Who should be responsible for the cost of mazak rot.

[The Johnster]

17 hours ago, Reorte said:

Isn't it down to the materials in the metal reacting with each other? Since they're mixed in together anyway storage won't affect it in the slightest. I suppose it's possible air or moisture getting in to that mix could slow or accelerate the process, but it'll only be prolonging the inevitable at best, if it's going to happen at all. Slight differences in batches could easily lead to speculation about whether storage was a factor, it would need some tightly controlled experiments to really determine if it is.

Yes, as I understand it (and I’m not a metallurgist), mazak rot is a chemical reaction caused by impurities in the alloy introduced at the time of it’s production, which is why it affects models in batches. 
 

But I have a very distinct impression that models that have been stored suffer more than those that are in regular use.  This is an opinion based on anecdotal evidence and my own experience of chassis blocks that crumbled within weeks of my getting them out of long storage, and I am not claiming it to be an objectively proven established fact, but it is very firmly established in my mind. 
 

Conclusive evidence from controlled experiment would be hard to obtain, and would need several years study that nobody is in any hurry to do. 

[ejstubbs]

3 hours ago, Sir TophamHatt said:

I see many comments about the price of new locos or units, but people don't really consider the cost of materials, speakers...  and yes, I appreciate not everyone wants DCC or Sound but not everyone wanted a flat screen / HD TV and look where we are now

 

While I don't necessarily disagree with your fundamental point, unfortunately I don't think you've chosen the best analogy.  Although TV features (HD, Full HD, 4K, varying degrees of smartness etc) and screen size have expanded over time, prices haven't really gone up that much, if at all.  A couple of examples:

• When I left uni I the first TV I bought myself was a 12" B&W CRT job which IIRC cost ~£100.  These days roughly same money will by you a 19" colour flat screen LCD HD Freeview TV (another £20 or so and you get a DVD player built in);
• We bought our first flat screen TV in 2010: a 42" Full HD not-very-smart-at-all job for £700.  Checking the same retailer just now, the lowest spec TV from the same manufacturer that they offer at around that size is a 43" 4K screen with Google TV "smarts" built in, which costs £200 less than what we paid for our TV 12 years ago.

It's the same basic story with a lot of modern "high tech" products: the standard levels of specifications and capabilities have increased, but prices are much the same or lower - even more so if you take inflation into account (and very substantially so in the case of my 1980s B&W CRT TV).

 

The main differences cf model trains are:

(a) TVs are definitely a mass market product based on rapidly evolving technology, rather than comparatively short run products  for a significantly more limited market and based to a large degree on old and not particularly quickly evolving technology, and

(b) the rapid evolution of modern technology means that manufacturers can't make a cheaper, no-frills product and make a profit on it, because the no-frills components either aren't available at all, or aren't available at a price that would make the product cheaper than the one built using the current industry 'standard' componentry that's churned out for pennies in the tens of thousands or more, and comes with the latest baseline level bells and whistles effectively included for free.

 

TLDR: model trains don't follow Moore's Law, whereas products like TVs whose functionality is largely delivered by electronics still more or less do.

Edited July 6, 2022 by ejstubbs

[kevinlms]

4 hours ago, ejstubbs said:

 

TLDR: model trains don't follow Moore's Law, whereas products like TVs whose functionality is largely delivered by electronics still more or less do.

A simple way of looking at TV's, is that they all come with remotes and indeed it's a PITA trying to operate one without the remote. Fact is, it's cheaper to supply with a remote, than providing a proper inbuilt control panel, that no one wants to use - unless they have lost/broken the remote!

[The Johnster]

A 'no frills' model, such as Hornby's Railroad range, is usually as expensive to produce as the full-fat equivalent.  Sounds daft, but a more recent tooling is designed to maximise production efficiency by CAD and good production engineering, whereas the older toolings that produce the Railroad model date from a period before these advantages were available.  Thus the Railroadesque item has to retail for not much less than the full-fat equivalent, despite the tooling having been redacted years ago.

 

As an example, look at the Hornby A30 auto trailer, effectively the old Airfix model that has been through Replica and Dapol before Hornby took it on, a 50-year old tooling, most recent rrp £40.  There are plenty of more recently tooled 'full-fat' coaches in the Hornby range for appreciably less than that, and the tooling was paid for by Airfix!  The conclusion has to be that this coach is, by current standards, expensive to produce.  Even the 1961 'shorty' clerestories, 5 pieces (bogies, bodyshell, roof, and underframe unit) that a child could clip together in 30 seconds, are being knocked out a £30 a pop. 

 

Modern RTR has much more separate detail which has to be attached in the final assembly facility by those clever nimble-fingered Chinese ladies, and this is held to be expensive, and, being labour intensive, becoming increasingly so.  Perhaps, but savings and efficiencies elsewhere in the production chain must offset this to some extent, surely?  Another piece of 'percieved wisdom' is that a new tooling is inherently better than it's predecessor, but, like the song says, 'it ain' ness'arily so'*.  A new tooling is siezed on by marketing as a positive selling point, but it may be to a varying extent merely a more efficient piece of production engineering that saves the company money and increases profitability, especially if marketing manages to sneak in a price rise on the back of it!

