HK Casting Menu - Introduction
• • 1968
  • History
  • Intro
  • Cars
  • Bodies
  • Chassis
  • Misc
  • US

Color Rarity Chart - HK Custom Cougar
Collector Colors shown (Color in Parenthesis is Mattel Official Color if different)
• • 
    
    Blue
    Common
  • 
    
    Orange
    Common
  • 
    
    Olive w/Black Roof
    Uncommon
  • 
    
    Blue
    w/Blue Tooth
    w/Blue Interior
    HTF
  • 
    
    Orange
    w/Orange Tooth
    w/Brown Interior
    HTF
  • 
    
    Gold
    w/Black Roof
    HTF
  • 
    
    Red
    w/Black Roof
    Rare
  • 
    
    Aqua
    w/Black Roof
    Rare
  • 
    
    Green
    w/Black Roof
    Rare
  • 
    
    Purple
    w/Black Roof
    Rare
  • 
    
    Orange
    w/Blue Tooth
    w/Brown Interior
    1 known
  
  
  
  Silver painted base cars are very rare and only come from the UK.
  Difficulty can vary when different interior colors are considered.

This casting was designed and based on the 1967 Mercury Cougar, click on the HISTORY tab above for more details about the actual 1:1 car or on the CARS tab for the full breakdown of all the casting variations.

The HK Custom Cougar casting was one of the orginal Ten cars released by Mattel in June of 1968. Later in 1968, six additional castings were released. This first set of 16 castings has become known by collectors as the Sweet-16.

The casting has an opening hood that reveals a detailed zamac engine compartment. It also comes with blue tinted glass and is seen with both Blue, Brown and Cream colored plastic interiors. The Wheels have Redlines and fit on Hubs with the rear wheels being the medium size. The Front wheels were the small size. Both Front and Rear wheels were first released with Deep Dish wheels(DD). The earliest of these are known as Bubble Gum DD (for their rounded wheel edges). The second version of these DD wheels have straight edges. The very first HK Custom Cougars were released in both Blue and Orange with both having a body color painted front tooth (PT), DD Wheels and a body color matched interior. Due to cost cutting steps, the Painted Tooth (PT) was soon dropped from the car entirely and instead left unpainted. The DD Wheels were also soon phased out with the supply of Front DD wheels remaining on cars longer than the DD Rears.

As Mattel began the 1969 casting year, several additional colors appeared. These additional colors all came with a flat black painted roof. Both the Blue and Orange HK Custom Cougars without Black roofs continued into 1969 but neither was ever to receive a black roof. There are some of these that appear with Silver Painted chassis. Apparently for some cars that were only packaged in the UK, there was some quality control issue that they addressed by first painting the basses silver before placing them in the packages. This silver painting process was not always very cleanly done with the silver paint sometimes showing up on the wheels of the car. The silver painted base cars are all quite rare.

By the end of 1969, this casting was dropped from the Hot Wheel lineup all together. The existing Tools and Molds for the car were destroyed.