FORMAT: VHS     DATE: 1980s PRICE: £? [2005: £?] 30x15x10cm 1kg

No, that picture's not a mistake - this really does belong in a VCR museum!
When video recorders started to become common, not surprisingly many companies tried to cash in on their popularity by producing accessories for the new video enthusiast. One common idea was a tape rewinder; usually they were advertised to "Save wear and tear on your VCR", though actually they're more useful for rewinding a tape while you're watching another.
Rewinders are incredibly simple machines to produce, basically just a motor and a cassette holder. The only complexities are the need to fit the tape exactly and correctly engage with the reel locks and tape covers, and the need to stop rewinding at the end - without snapping the tape.

What I like about this one is how incredibly "Eighties" the design is. It could have been a simple square box, but how much better would an aspirational sports-car look, proudly displayed on your black-ash shelving unit? Even the grey colour is typically eighties; it was also available in red, completing the black/red/grey theme that was thought so cool at the time. It's actually an up-market model, which can also wind the tape forward. To switch direction, the left side of the front bumper is pressed; the right side is the stop/eject button. The car's headlights even shine to show which way the tape is going!

These days it seems odd to worry about "wear and tear" from just rewinding, but of course, twenty years ago video machines were not only vastly more expensive but also much more delicate than they are today. So, perhaps it was a more reasonable idea than it seems. Also, at that time we didn't really know how long the machines would last, and some well-known models (particularly the Sanyo VTC-5000) did have problems with their ff/rew 'idler' mechanism wearing out.