 

Costs are undoubtedly rising, due to better standards of living in China, raw material costs, and transportation issues that have not recovered from the perfect storm of Covid and Ever Given, but the true extent of this is hidden from us as a matter of commercial confidentiality.  It impacts on the mazak issue (see how I wangled my way back on topic, there) because mazak quality is very much a QC-related matter, and QC is expensive.  Certain manufacturers' products suffer less from the rot, and are appreciably more expensive than those of other certain manufacturers that perhaps economise on QC in this matter.

 

One wonders if a situation is developing in which the cost of effective QC of mazak batches is becoming high enough for the use of the ideal material, brass, to be considered!

[tomparryharry]

Ahh, Mazak!  Sorry for  such a long time away! Chinese mazak is made as cheaply as possible. Zinc will burn out, as it goes through the recycling process. The largest problem FWIW, is the failure of the clients QC department. In all fairness, I can't see a metallurgist joining the ranks of Hornby, but they can utilise an outside company  to do that nowadays. I'd guess that if a model company specifies a certain grade to the supplier, then that's a start. As a 'toy' manufacturer, the greatest emphasis would undoubtedly be risk avoidance: "Why is little Johnny eating that chassis?"

 

Find the liquid solution that inhibits the rot, and then put it in an autoclave. Introduce the solution at the same time the vacuum is destroyed. The action  draws the solution  onto the surface even microscopic nooks & crannies.  It's been a while since I've done this sort of thing.

 

QC & specification are the best defence for Mazak rot. 

[Hal Nail]

12 hours ago, Sir TophamHatt said:

I wonder how much more expensive the product would be if production was in the UK.

 

Been discussed 1000s of times on here and the usual comments are:

 

1) not much more and it would be amazing because anything british is automatically best (51%)

2) cost a fortune and better off leaving things alone (49%)

 

My data is out of date. it might be different today.

 

Edited July 6, 2022 by Hal Nail
typo

[The Johnster]

Difficult to assess IMHO.  Discounting the entrenched views as in Hal’s post (not accusing Hal of holding either of them) and accepting that the move to China 30-odd years ago was a shameful example of exploitation of low wage workers that we did not complain nearly enough about, the Chinese still make good models at a competitive price despite a system of sub and sub-sub contractors that would be a disaster zone of missed deliveries and wobbly QC if it was attempted here, or anywhere in the West.  Our systems are not up to the job, as anyone going out of business because of supply problems out of their control will attest!  
 

The economic question, always the bottom line, is ‘could the market be supplied more profitably from UK based facilities making shortish runs of models after waiting for demand to make it worth the bother’?  Probably not, and in any case the Chinese have a setup that works and has not yet become so expensive that it has affected demand, but nobody knows because none of the volume producers have tried it, and are not willing to take the risk.  Understandably; the corpses of dead RTR UK-manufacturing companies that littered the scene 2 or 3 decades ago are still fresh in the memories of the current players and their backers. 
 

And then there’s Hornby.  The company’s dna is rooted in Rovex, 73 years ago, and the name with Meccano a century ago.  The only RTR company that everyone in my local pub knows; a mention of Bachmann results in a universal ‘who’?  There is a feeling that the company and the name are ‘national treasures’ and when things get rough, as they have several times this century, all the stops are pulled out and the latent goodwill saves the day.  This has led to a dangerous belief that the Precious Institution is indestructible, but it’s not, and it has to cut back on overheads more than it would probably like to service it’s bailout loans.  We all wish it the best in this endeavour, but it would be delusional to say that all is well at Margate.  I’m not saying they cut costs with QC, because I don’t know this to be a fact, but it is significant that their models feature more often in ‘bits falling off’ complaints on this sort of forum, and seem to feature in mazak issues more than the competition as well.  The obvious culprit would be QC. 
 

I can’t see any of the traditional players returning to UK production any time soon; why would they take the risk, and it would certainly be a high-risk strategy.  But a new startup might view things differently, and make a smaller range of models here in a more continuous production model.  Peco, suppliers of flexible track to most of the planet, have been doing this since god was in short trousers, and seem to be doing ok!
 

 

Edited July 7, 2022 by The Johnster

[kevinlms]

2 hours ago, The Johnster said:

 Our systems are not up to the job, as anyone going out of business because of supply problems out of their control will attest! 
 

And then there’s Hornby.  The company’s dna is rooted in Rovex, 73 years ago, and the name with Meccano a century ago.  The only RTR company that everyone in my local pub knows; a mention of Bachmann results in a universal ‘who’? 

