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BBC Four - James May's Big Trouble in Model Britain


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I it last with my partner and we both found this show to be very good. The only thing that annoyed me is when they got the D&E modeller in who pointed out the only thing he had was a Hornby 08. While it was my better half who pointed that the majority of my LSWR stock is Hornby and I bet if they did a cross section of modellers you’d find a more even split with a few skewed either  way.

 

Big James  

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2 minutes ago, Big James said:

I it last with my partner and we both found this show to be very good. The only thing that annoyed me is when they got the D&E modeller in who pointed out the only thing he had was a Hornby 08. While it was my better half who pointed that the majority of my LSWR stock is Hornby and I bet if they did a cross section of modellers you’d find a more even split with a few skewed either  way.

 

Big James  

Agreed. In my "fleet", I reckon Hornby product outnumbers everything else combined by 4-to-1. The only area in which Bachmann dominates is wagons.

 

John 

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17 minutes ago, RAF96 said:

Maybe Hornby should grasp the nettle of losing all those old moulds and go for new and inovative future production methods.

Industry is already making complex parts in various materials using computer driven lasers and clever tools. Squirting hot plastic into a jelly mould is old hat.

Take the quantum leap Hornby and go for radical new methods which will leave the competition behind for some considerable time.

 

Not hugely interested in the blandness of the permitted "debate" on this TV apologia, but I am intrigued by your post. I wonder if you could identify the specific "new and inovative [sic] future production methods" that Hornby should be using.  I would imagine that all the major manufacturers of RTR - Hornby, Bachmann, Dapol, Heljan and Rapido - will have kept their eyes open for a technique that delivered what injection-moulded plastic currently does, particularly if it was a technology that avoided the considerable upfront costs of cutting tooling.

 

If you know of a better mass-production technique than "Squirting hot plastic into a jelly mould", I would ask you to share the knowledge.  

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2 minutes ago, Pete Darton said:

 

Also so looking at gaps in the market, the dcc concepts digital ip slow motion point motors are only option on the market and they are not very reliable. 

 

 

 

Alternatives that spring immediately to mind are Tortoise and Fulgurex. 

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Just watched it on iPlayer. Thought it was very good; had the right balance between good humour and the way they illustrated the challenges Hornby faced.

 

I couldn't help but laugh at the launch of the Airfix Hellcat, when they blurred the faces of some of the young modellers at the front of the crowd to give them a better chance of finding a lady later on in life. I spent a while in front of the Hornby stand at Warley; suspect I've been blurred too....

 

One thing I thought wasn't really necessary however was when Jim the Airfix builder was having his lunch, and there was about 30 seconds simply of him slurping his coffee before saying, "Back to work." Maybe they were trying to show how much he was feeling the pressure?

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5 minutes ago, Pete Darton said:

more railroad level trains for that section of the market. Let other manufacturers do the better quality trains. But still compete in certain areas for the better quality trains.

 

Not sure I would agree, a mix of standards offers a wider income stream, all eggs in one basket like Bachmann leave you wide open to a broadside i.e. the 66 from Hattons.

 

I'm not in the market for Railroad nor the sound wagon - they are important to Hornby and I see why they exist but they're not for me.

 

When I went over to 00 a couple of years back I didn't think at the time that all but two of the coaches I have would be Hornby nor a large proportion of my locomotives would be theirs too.

 

Anyway the new Terrier is blurring the price distinctions between Railroad and full range again - it's very good value even if the buffers look at little odd at the moment.

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22 minutes ago, woodenhead said:

Not sure I would agree, a mix of standards offers a wider income stream, all eggs in one basket like Bachmann leave you wide open to a broadside i.e. the 66 from Hattons.

 

My guess is that they make money out of their Railroad models given that they keep selling them.

 

I would have thought that anything helping to keep Hornby afloat is a beneft even to those who wouldn't buy such models themselves.

 

I can't imagine it's taking up too much R&D time deciding what the next set of imaginary liveries will be for their 0-4-0s.

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36 minutes ago, Big James said:

I it last with my partner and we both found this show to be very good. The only thing that annoyed me is when they got the D&E modeller in who pointed out the only thing he had was a Hornby 08. While it was my better half who pointed that the majority of my LSWR stock is Hornby and I bet if they did a cross section of modellers you’d find a more even split with a few skewed either  way.

