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

[newbryford]

3 minutes ago, JSpencer said:

 

 

The more common liveries have been done before. Anyone wanting it cheap will find one somewhere. So any new additions in the cheap end will have little influence on Hattons. Then we have the liveries not covered before. There will be people who cannot afford the Hattons one anyway but will buy the Hornby one, so No impact on Hattons sales. Then you have those wanting the best 66 possible, they are hardly going to buy Hornby's old tooling model. You are left with just the small section which was after the never done before livery and consider the old tooling adequate off their needs. There will be an impact there for sure but not something to worry about.

You then have a lot of people like me who will find the 66 too recent for their layouts. 

The real nightmare must therefore be with most other model shops. What with Hattons, Hornby and (eventually) Bachmann producing so many variants, it is no longer a question of how many to stock of each but rather which ones? Most model shops are not  going to sit on 30 different versions of the same class in multiple colours from 3 makes!

in fact sitting on 9 different versions just from Hornby is likely to end up being money tied up.

A strategy that is somewhat rushed. The world is in constant evolution and changes moving from one crisis to the next. For any business to survive it needs to flexible enough to meet the needs of customers. Traditional telephone companies now sell television Chanel's as a major part of their DSL packages and my lease line serves more for TV and internet these days than use as a telephone.

Innovation is a key for sure, but the right innovations require close interactions with customers finding and testing ideas. The multiple 66s is an idea clearly rushed, untested on customers with the sole objective of trying to dissuade new players from entering the market - clearly and obviously it will fail! The world has moved on and returning to the past is impossible.

Why was the early 2000s a success? Because Hornby finally abandoned its old way of producing trains with tender drive locos produced from tooling that had little changed in 20 years and asked people and then produced all new models with a spec that people wanted. They need to repeat the exercise again to find out where the market is now.

 

 

 

The past 24 months or so has seen a preponderance of new/celebrity liveries on Class 66s - especially amongst the GBRf fleet. Who can blame the manufacturers for falling over themselves to produce them as that's where a lot of modelling tokens are spent?

 

There is one major difference between historical and current day models that seems to have been overlooked - there are no new (or very, very few) liveries to be covered when it comes to steam era models. I can't really comment on the multiple livery releases of the Terrier as it's too early for my needs..........

 

At least Hattons made the effort not to produce any other name/livery combinations that had previously been produced by Lima, Bachmann or Hornby - it's just unlucky timing for them with the likes of 66783/789 etc. and the triplication of them by Bachmann and Hornby.

 

As for Hornby repeating the 2000s exercise  - not easily done as most the "popular" prototypes are already produced to a high standard. I would love to know what locos they could upgrade from tender drive.

Principally as a current scene diesel modeller, luckily I pretty much lack for nothing on the loco front. (Awaits howls of derision about the Bachmann 37............ other diesels are available)

Multiple units however, are a different matter, but I don't think they fit into Hornby's psyche . The 4-VEP was a half-hearted attempt and they haven't made any effort to update the 156 or 142 or 101, leaving them to others. The 2-BIL, although not in my modelling period, had mixed reviews with it's design clever approach. 

 

 

I'm buying my first Hattons 66 as I particularly like the livery on 66789 and when it was announced, the Bachmann or Hornby version wasn't on the scene. Not that I would purchase a Hornby 66 - sorry SK! Yes, I am capable of repainting a Bachmann 66 to a reasonable standard, but why would I do so, when I can obtain a factory finish for less than the time, effort and decals that it would cost me (I have limited spare time at the moment, so cost and prioritisation of it it is a factor)

 

IMO - Bachmann will be the biggest losers in the battle of the 66s.

 

Cheers,

Mick

 

[NIK]

11 hours ago, Captain Kernow said:

 

Thank you, I can see the reasoning in this, (assuming one didn't have a handy paper list with the necessary DCC information already shown on it).

 

I don't know what the coloured geometric shapes along the edge of the baseboard are supposed to signify, though.

