Farish TPOs and JPAsshow

[Revolution Ben]

Hello folks,

 

Herewith a quick snap of the new Farish JPA cement wagon and TPO vans unveiled at the N Gauge International Show at Leamington today (11th Sept.)

 

The JPA wagons follow on from the similar vehicles released in OO and will be available in the Castle Cement livery shown, and in Lafarge silver.

 

 

The TPOs will be available in four liveries, with some detail differences between them. The original style version (at the top in the photo) has working platform lights which can be controlled by a switch inside or by DCC as the vehicle contains a socket.

 

 

Also on the way by Warley will be the first shots of the Class 03 shunter and Class 101 DMU.

 

cheers

 

Ben A.

[TomE]

Those JPAs look very tasty! Thanks for the photos Ben.

 

Tom.

[Gloucester Road]

I agree JPAs look good

[Steadfast]

Had a good day out today, here's a couple more shots.

A rake of Lafarge JPAs will certainly be seen heading my way, and a TPO is tempting to run on HHC...

cheers

 

jo

[Kris]

Those TPO's look very nice, I'm wondering if I could stretch history a bit to justify one. I know the first were produced in 1959 (well according to Wikipedia anyhow) Where were these first deployed?

[BernardTPM]

Where were these first deployed?

 

The lowest numbered ones had W prefixes, Western Region.

[Kris]

The lowest numbered ones had W prefixes, Western Region.

 

Thanks for that. It provides some possibilities then.

[43179]

wow - nice to see the TPO vans have gone under the shrink ray unfortunately I wont be opening the wallet unless some modern versions(with small windows) appear . Bachmann/Farish really need to do some stowage vans to go with these to get the best of them. Good News about the class 101 - must keep an eye out at warley.

 

Jon

 

 

[Bob Reid]

Strange that they've not avoided the massively overscale roof welds whereas they did on the 4mm one (thanks goodness)! It could of course be just a mock up and the production version won't have them....

[Etched Pixels]

Strange that they've not avoided the massively overscale roof welds whereas they did on the 4mm one (thanks goodness)! It could of course be just a mock up and the production version won't have them....

 

Bachmann have a history of this including copying errors from the OO 04 to the N scale one, from the peak, and particularly badly with the 24 where despite the flaws being flagged up big time in the OO version the N scale one managed to both repeat the roof screwups (doubly unfortunate in a scale you see much more from above) and the silly numbering error where they used a number for a loco that had different grilles.

 

So I'm afraid I'd expect to see all the OO errors faithfully re-rendered at a bit over half size - no idea why - cost of correcting it versus market size perhaps. Given the time between the N and OO versions its hard to believe its incompetence.

 

Alan

[Bob Reid]

It wasn't however an error they made on the 4mm version though Alan so goodness knows why it's been re-introduced on the 2mm one!

[brushman47544]

Hmmm... Once again Bachmann/Graham Farish are using R&D paid for by a retailer for a commissioned model in OO to produce their own N gauge version. I do hope Modelzone gets something out of this since they presumably paid for the development costs of the TPOs. Scaling down cad-cams is not difficult or expensive, particularly if as Etched Pixels says any errors in the OO versions are repeated.

 

That's said, it good to see Farish are sufficiently confident in the N gauge market to produce these models. At this rate, I may eventually be persuaded to scale down from OO. Just need DCC Sound in N gauge to clinch it...

[Steven B]

Hmmm... Once again Bachmann/Graham Farish are using R&D paid for by a retailer for a commissioned model in OO to produce their own N gauge version. I do hope Modelzone gets something out of this since they presumably paid for the development costs of the TPOs.

 

Surely Modelzone don't own the rights to the dimensions of a TPO van. They may own the OO gauge tooling, but what's wrong with Bachmann making full use of the drawings they've produced to give us N Gauge modellers something new?

 

If the likes of Model Zone or the NRM (Deltic) aren't going to produce such models in the smaller gauge why should N Gauge modellers miss out?

 

It happens the other way round too - I doubt the N Gauge Society are getting anything from Hornby Magazine for the re-use of the Stove R data.

 

Happy modelling.

 

Steven B.

[Kris]

Hmmm... Once again Bachmann/Graham Farish are using R&D paid for by a retailer for a commissioned model in OO to produce their own N gauge version. I do hope Modelzone gets something out of this since they presumably paid for the development costs of the TPOs. Scaling down cad-cams is not difficult or expensive, particularly if as Etched Pixels says any errors in the OO versions are repeated.

 

Providing that the use of the R & D in different scales was not excluded (and I bet Bachmann and Dapol make sure that it's not) then I see nothing wrong with doing this at all. It's not impacting on the profits of the particular companies as they are not competing products.

 

 

 

[Edwin_m]

The contract between Modelzone and Bachmann is no doubt confidential. However it is likely to specify that Bachmann will not produce the TPO models in 00 gauge in its own right, either for a certain period or ever. No doubt Modelzone could have extended this clause to cover N gauge if it had wanted to, but would have paid more to Bachmann for the privilege.

 

It does however put an interesting spin on things. We are told that retailers are funding development of particular models because the market for them is too small for a manufacturer to take the risk. However we now have the same model selling into a smaller market, and Bachmann is carrying the risk. Clearly in this case all the research and most of the design has already been paid for, but there is still a significant cost for production and distribution which is Bachmann's risk unless it has pre-orders from retailers.

