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Background Information[]
Television Series[]
Kelly is a fictional mobile crane created by Phil Fehrle, Jonathan Trueman, Abi Grant and Robert Gauld-Galliers.
In 2002, he made his debut in the sixth series of Thomas & Friends in the episode, "Jack Jumps In". He later appeared in the spin-off series, Jack and the Sodor Construction Company.
Kelly last appeared in The Great Discovery and has not appeared in the television series again since 2008.
Kelly is based on an Austin K6 lorry, built with a mobile crane body. Built from 1942, according to Royal Air Force order, these lorries were used by the British land forces during World War II.[1]
Live-action model[]
Kelly's model was custom built and painted in a matte finish with the numbers made from custom stickers.
There were three remotes built to control Kelly, one was used to control his movement, one was used to operate his crane arm and one was used to move his eyes.
The eye mechanism had two servos, one for up and down movement and one for left and right movement. The up/down servo was attached to the body. The left/right servo had a rod attached to the arm, which connected to a bracket. The eye balls were coupled to the bracket and locked in by the face-plate, so whenever the servos were powered, the eye balls would move however the crew member desired.
Eleven different facial expressions were sculpted for Kelly, although only nine were used on-screen and eight were seen in Stories From Sodor. The faces were first sculpted in clay and from that resin casts were made using a silicone mould.
Voice Actors[]
- Kōzō Shioya (Japan)