 

 

Hi,

 

The coloured geometric shapes are my idea of how to easily identify what view the phone has of the layout. They would be physically attached to the layout. The location, colour, shape and size would allow the AR software to easily work out where the phone was pointing at from what distance in order to locate information to be superimposed on the screen. My example was aimed at making things quicker on a club exhibition layout where people just bring along locos and multiple units.

 

Regards

 

Nick

[jjb1970]

If Hornby are particularly Machiavellian then they probably realise that Hattons are in a weak position to really do much against Hornby. They have lost their relationship with Bachmann, if they were to lose it with Hornby too then they would be a model train shop without the two principal British outline model train companies. Regardless of their own plans there is no way that they can fill the gap for their retail operations if they ended up losing both Bachmann and Hornby and I think they'd hemorrhage business to competitors. 

[rockershovel]

Regarding various comments above..

 

surely the difference between VR and imagination, is that VR provides a controlled, 

predetermined content controlled by others? 

 

Regarding something real as false, and believing false things to be true are surely directly related, if not aspects of the same thing? 

 

A propos BBC production editing, I spent a very satisfying hour yesterday listening to Sir Robin Knox-Johnston’s account of his solo circumnavigation. I can’t imagine any other network producing such an absorbing hours’ listening centred on such a remarkable character and for those with iplayer, I strongly recommend it.

 

 

 

 

[blueeighties]

1 hour ago, rockershovel said:

 

 

Regarding something real as false, and believing false things to be true are surely directly related, if not aspects of the same thing? 

 

 

 

 

 

I like bananas.

[JSpencer]

8 hours ago, newbryford said:

 

 

 

The past 24 months or so has seen a preponderance of new/celebrity liveries on Class 66s - especially amongst the GBRf fleet. Who can blame the manufacturers for falling over themselves to produce them as that's where a lot of modelling tokens are spent?

 

There is one major difference between historical and current day models that seems to have been overlooked - there are no new (or very, very few) liveries to be covered when it comes to steam era models. I can't really comment on the multiple livery releases of the Terrier as it's too early for my needs..........

 

At least Hattons made the effort not to produce any other name/livery combinations that had previously been produced by Lima, Bachmann or Hornby - it's just unlucky timing for them with the likes of 66783/789 etc. and the triplication of them by Bachmann and Hornby.

 

As for Hornby repeating the 2000s exercise  - not easily done as most the "popular" prototypes are already produced to a high standard. I would love to know what locos they could upgrade from tender drive.

Principally as a current scene diesel modeller, luckily I pretty much lack for nothing on the loco front. (Awaits howls of derision about the Bachmann 37............ other diesels are available)

Multiple units however, are a different matter, but I don't think they fit into Hornby's psyche . The 4-VEP was a half-hearted attempt and they haven't made any effort to update the 156 or 142 or 101, leaving them to others. The 2-BIL, although not in my modelling period, had mixed reviews with it's design clever approach. 

 

 

I'm buying my first Hattons 66 as I particularly like the livery on 66789 and when it was announced, the Bachmann or Hornby version wasn't on the scene. Not that I would purchase a Hornby 66 - sorry SK! Yes, I am capable of repainting a Bachmann 66 to a reasonable standard, but why would I do so, when I can obtain a factory finish for less than the time, effort and decals that it would cost me (I have limited spare time at the moment, so cost and prioritisation of it it is a factor)

 

IMO - Bachmann will be the biggest losers in the battle of the 66s.

 

Cheers,

Mick

 

 

Just for clarity, Repeating the 2000 exercise is not to replace tender drives nor any other loco. It is to find out what the market wants now. It is not a simple exercise of which loco but rather complex exercise to determine the spec, make proposals etc. Telephone companies no longer provide just lease lines, they branched in selling TV as well. Maybe Hornby could look at VR or follow the Accurscale route of extreme high fidelity or something else. Or it can be simple questions on quality vs price. Demonstrating what end of the scale means.

If you don,t do this, you end up producing things no one wants.