[frobisher]

Hmmm... Once again Bachmann/Graham Farish are using R&D paid for by a retailer for a commissioned model in OO to produce their own N gauge version. I do hope Modelzone gets something out of this since they presumably paid for the development costs of the TPOs.

 

Without knowing the contractual details you can't really say that. What you can say is the the contract that Bachmann had with both parties allows them to do this (otherwise Modelzone and the NRM would be justifiably annoyed). It's not like Dapol (for instance) hasn't also done something similar with the Stove R and Snowploughs though offering those as special commisions in different scales via other organisations.

[bennyboy]

I seem to remember that it was stated by Modelzone or Bachmann that after XXX years, Bachmann would be allowed to sell the OO version of the TPO as a standard Bachmann model and they would own the tooling.

[frobisher]

I seem to remember that it was stated by Modelzone or Bachmann that after XXX years, Bachmann would be allowed to sell the OO version of the TPO as a standard Bachmann model and they would own the tooling.

 

I've got that recollection too, but couldn't find a reference for it.

[davidw]

I think the rights to the TPO reverted to Bachmann after 12 months. I suspect we'll see the 00 model appear in the Bachmann general range next year - wonder if as a result we'll see further TPO diagrams and a resurgence in interest in MK1's ?

 

Please Mr B : Can we have mk1 Sleeper, FO , BSO and RBK?

[brushman47544]

It does however put an interesting spin on things. We are told that retailers are funding development of particular models because the market for them is too small for a manufacturer to take the risk. However we now have the same model selling into a smaller market, and Bachmann is carrying the risk. Clearly in this case all the research and most of the design has already been paid for, but there is still a significant cost for production and distribution which is Bachmann's risk unless it has pre-orders from retailers.

I wasn't for one minute suggesting that Bachmann was doing anything wrong. My point was more on the lines of Edwin_m comment above. As an OO gauge modeller, we are constantly being told by the major manufacturers that the market isn't big enough to produce this or that model. A retailer steps in and takes a potentially big risk that a model will sell. It does, and all of a sudden there is also a market for it in N gauge as well, which is a smaller market than OO. I've no problem with that, and one day it may persuade me to down-scale, but it just seems to me that the balance is shifting and retailers rather than manufacturers are deciding what will sell. This generally means higher prices for us consumers as they are limited edition models and if a mistake is made, a retailer could go out of business. Is this really how it should be?

[Revolution Ben]

Hi folks,

 

Perhaps it's not surprising that retailers (who deal with potential customers every day) have a better idea of "what will sell" than the manufacturers, and therefore are more confident about putting cash into a potential project.

 

cheers

 

Ben A.

[frobisher]

This generally means higher prices for us consumers as they are limited edition models and if a mistake is made, a retailer could go out of business

 

Any retailer comissioning models on that basis deserves to go out of business quite frankly. You do not bet the farm on a single product that is away from your core business. The likes of Modelzone, Kernow, Rails and Hattons can afford for any one of their special editions to fail commercially. They won't go bust, they'll just know not to make that particular mistake again. You'll note that with the exception of re-liveries of existing models, plus the NGS that N has been given a body swerve so far, presumably because the core business of most shops is OO.

[Edwin_m]

Model Rail dipped their toe into N gauge specials with the three aviation tanks, which I believe sold very poorly and were eventually offloaded to ModelZone.

[Guest Belgian]

I wasn't for one minute suggesting that Bachmann was doing anything wrong. My point was more on the lines of Edwin_m comment above. As an OO gauge modeller, we are constantly being told by the major manufacturers that the market isn't big enough to produce this or that model. A retailer steps in and takes a potentially big risk that a model will sell. It does, and all of a sudden there is also a market for it in N gauge as well, which is a smaller market than OO. I've no problem with that, and one day it may persuade me to down-scale, but it just seems to me that the balance is shifting and retailers rather than manufacturers are deciding what will sell. This generally means higher prices for us consumers as they are limited edition models and if a mistake is made, a retailer could go out of business. Is this really how it should be?

Perhaps the reality is that by using the R&D for both 00 and N gauge models we are all benefitting by the greater spread of up-front costs over larger total sales. Those who commission the 00 models have to pay less to the manufacturer if the latter can re-use the R&D on its N gauge models, and by investing less thus have either more money left for additional commissions or can make this commission profitable on less sales, either of which means there is likely to be further commissions. The OO modellers get more models to choose from, the N gaugers get many that couldn't be justified on their own - so it's a win-win situation for everybody. I know commissions are expensive, but surely it's better to have the models available (particularly the more esoteric ones) than not? There seems to be an awful lot of negativity creeping in amongst modellers these days (I'm not suggesting the quote above is negative, by the way)!

JE

[grahame]

Model Rail dipped their toe into N gauge specials with the three aviation tanks, which I believe sold very poorly and were eventually offloaded to ModelZone.

 

And that wasn't exactly a commission of a unique/new wagon but really just a different livery of an existing one. It wasn't a particularly exciting choice and rather limited in use/geographic coverage.

 

G.