 

Big James  

 

Surely the point being made was that the days of a model railway/train set = Hornby have been and gone.  I did not view it as a statistically significant measure of the ratio of Hornby versus other makes.

 

FWIW my track is not Hornby.

My controllers are not Hornby.

My scenics are not Hornby.

And a significant amount of my stock is not Hornby though I will admit to several models rather than just one.

 

There was a time back in the 70s and early 80s where a lot of the above would have been Hornby.

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A very interesting programme, missed it last night so thanks for posting the link Andy (in the first post).

 

I have no brand loyalty for my model railways - I buy the models I want - if it's Hornby, Bachmann etc so be it. Looking at my loft layout, i have (and run) lots of models from the 60's & 70's right up to the present. I'd guess 30% Hornby, 30% Bachmann, 25% Lima the rest various. All track is Peco.

 

I have always been happy with Tri-ang, Tri-ang Hornby and the latest Hornby products, just a little less so with Bachmann. Lima locos are like cockroaches - simple life forms, noisy and indestructible - I like them !!

 

The guy making the Hellcat did a wonderful job - I remember making lots of Airfix EE Lightnings back in the 60's - then a two bob kit with a dozen or so parts - loads of fun back then.

 

As to the age thing - I remember also as a young lad in the 60's visiting the Manchester Model Railway exhibition every year just before Christmas at the Corn Exchange, Back then there were loads and loads of grumpy old farts smoking pipes and Woodbines  (not all of them mind !!) - the air was blue (with smoke !!). Thank god THAT has gone.

 

Don't forget we are an ageing society so there will be no shortage of OAP's in the future hopefully taking up / re entering / continuing with our fantastic hobby.

 

Good luck to Hornby - looking forward to part two (and the punch up !!!!).

 

Brit15

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Hornby are probably the last company to offer everything - locos, coaches, wagons, buildings, track and controllers, Bachmann do almost everything but their track range isn't as complete as Hornby's.

 

Dapol do a mix of locos and wagons so to a certain extent cherry pick but they don't have the resources of Hornby or Bachmann to do everything.

 

The other smaller companies certainly cherry pick and leave it to Hornby and Bachmann to provide the rolling stock.  This is a developing area though and there are now companies also doing rolling stock as special commissions though we've yet to see a humble steel mineral or box van to Accurascale's standards.

 

Hattons is rather unique, it is procurring locos and wagons in a number of gauges - it gives the impression of a one stop shop because you can also pick up track, building etc to go with your purchases but again it is relying on Hornby and Bachmann to fill the gaps which it hopes to sell too.

 

I don't see Hornby giving up one element of what it produces as it all supports the other items in it's ranges - no track means no trainsets, no buildings means no add on sales when building the basic trainset.

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21 hours ago, delticfan said:

Quite shocking that the moulds were scrapped Simon seemed visibly shocked. Heaven knows what was lost all those iconic ex triang bridges platforms etc. I hope not.

 

It might be partly understandable if the moulds were disposed of in order to use the space for something else, or to sell off the building/stop renting it.  However, the sight of all that empty space on the programme kind of disputes all those reasons.  So dumping it achieved......sweet f.a.

 

I encounter similar arguments at work - the bean counters are forever saying that we have to get rid of kit because "it costs money to have it sitting there".  My boss and I are experts at squirreling stuff away, hiding it, rescuing from skips etc. etc.  And the number of unexpected  jobs we've been able to complete using stuff that the brass thought was dumped years ago is unreal.  We're currently in the process of gathering lots of this "junk" together to sell to an overseas customer, which will enable them to keep a very important multi million £ system going for the forseeable.  As for Bean counters........

 

As for the programme, I found it very interesting however I did feel that modellers were being portrayed a little as anoraks or nerds; borderline p1ss taking, in fact.  A bit unecessary.

 

My only hope is that, for the recently departed management who it seems made a mess of things and lost Hornby money (am I right?) is that they managed to lose lots of their own personal money in the process. .....