[PMP]

2 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

(Snip) Regardless of their own plans there is no way that they can fill the gap for their retail operations if they ended up losing both Bachmann and Hornby and I think they'd hemorrhage business to competitors. 

 

Not necessarily, they’d still have the option of buying via a wholesaler. No where near as profitable, but it would continue the supply chain, and the wholesale outfit would do very nicely. And then possibly the wholesalers become another competitor if they commissioned products!

[Roddy Angus]

2 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

Regardless of their own plans there is no way that they can fill the gap for their retail operations if they ended up losing both Bachmann and Hornby and I think they'd hemorrhage business to competitors. 

 

Edited March 16, 2019 by Roddy Angus
Sorry, I misunderstood the quote.

[Pacific231G]

16 hours ago, Captain Kernow said:

Yes, I do understand where you are coming from, but whatever happened to the concept of imagination?

 

We may be looking at AR in that way because we're trying to fit into what we already know- which we all do with new technology e.g. horseless carriage, measuring engine output in terms of horses. motion pictures and so on.

Imagination is what will allow us to do new things with it that we'd not already thought of.

 

I was definitely falling into that trap by thinking in terms of walking passengers,  etc. augmenting what you are seeing rather than adding different informatino. You could for example look at a wagon in the yard and see its waybill and destination etc. something a shunter in real life would have seen posted on the wagon but modellers have to do separately (viz all those waybill boxes by the side of American layouts) You might point at the signalbox and see a live display of the block instruments. An exhibition  visitor might look at a loco and see the history of that particilar loco in reality (A bit like second screening when you see something in a TV programme and Google it on your tablet)  I'm sure you can think of other possibilities.

The great thing about this is that once the base technology had developed small firms and individuals could produce specialist applications rather as people do now with add on sound chips. What this would do for Hornby isn't clear but they'd be daft not to keep their eyes open.

[melmerby]

15 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

And look how many continental manufacturers have gone bust or finished up in deep financial dodo.

Five of them ended up as part of Hornby.

With Arnold they have a TT (1:120) range as well.

[The Stationmaster]

4 minutes ago, melmerby said:

Five of them ended up as part of Hornby.

With Arnold they have a TT (1:120) range as well.

And look what happened to Hornby after it had bought them (not that the money spent on those companies necessarily caused Hornby to slip into losses, but ...)

[Hroth]

Email from Hornby just arrived, announcing new Class 66 and more Terriers available now, "As seen on BBC 4".

 

Hmmmmm...

[Philip Jackson]

I feel sorry for the young lady who joined the design team. By now her social media would be set to private so non of us sad old gits can bother her

[Ian Hargrave]

28 minutes ago, Hroth said:

Email from Hornby just arrived, announcing new Class 66 and more Terriers available now, "As seen on BBC 4".

 

Hmmmmm…

 

Hmm indeed.Also read the embarrassing blooper....."Our Class 66 coaches caused quite a stir".Bet they did!!

[Sir TophamHatt]

I'm don't think VR/AR will take off.

I can see the draw with live steam and it's a shame no other company has looked into developing this - even for diesels.   More so, companies not looking at making opening doors on multiple units, or other such things. Yes, prices will rise, but hey, I bet 20 years ago nobody thought people would buy sound locos!

 

But VR/AR? 

 

May as well not bother putting anything but track down then... if I can just model it all on a computer and play using goggles, right?

 

Samsung tried with VR but the uptake has been very slow. It was about 4 years ago I first tried the Samsung goggles with a phone and a rollercoaster. Haven't heard anything about it since.

 

Same with 3D. Notice how it's not a main selling point of TVs these days - people have decided it's not worth it. It's all about 4K, 8K - which is a waste in itself as there are still a good number of channels that aren't HD yet.

Myself though, I like to model.

 

I like ballasting, making trees, the landscape, putting together a scene or a station. That's what this hobby is about no?

Edited March 16, 2019 by Sir TophamHatt

[Hroth]

47 minutes ago, Ian Hargrave said:

 

Hmm indeed.Also read the embarrassing blooper....."Our Class 66 coaches caused quite a stir".Bet they did!!

