Hornby announce TT:120

[CF MRC]

I had a look at the models on display at KX today. They look very good to me…

 

Tim

[britishcolumbian]

1 hour ago, Tim Dubya said:

 

It's not for 'us', it's for trainsets.  Anyone who's seriously into (dare I say it) finescale TT:120 is going to be cooking their own point and crossing work and either using Peco Flexi (haven't seen it in the flesh yet, so can't comment on how it looks) or again, home cooked plain track sections.

 

 

Yeah, this. I suspect most of us who are already established in working in 1:120 aren't going to give the Hornby track more than a cursory glance. I've never laid my own track yet and I don't know if I want to go down that road since I'll have plenty else to scratchbuild. I've not had a chance to see the Peco product yet (but I know there is some in the city already) but I'm already used to compromises in trackwork given the discrepancies between Continental and North American track work so I could see myself living with the compromise of using Tillig track for my British modelling, too.

 

I suppose that was just a really long-winded way of saying that I haven't given Hornby's track a second thought after seeing the first pictures.

[Porfuera]

2 hours ago, Matt C said:

 

Just picking up your comment as a point in question. . . Is it just me. . Or does this all seam just a bit Rushed ??

[...]IF done properly and not just thrown together it just MIGHT gather steam and prove a success.

 

Hornby please PLEASE get it right and don't just rush to get it to market in an attempt stifle competition ??

 

 

I agree with the sentiments of this - it seemed a bit rushed to me as well, in as much as very little of this range seems to go together unless you want to run rakes of express trains.

 

I would have jumped in if there was a Class 08 (any era) and a few matching wagons to shunt around on an Inglenook or similar, using track from Peco rather than Hornby.

 

However the best I can do at the moment seems to be an Era 7 (TOPS) BR blue Class 08 and three TTAs. At a stretch I could add the six Era 8 (Sectorisation) HAA MGRs but that seems to be as far as it goes until Phases 3 and 4, and even then the pickings will be fairly thin.

 

And am I the only one that thinks that shunting TTAs and HAAs would be an odd mixture...?

 

So I took a look and Hornby's OO Catalogue and as far as I can see there isn't much more on offer in OO in Eras 4 to 8 (as far as wagons are concerned, at least) and therefore I guess Hornby will need to expand its range of wagons in TT, which may in turn mean additional stock for OO - who knows?

 

I do hope that Hornby can make a go of this - I have no reason not to and surely it can only be good for the hobby as a whole if it does?

 

But it looks like they will either need to commission a lot of new wagons for various eras or else we will be waiting for other manufacturers to jump in to add extra stock to fill in some gaps in Hornby's range.

 

In the meantime I'll be holding on to my money (not what Hornby want, I'd imagine) and waiting for reviews.

 

Cheers, Neil.

[Matt C]

1 hour ago, Hobby said:

 

It's been five years in the making so not rushed! I suspect, as others have said, that the stuff is on the boat in its container so they know the arrival date and can start the launch. We can read too much into things, see the comments about the display model, which it now appears aren't the production models but stuff put together to publicise it. I'm not a finescale modeller so even those models looked, in the main, ok!

 

'Sigh' as I pointed out to another poster replying  to my thoughts, YES five years in making i.e. designing and producing is maybe not Rushed, BUT if this LAUNCH was five years in the making then I would suggest a change of Marketing team 

[Keith Addenbrooke]

1 hour ago, gr.king said:

Since this digital devilry won't apparently allow me to quote a series of posts from three preceding pages, I'll proceed without those, but...

 

Whilst I acknowledge that set-track may have to be more robust to suit repeated handling, and I'm aware that Peco do, or did, offer something better looking for 12mm gauge modellers (if the stuff I saw on some sensible-scale TT3 layouts about 5-6 years ago is any guide, this looking far better in the sleepering department than any Peco OO offering at that time), I still don't see that any of that justifies the provision (yet again) of something cosmetically very, very, un-British in the Hornby trainsets, something that is likely to mislead new modellers regarding correct appearance and in some cases lock them in to the purchase of yet more incorrect track in order to match what they already have, should they wish to expand their layouts. .

Top is the Peco Code 75 H0m 12mm gauge Flextrack for metre-gauge Continental modelling in HO Scale.

 

Below is the new Peco Code 55 TT:120 12mm gauge Flextrack for Standard Gauge railways.  

 

Hope this helps clarify - worth comparing with the overhead photos of the Hornby display at KX, Keith.

 

Edited October 16, 2022 by Keith Addenbrooke
Presentation

[Kris]

1 hour ago, The Stationmaster said:

Quick question - apart from Hornby's own promotional stuff has anybody yet seen them advertising TT120 in the wider world?

They have been advertising on Facebook. Sponsored adverts and the like.

[Samedan]

It’s in the nature of the beast of course, but I find it mildly amusing that most people on here are debating the merits of TT 120 for “serious” or finescale modelling and licking their lips over all the long rakes of contemporary trains and varied locos that they’ll be able to fit into their spaces.