 

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35 minutes ago, Coryton said:

 

My guess is that they make money out of their Railroad models given that they keep selling them.

 

I would have thought that anything helping to keep Hornby afloat is a beneft even to those who wouldn't buy such models themselves.

 

I can't imagine it's taking up too much R&D time deciding what the next set of imaginary liveries will be for their 0-4-0s.

Hornby may be making money out of Railroad models but I am not sure that the retailers are. For the last five months Hattons has been selling R3170 Adderly Hall, with a list price of £94.99, for £49 and R3491 Warship Benbow, list price £64.99, for £34.90. The Hall is Hattons' best seller but Hattons cannot be making much profit from selling them unless they received a huge discount from Hornby.

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16 minutes ago, Robin Brasher said:

The Hall is Hattons' best seller but Hattons cannot be making much profit from selling them unless they received a huge discount from Hornby.

 

Either Hattons had hundreds of them or they don't sell much other stock for that to be a true best seller, it's marketing to clear shelves.

 

Just like those videos Hattons now do inducing you to buy other items in the bargains lists.

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1 hour ago, Dunsignalling said:

 

In my case, the parallel is the tribulations of various high street clothing emporia. The only one I miss is BHS, which was my go-to source for shirts and casual trousers. M&S stuff is no better and twice the price.

 

A certain member of this forum, who shall remain nameless (unless he or I choose to reveal his identity), used to accuse me of purchasing my clothes at Primark, because he took a distaste to a summery short-sleeved shirt that I wore one day. That shirt probably came from BHS and I'd never purchased anything from Primark before, but I subsequently decided that I would. He's never noticed those clothing items that did originate from Primark.

 

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2 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

I think that to succeed in any endeavour it helps hugely to be passionate about what you do.

 

Just to make one more comment about Hornby, rather than Primark or boring old fuddy duddies, and that is that Hornby clearly have a lot of passion for Pecketts, which is just fine by me.

 

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I thought it was very interesting - especially actually the airfix bits with the hellcat and the big Telford show, I hadn’t realised plastic kits were still so big - I wonder how big the market is in the UK ?

 

good to see Mr Kohler - a steady hand back at the tiller and one that seems to listen to what the modellers really want .

 

Loved Gerard with his “ actually just the shunter is Hornby “

and the kit guy ( can’t remember  his name ) “ we are all on the spectrum somewhere “

 

looking forward to part2

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1 hour ago, Robin Brasher said:

Hornby may be making money out of Railroad models but I am not sure that the retailers are. For the last five months Hattons has been selling R3170 Adderly Hall, with a list price of £94.99, for £49 and R3491 Warship Benbow, list price £64.99, for £34.90. The Hall is Hattons' best seller but Hattons cannot be making much profit from selling them unless they received a huge discount from Hornby.

 

Non-Railroad models also end up in the bargain bin - I don't think either of these can be used to argue that Railroad isn't a profitable range.

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1 hour ago, Captain Kernow said:

Just to make one more comment about Hornby, rather than Primark or boring old fuddy duddies, and that is that Hornby clearly have a lot of passion for Pecketts, which is just fine by me.

 

 

'Passion for Pecketts' - playing tonight at the Dublin Castle, tickets on the door only, concessions available. 

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4 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

I think that to succeed in any endeavour it helps hugely to be passionate about what you do. A healthy passion helps carry you through the difficult times and keep going when things are tough. I hate giving career advice because I find most careers advice is about self justification rather than about thinking about what is best for the person being advised and respecting their choices. However one thing I do advise youngsters is to do something that they enjoy and have a passion for as it is remarkable how things like pay and promotion can look after themselves if you love what you do, and if not then you will probably be happier than doing something that you hate. So it is good that Hornby has so many passionate people. However, you also need people who can run the mechanics of a business, recognise when passion needs to stop and hard headed business needs take over, make difficult decisions and have the necessary competence. I do not see these things as being exclusive as they can be combined in an individual (eg. Jason Shron), equally it works if people do not have both sets of attributes if they are in the right positions. Certainly I would always take passionate people over indolent time servers but they also need to be capable of doing the job they have been paid to do to the required standard. One of the big positives of this show was the obvious passion of so many people at Hornby. 