 

Peco, suppliers of flexible track to most of the planet, have been doing this since god was in short trousers, and seem to be doing ok!
 

 

Much of the Western world has simply given up attempting to make things. Once competitors move to China to get such made cheaper, then everyone has to follow.

 

If non modellers have never heard of anyone but Hornby, does it matter, since they won't be buying model trains anyway. If they do start, then they will soon discover other brands - but they need the motivation to find out. The last mainstream computer game I purchased was Train Simulator (original), but I'm led to believe that many others write computer games!

 

Of course Peco are doing OK, because they have long since designed, developed and manufactured locally. I would imagine that their workforce is reliable, reasonably well paid and most employees would be loyal - which obviously cuts both ways, something that many businesses fail to understand!

 

Everyone needs track, if the owners of model trains want to see their purchases run. Agreed not everyone does, some are quite intent to look at them in a cupboard - large! But how does Peco sell track around the world, if everyone only knows Hornby - I see your assumption as wrong, those interested will soon find other makers. That's what the WWW is great for.

 

Peco's sums have almost certainly indicated that for most of their product range, the savings by sending to SE Asia to be made would be marginal. Their recent 75 year lift out said exactly all of the above.

[AndrueC]

43 minutes ago, kevinlms said:

Peco's sums have almost certainly indicated that for most of their product range, the savings by sending to SE Asia to be made would be marginal. Their recent 75 year lift out said exactly all of the above.

I also assume that most of Peco's products can be assembled by machine. It's basically just metal embedded in plastic. I'd guess all you need is a jig to lower the track into the top layer of a plastic mould. Live frog turnouts require wire connections but machines to solder a wire between two points have been around for decades.

 

A diesel locomotive probably requires a human for final assembly. A steam locomotive with valve gear surely does.

Edited July 7, 2022 by AndrueC

[Phil Parker]

6 minutes ago, AndrueC said:

A diesel locomotive probably requires a human for final assembly. A steam locomotive with valve gear surely does.

 

Both require lots of human assembly - several manufacturers have told me this the most expensive part of the model. You probably could build machines to do some of it, but the costs would be horrific, especially for the tiny numbers produced.

[Phil Parker]

3 hours ago, The Johnster said:

But a new startup might view things differently, and make a smaller range of models here in a more continuous production model.

 

The Little Loco Company tried - and failed. Partly because they couldn't find anyone who could do it in the UK. Rapido say the same for Canada.

[kevinlms]

1 hour ago, AndrueC said:

I also assume that most of Peco's products can be assembled by machine. It's basically just metal embedded in plastic. I'd guess all you need is a jig to lower the track into the top layer of a plastic mould. Live frog turnouts require wire connections but machines to solder a wire between two points have been around for decades.

 

A diesel locomotive probably requires a human for final assembly. A steam locomotive with valve gear surely does.

Perhaps you should actually find yourself a copy of 'Peco at 75', a lift out which came with the Railway Modeller for October 2021, where several pages are devoted to an overview of how they make plain track and points.

The threading of plain track in 3ft lengths until recently, used to be assembled manually in especially made jigs.

 

Points are made in a series of modules, put together manually then put in moulding machines. States that there are simply to many variables to automate fully.

Edited July 7, 2022 by kevinlms
Typo and more info

[Darius43]

13 minutes ago, AndrueC said:

I also assume that most of Peco's products can be assembled by machine. It's basically just metal embedded in plastic. I'd guess all you need is a jig to lower the track into the top layer of a plastic mould. Live frog turnouts require wire connections but machines to solder a wire between two points have been around for decades.

 

A diesel locomotive probably requires a human for final assembly. A steam locomotive with valve gear surely does.

Peco issued a video during the pandemic - towards the end of lockdown - showing how they had reorganised their uk production to produce PPE and how they were reorganising to restart track production.  They do use machines but they assist human operators rather than being fully robotic.  It was a very good video and I highly recommend it to you - if only to remove the need for your guesses and assumptions.

 

Cheers

 

Darius

[kevinlms]

1 hour ago, Darius43 said:

Peco issued a video during the pandemic - towards the end of lockdown - showing how they had reorganised their uk production to produce PPE and how they were reorganising to restart track production.  They do use machines but they assist human operators rather than being fully robotic.  It was a very good video and I highly recommend it to you - if only to remove the need for your guesses and assumptions.

 

Cheers

 

Darius

Is there a link to this video?

[Barry Ten]

Might be this one:

 

 

[57xx]

On 27/06/2022 at 15:25, Steamport Southport said:

 

Just Google it or ask in your local "quality" outdoor gear store (not Sports Direct or Millets).

 

 

Sports Direct offer zero warranty. Less than 1 year's use is deemed ok for them to worm out of shoddy goods falling apart.

[Mike Buckner]

On 06/07/2022 at 16:33, kevinlms said:

it's cheaper to supply with a remote, than providing a proper inbuilt control panel

 

or a butler to stand by the TV and change the channel