I didn't look too closely at the email body, but yes...  Actually, a range of corrugated side coaches following the Class 66 body profile would be eye-catching!

[woodenhead]

1 hour ago, Ian Hargrave said:

 

Hmm indeed.Also read the embarrassing blooper....."Our Class 66 coaches caused quite a stir".Bet they did!!

To be fair, they may know something we don't - if DB have too many 66s perhaps they are stripping them out as we type 

[Ian J.]

From a real life modelling perspective, VR purely on it's own I can't see being of much use, though I am open to having my mind changed if a good idea to use it comes along.

 

AR on the other hand, where either goggles or more likely a phone or tablet could overlay information on to a camera view of the model could be very useful (as previously described in this thread) for information and control. Not so much for driving, but for selecting vehicles, setting couplings, turnouts, signals, etc. In the future control via apps on mobile devices will become the norm and I'm open to innovation that could use AR to help. Unfortunately, I don't think the DCC/decoder systems we have today are up to the job. Much more innovation in the underlying digital interfaces of our models will need to be done so that capabilities like automatic coupling and uncoupling, etc., are easy to install and use.

Edited March 16, 2019 by Ian J.

[Deltic]

4 hours ago, PMP said:

 

Not necessarily, they’d still have the option of buying via a wholesaler. No where near as profitable, but it would continue the supply chain, and the wholesale outfit would do very nicely. And then possibly the wholesalers become another competitor if they commissioned products!

Only they cannot obtain Bachmann products unless they go direct.

[PMP]

I was referring to Hornby products, this thread primarily being about Hornby, and the well known, I think, non wholesale policy from Bachmann.

[Ron Ron Ron]

People are assuming that VR would be restricted to goggles and that AR can only be viewed through the lense and screen of a smartphone or iPad.

These are only early applications of such technology.

 

Remember the ill-fated Google Glasses?

The technology wasn’t quite there, but a similar but more advanced approach is being worked on.

If you already wear specs, imagine if a future pair of ordinary specs could display AR images and data as if it was out in front of you?

 

I can’t remember who it is, but one car company had recently demonstrated AR information and images, superimposed on the whole windscreen of a car, so that sat nav data, animated objects and virtual road signs appear as if they were outside and in front of the vehicle or on or to the side of the road ahead.

It takes head up displays to a completely different level.

 

There are research teams around the world trying all sorts of applications for these technologies.

I don’t think we can predict what may be available for model railway use in future years?

 

Ron

[robmcg]

There are some of us Luddites who enjoy a beautiful model in a tactile and visual way, and I for one think the US industry went nuts with smoke and sound.

[CME and Bottlewasher]

Sadly real smoke, real water and real sound doesn't scale (unless the scale is large) and external 3:1 or 5:1 speakers often out perform onboard speakers in make shift enclosures.

[Captain Kernow]

It's a pity that Hornby and Rails have gone 'head-to-head' over the Terrier. I'd have been much more excited if Hornby had decided to go 'head-to-head' with Hattons a couple of years ago, over another loco that they (Hornby) have in their Railroad range, which has been under the Hornby banner for just as long as the Terrier and is, by their logic, just as much a part of their traditional range as the Terrier.

 

We might then have got one decent looking and well running loco out of the pair of 'em.

 

But I'm not bitter.

 

Edited March 16, 2019 by Captain Kernow

[CME and Bottlewasher]

3 minutes ago, Captain Kernow said:

It's a pity that Hornby and Rails have gone 'head-to-head' over the Terrier. I'd have been much more excited if Hornby had decided to go 'head-to-head' with Hattons a couple of years ago, over another loco that they (Hornby) have in their Railroad range, which has been under the Hornby banner for just as long as the Terrier and is, by their logic, just as much a part of their traditional range as the Terrier.

 

We might then have got one decent looking and well running loco out of the pair of 'em.

 

But I'm not bitter.

 

Different management team back then?