Possible legal ramifications for selling a model based on existing toy?

So I plan on building a 1:1 replica of a McFarlane 6" toy vehicle out of styrene. My reasons for doing so are as follows:
-The toy is from the early 2000's, and McFarlane Toys no longer sells this particular figure. It is possible they also no longer hold the license for the IP.
-I plan on putting lights in my model, something not in the original toy.
-I do not want to modify an existing toy, as they have become increasingly rare/expensive, and I probably wouldn't be able to fit batteries and LEDs in the original without some major modification.

I currently plan on making two, one for my own personal collection, and one to give to a friend, but if I am happy with the results, I may make more and sell them. Note: I am NOT molding and casting the original toy, rather I have purchased an original toy, and am using the measurements to create my own out of styrene and some other materials. However, if I were to sell these, I would probably make a mold of my completed styrene version and sell castings of that, as that would make the process much easier. Obviously, I shouldn't be in any trouble from the two I'm going to make first, but I'm worried that I might run into legal issues once I start making a garage kit. I have also heard that as long as I keep production small, a garage kit probably wont be a problem. How many can I make before it becomes an issue? 10? 50? 100? I'm relatively new to model making, and very new to the world of garage kits, so I just want to make sure I'm not breaking any major rules, whether they're laws or just common courtesy to whoever constructed the original toy. Thanks!

From what little i know of copyright and trade laws, if you're making your toy based on your own masters, the copyright holder of the original IP would have to take issue, not McFarlane (unless mcfarlane still have a license and don't want you competing with them). Big companies usually ignore people doing their stuff for their own collection, it's when you start selling it they may take notice.
How many to sell before it becomes an issue? one, i guess. but it's up to you how much risk you want to take. often you'll just get a "cease and desist" before any actual litigation.
Generally if you avoid using their trademark you'll avoid most of the litigation. This is why you see garage kits of the TARDIS will just call it a "phone box time machine" or something generic like that.

Do you feel lucky, punk?

Most garage kit makers just hope to fly under the proverbial radar. After all, if you get a cease and desist - even one with zero factual or legal grounding - there’s no way you could win.

McFarlane toys more than likely had a limited Licence to make the toy. But they may still have the right to "that" design of the figure if they made the original.
The owner of the original Intellectual property. Movie/Comic/game etc, probably still have the rights.
If it's anything Star wars related The Mouse WILL hunt you down.
Now on the practical side garage kits are expensive because resin is expensive.
You may want to sit down and do the math on how much to make the mold of your model, how much resin you will need etc etc.
How much will it cost in materials to Produce 1 let alone X amount .
And can you realistically sell enough to make it worth the time and money with out spending any money on advertising?

Thanks everyone for the responses. I don't think I'll be making a garage kit any time soon. mash3d is right, the amount of work and material costs to make a garage kit that I would be happy with is pretty high, and I've realized probably isn't feasible for me right now. Also, producing multiple castings to sell, whether based on my styrene version or the original, just feels kind of like I'm ripping off someone else's work. However, since I'm fairly certain McFarlane no longer has the license to the IP, and its nothing Star Wars or Disney related, I still plan on making my styrene versions for my friend and myself. I actually think I'll hand make around 10, that way I have extras I can trade or sell to someone in person, rather than a kit run I'm doing online that may attract the attention of the holders of the rights. Also, making 10 models from scratch based loosely on an existing toy, instead of making one from scratch exactly right and then casting it feels more, I don't know, respectful to me? Neither are technically recasting, but the former feels more like I'm doing an interpretation of the toy, rather than just ripping it off completely. If anyone else has thoughts about this topic, feel free to add your two cents!

Adam talks about this topic on the latest "still untitled" - worth a look if you haven't seen it:

NS4 said:

Adam talks about this topic on the latest "still untitled" - worth a look if you haven't seen it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-xcqyg_JmM

Click to expand...

The latest episode was actually one of the reasons I started to worry about legal issues. Adam mentions in the podcast that most IP holders only care about garage kits if they're making a significant profit and/or taking away from sales of an existing product, so I was less worried about the IP holders and more worried about McFarlane. I figure that even if they no longer hold the license for that IP, they probably still maintain some sort of manufacturing rights for the sculpt of that particular toy. For example, I'm sure when Sideshow made they're Iron Giant figure, if they had just taken all the measurements from the Mondo version, they would have gotten in trouble with Mondo, even if they no longer have the license to that movie. I just wasn't sure if a company would feel as strongly about enforcing those kinds of rules with a garage kit or not.

Gryphon37 said:

The latest episode was actually one of the reasons I started to worry about legal issues. Adam mentions in the podcast that most IP holders only care about garage kits if they're making a significant profit and/or taking away from sales of an existing product, so I was less worried about the IP holders and more worried about McFarlane. I figure that even if they no longer hold the license for that IP, they probably still maintain some sort of manufacturing rights for the sculpt of that particular toy. For example, I'm sure when Sideshow made they're Iron Giant figure, if they had just taken all the measurements from the Mondo version, they would have gotten in trouble with Mondo, even if they no longer have the license to that movie. I just wasn't sure if a company would feel as strongly about enforcing those kinds of rules with a garage kit or not.

Click to expand...

Just to clarify, in my example I'm talking about the 2016 Mondo collectible figure, and the 2018 Sideshow Maquette. I only just realized that both were sold on sideshow's website, but I think my idea still makes sense.