000 Sarges in 6-7 months … this a MILLION per mold toy … they are not going to limit their revenue just to have a nice giant box … no, they will break up the box AND make more money … Right now, they seem able to sell EVERY Dinoco 400 Box Set at Target with 7 CARS for $29 … which includes 4 CARS that nearly everyone has … so the 43 CARS can be can split into 6 or 7 boxes (or course, with a few repeats) so 7 boxes times $29 equals @$200 … humm, where have I seen that number before? Asking someone to pay $29 a box is so much more palatable. And if they’re greedy, they can even increase the set count to 8 boxes or even 9 and reduce the price per set slightly but repeat more CARS (which would not shock anyone) … 9 boxes at $24.99 is a gross of $225 per person to Mattel … and hey look, 9 boxes split among three retailers as exclusives would be 3 each … humm, what three retailers might step up to order 3 exclusives spread out over 6 or 9 months? Or 8 boxes split up for 2 retailers …

AND what’s even more brilliant is that 1,000 or a few thousand more rabid completists will then pay Mattel DIRECTLY to buy the Hot Wheels Collector’s Club “special” set … at an even bigger markup – maybe $250? That’s a cool $250,000 in their coffers for every 1,000 sets they produce ON TOP OF what they would pay to buy the 6-9 sets at the mass market retailers because fanatic completists will not be stopped by $250. While there would be fewer sales if everyone knew going in that the Speedway of the South Box Set was not so exclusive in its content, I’ll bet they could still sell 1,000 of them. So Mattel can get it coming and going … There is very little chance Mattel would walk away from a several million more by NOT selling to TRU, Target or WM just to be “super-exclusive.”

Plus as a mass market line, there would be a riot. And not just any riot. If Mattel upset the collector’s club (maybe 30,000 members?), it would be tough but manageable to right the ship. Upsets MILLIONS of moms, dads & kids? Upset WM, Target & TRU customers? Even if they were using the Collector’s Club to gauge interest, the letters, emails & phone calls would convince them a re-issue in smaller sets would be prudent … but frankly, I think Mattel has that all planned out.

In summary, there’s no reason to annoy millions by customers by limiting the availability (through the cost or a low production run) by selling just to collector’s when the mass market is so much larger and willing to buy it – just at a slower pace and spread out a bit more. Even better, fanatic collector’s will buy BOTH versions anyway. So instead of making a nice return but annoying millions, why not make millions PLUS sell an extra limited set at a real high cost to hardcore collector’s?

(Just like with the Mattel Factory 2006 Set if the SARGE recall hadn’t gummed up the works. Casual fans would not care because every CAR was already available – only a hardcore collector would pay $160-$180 for a set they would NEVER open.

In fact, recently the Piston Cup racers were made available for sale (no, I do not know who spirited them out the back door of a HK/Guangzhou factory and no, I did not buy them) but that to me gives creedence that multi-sets are coming soon. There is no reason Mattel would start making a massive set for June 2008 right now unless they were getting ready to ship them soon … presumably, to arrive in Spring 2008 (shipping by boat takes 1-2 months). There is no way they are going to hold inventory of a ready-product until April or May of 2008.

Also note – while Mattel said that the Hot Wheels Collector’s Club/Red Line Club set would contain exclusives, keep in mind that Mattel counts PACKAGING as an element that might make it “exclusive.”

So like they are calling Rollin’ Bowlin’ Mater & Crusin’ McQueen as exclusives … they are ONLY exclusives in the sense they have never appeared on desert/classic design cards … so look for more boxes like this one …

Of course, as soon as we hear anything, we’ll let you know.

NEWS OF PISTON CUP RACERS – RETAIL?

Dinoco 400

Of course the Dinoco 400 box is out and people are rightly grumbling there are only three “new” CARS.

OCTANE GAIN – will be available as a “launcher” CAR (see next paragraph)

NO STALL – will be available as a multi-pack with LEAK LESS (yes, that Leak Less) sometimes next spring. See our 2008 post – scroll down to the multi-packs area.

VINYL TOUPEE – strangely enough, available in the UK as a freebie for buying 6 CARS. You can presumably find it being auctioned on eBay. As for its availability in another form or box, nothing as of right now but it would not surprise me as noted – Mattel has repackaged EVERY car multiple times … and no CAR nor multi-pack is retired – everything from DAY ONE is still available in one form or another … or in most cases, multiple and multiple formats.