 

Overall it is great to see the positive interest in Hornby generated by the show and the genuine affection so many have for the brand, that can only be a good thing. Certainly it speaks volumes of the standing of Hornby that the show was even made. No other model company would be seen as worthy of such attention by the media. With the best of will, how many people outside the hobby would notice or care if Hattons or Bachmann shut up shop? 

 

Just thought most of that was worth repeating.   :)

 

I have seen a fair amount of 'passion' around this survival of Hornby issue  and while some people on RMweb are passionate they certainly differ in opinion!

 

Viva Hornby! 

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3 hours ago, Pete Darton said:

 

Also so looking at gaps in the market, the dcc concepts digital ip slow motion point motors are only option on the market and they are not very reliable. 

 

 

 

Without wishing ti hijack the thread, can you back up that statement with numbers and personal experiences please?

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12 hours ago, No Decorum said:

Don’t forget Paul Isles (Islesy in here). He occupies quite a different position in the company but he is a major asset. He is approachable by all reasonable people and is full of enthusiasm. It may be Paul or someone else but whoever came up with, and maintains, the Engine Shed was inspired.

 

A very enjoyable programme, by the way.

Yes, I was surprised Paul didn't get a mention in the programme - I simply spotted him in the background of footage taken at a show.

 

I was interested at how little we saw of Lyndon Davies, Chief Executive, in relation to Hornby trains, and how much we saw of Simon Kohler. The impression from last night's programme is that Simon is very much at the helm for Hornby.  Interesting.

 

And yes, we've had lots of great product in the years of apparent poor management.  LNER J15, Claud Hamilton D16/3 and K1; LSWR Black Motor; and Crosti 9F (that was just their 2014 announcement!); Merchant Navy, Peckett, B12/3 and Q6 in 2016.  These were good years model wise, without even mentioning coaches or wagons.

 

john Storey

 

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4 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

Overall it is great to see the positive interest in Hornby generated by the show and the genuine affection so many have for the brand, that can only be a good thing. Certainly it speaks volumes of the standing of Hornby that the show was even made. No other model company would be seen as worthy of such attention by the media. 

 

The standing of Hornby among people of what age though?

 

I don't think the brand recognition is exactly high among children these days.

 

 

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3 hours ago, Pete Darton said:

I fully agree and there a certainly newer ways of making things. 

 

Also so looking at gaps in the market, the dcc concepts digital ip slow motion point motors are only option on the market and they are not very reliable. Also better mechanisms for changing points because people find it difficult lining up point motors to work correctly.

 

The limited choice of concrete sleeper track on the market, more options here are a good idea.

 

airfix style trains you can build and paint yourself.

 

dcc controlled sounds for stations and other similar items.

 

more railroad level trains for that section of the market. Let other manufacturers do the better quality trains. But still compete in certain areas for the better quality trains.

 

bet there are many more avenues to investigate.

 

Erm ... all of these things already exist! Even from Hornby themselves in the case of the 'sounds for stations' which they have done in the form of the excellent little Vent Van which featured on the show. As someone else has already mentioned Hornby have pulled a blinder with this idea and it is surprising someone hasn't mass-produced something similar already (easy to say with hindsight!). I have one but am also looking forward to the next one (2019 catalogue) which will apparently feature different sounds.

 

Hornby are also steadily pushing more 'main range' models into the Railroad range as and when they bring out new-tool models. 

 

I agree on the 'track' side of things though - and as was noted on the show - whilst Hornby have focused primarily on rolling stock and more recently ready-made buildings and now scenic materials they haven't really developed their railway infrastructure range at all, like track, signals, points etc but maybe they feel that this isn't their core business and that other manufacturers already have this part of the market wrapped up? For the average 'train-set' for the children though (or the big kids!) their set-track range (and 'extension packs') is still fine and fit for purpose.

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Just now, Coryton said:

 

The standing of Hornby among people of what age though?

 

I don't think the brand recognition is exactly high among children these days.

 

 

 

Maybe not, but children aren't the big spenders withing the model railway hobby.

It's those that were children in the 50s/60s.

 

If it was aimed at children, it would be on earlier, or on CBBC..........

 

 

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