Meccano Manuals
1945-1947
Overview
In the immediate post-war period there was very little change. The outfits 1 - 5 manuals were basically a reissue of the cut down September 1941 editions. Outfits 6 - 8 were cut down versions of the 1940/1 manuals. There were no new models. Initially only outfits 0 - 5 together with their accessory sets were available. Outfits 6 - 8 were added in 1946. Outfits 9 & 10 were NOT available even although the manuals showed them in the outfit contents pages.
The March 1945 manuals were export only editions. However they do turn up in the UK from time to time. They are identical to the later 12/45 manuals except for the change in colour of the cover. There was also a March 1945 outfit 0 manual using yellow paper.
Some of the December 1945 manuals appear to been issued in both export and UK editions. They are identical. The only difference is that on the spine of manual on internal pages, where it mentions the outfit number it adds in the word 'Export' or 'Home'. The export editions are quite common in the UK, so it is thought that export editions were included in UK outfits. From 1946 it appears that there was only one common English edition
Models were basically the same as pre war. A small number of models were deleted and others renumbered. Click here for more details. The model pictures continued to show hatched parts although the parts no longer had them.
In 1947 a 'Selected Models' manual was issued, which had a number set 0-3 models. Most of these models were repeats from the standard manuals of the era. However three of them were taken from pre-war manuals. These were 0.19 (1937) and 1.45 & 2.22 (1937-41). The reason for issuing this manual is unclear as the majority of the models were from current manuals.