Thanks to “KristieD22,” Target on Amazon has it on sale for $17.99 – while you can search to see if it’s available at Target stores, I’m presuming Target retail matches Target.com pricing? And yes, that photo in the link is incorrect but you get the Dinoco 400 set.

ON SHELVES

Pit Stop Racers.

“Each includes a die-cast vehicle with launcher. It’s your favorite racers from the hit Disney/Pixar movie CARS, in the new Pit-Stop Racers Assortment. Each includes a die-cast vehicle with launcher. Connect the launchers to recreate Pit Crew Row, then send your character cars into high performance mode with a pow! Assortment includes Lightning McQueen, The King, Chick Hicks, Octane Gain, Leak Less and Nitroade.”

SUMMARY

It’s only rumors that the Piston Cup racers will be available in boxes of 7 or 8 but I’m sure they are true – as soon as anything is actual news, it will be posted.

OTHER CARS POSTS

THE BASICS

If you want a recap of the Mattel Pixar CARS line from the beginning.

Mattel Pixar Cars Checklist: It’s What to Collect

Unlike other toys/hot items that stay hot for a few weeks or months – this Mattel Pixar CARS diecast line has pretty been SIZZLING for 16 months – not just rare but almost un-heard of.

Of course, we would love to tell you that if you show up here at 7:00 AM, you are assured of seeing it on the shelve un-touched … or course, that is not really possible with this line due to real demand and eBay “re-distribution” demand but we have tried to sum up why it’s seems impossible and some buying tips that while not foolproof, might make things slightly easier …

Mattel Pixar Cars: I Want to Buy But Where?

BUYING CASES & WHAT’S NEXT

First, one way to skip the driving around is to buy sealed cases, here is a brief rundown on what that is AND what are the CARS coming this holiday season (the last two months of 2007):

Mattel Pixar Cars Checklist: New Sealed Boxes

And what’s coming in 2008:

Mattel Pixar Cars Checklist: New Sealed Boxes Holiday 2007 & 2008

Or what the latest on the shelf cards & CARS look like?

Mattel Pixar: What’s in Stores Now

HOW TO COLLECT

For those on the intermediate & advanced stages of this obsession (yes, I has the fever! I has the fever 🙂 ) … you’ll want a “field guide” to spotting what’s what:

A Basic Checklist (in spreadsheet form)

The checklist offers a few versions on how you like your poison 😉

Then of course, a more indepth guideline on how to collect them – just one of each? one of each available on a different card?

Mattel Pixar Cars Checklist: How to Collect

As you progress further, you might need or want a guide to understanding what do the three different designs on the front indicate and how complete of a collector you want to be:

Mattel Pixar Cars Checklist: Card Backs

MORE INFORMATION THAN NORMAL

Of course, by now, you’ll want to know everything and plan your budget carefully … Mattel will definitely release 35/36 of the Piston Cup Racers in one massive collector’s set but will they release them in smaller sets? Our speculation on why rioting is probably not necessary:

Mattel Pixar Cars: All the Piston Cup CARS-Speedway of the South Box Set

Did you know the Blu-Ray DVD (for HDTV’s) will include a “name-spotter” feature that will let you see the names of 217 CARS within the movie?

Mattel Pixar Cars Checklist: It’s What to Collect-Part II – 217 CARS?

And while we’re at it – pure speculation on our part as to what might be coming next?

Mattel Pixar Cars: What’s Coming in 2008 or 2009

Mattel Pixar Cars: What’s Coming in 2008 or 2009? Part II

Mattel Pixar Cars: Mia & Tia – All the Possible Variants

MORE USEFUL INFORMATION

Details on the Mattel sponsorship & CARS charity auction for CAAF (Children Affected by AIDS Foundation):

Mattel Pixar Cars & Children Affected by AIDS Charity Auction

While Frank the Combine on eBay seems enticing, you might want to know that he’s very small and all plastic but there are some other options …

Mattel Pixar CARS Movie: Frank the Combine – eBay Warning

The Sarge Recall:

Mattel Recalls Pixar CARS Sarge Diecast Metal Car

Nothing very insightful about what’s coming but still good to know that CARS is bringing in money and everything is looking smooth.

Mattel Pixar Cars: 3rd Quarter 2007 Earnings-Financial Numbers

CARS 2, THE SEQUEL?

Yes, more speculation & answers on our part but the stars and other things seem to be syncing up for a 2011 sequel:

Pixar CARS 2 Sequel: Rumors, Rumors, Rumors