 

Chill, guys, everything about this product launch screams “train set” and “family set up”. The lack of attention to correct track proportions or refined appearance etc is of limited relevance to the Dad/Granddad (with due acknowledgement that other genders are available) looking for a project that they can put together with their youngsters. If it is to meet Hornby’s financial expectations, it’s got to sell in some volume to that market. These will be average Joes who will be excited by the prospect of fitting more railway onto the classic sheet of plywood from B and Q than would be possible in OO. And I bet it’s not the adults who find N too fiddly but the young children. 

 

SK admitted that the track has to be available from Hornby so that they can claim to sell a complete system and sell train sets at Christmas. Most of the target market wouldn’t recognise inaccurately proportioned track if it hit them in the face. So, expect lots of “iconic” locos representing “key milestones in railway history”, with a bias towards anything that ran/runs in the South of England. Lots of colour. Probably lots of digital gizmos and gimmicks when the range gets going. 
 

As someone else has said, it may not be for the likes of us, but that’s not a reason to carp at the type of product on offer if it brings people into the hobby and offers a diversion from the current grim realities of this world. 

[Hroth]

8 minutes ago, Matt C said:

 

'Sigh' as I pointed out to another poster replying  to my thoughts, YES five years in making i.e. designing and producing is maybe not Rushed, BUT if this LAUNCH was five years in the making then I would suggest a change of Marketing team 

 

You might be overthinking events.

 

You can't accept that Hornby have been planning this for half a decade, have planned to release trainsets for this Christmas, have their track ready to sell and then say that you think Hornby have ulterior motives for announcing it to the world at this point in time.

 

Its silly to suggest that Hornby jumped because Peco announced British outline TT:120 in June and that Heljan had announced one "definite" and two "possible" locos a little later.  

 

We'll just have to see how much Hornby TT:120 content turns up in the forthcoming series of "Hornby, A Model World" when it airs in 2023, but until then Mondays launch was probably bang on schedule!

 

[Dunsignalling]

4 hours ago, Hroth said:

 

I was thinking mainly of the track base, rather than replicating the points design! Type B track was a 12mm sibling of OO gauge Series 3 and was probably introduced simultaneously.

 

Not that the sleeper spacing of Type B would be appreciated!

 

I knew a couple early exponents of O-16.5 who quite assiduously sought out good s/h Series 3 back when it could be picked up for not much more than pennies at swap meets.

 

[Dunsignalling]

27 minutes ago, Matt C said:

 

'Sigh' as I pointed out to another poster replying  to my thoughts, YES five years in making i.e. designing and producing is maybe not Rushed, BUT if this LAUNCH was five years in the making then I would suggest a change of Marketing team 

 

Not five years in the making, but almost certainly three for a range this size, and a couple of years before that convincing the bean-counters it wasn't some kind of commercial suicide pact. 🤣

 

[gwrrob]

Sorry if this has already been posted but Hornby are attending this show in a fortnight for those who want to ask SK about the range in person or possibly see same samples. This show is organised by @Phil Parker local club and I'm sure he'll be eager to see them himself with his BRM hat on.

 

http://gbmrs.com/

Edited October 16, 2022 by gwrrob

[Dunsignalling]

2 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

As they have apparently (according to a good source) spent over £1 million on developing the TT idea the inference will inevitably be that it was money that could have been spent on something else.    But that  applies to anything and everything any manufacturer/commissioner introduces.   For example you might think that Bachmann spending a small fortune updating the Class 47 might have been better advised to have spent it on the SR mogul while I might think it would have been better to spend on the Western 56XX.  

 

The big problem with money is that you can't spend it twice (although quite a few people seem to try doing exactly that - and get in a right mess as a result).  hence for a while in the future any money spent by Hornby on the future phases of tty120 won't be able to be spent on the examples listed by 'Ravenser'. (but they do have £21 million of potential borrowing on tap should the need arise and if they have teh resources to do it all at the same time). 

Having the money (potentially) available to do both TT:120 and "something else" is one thing.

 

Unless Hornby took on additional design staff specifically for this project, those resources will have been diverted from "something else".

 

John

[britishcolumbian]

Just now, Tim Dubya said:

 

I understood the the gauge/scale ratio was correct?

It is. 1435/120 = 11.9583333 mm, i.e. 12 mm gauge is as bang-on accurate as you can want for 1:120 scale.

[Dunsignalling]

7 minutes ago, britishcolumbian said:

It is. 1435/120 = 11.9583333 mm, i.e. 12 mm gauge is as bang-on accurate as you can want for 1:120 scale.

Depends on period. AIUI "standard gauge" has drifted about by a few mm over time.

 

There's also an issue of gauge-widening on curves, which would definitely apply to the sort of radii involved in train sets.

 

John

Edited October 16, 2022 by Dunsignalling

[britishcolumbian]

Just now, Dunsignalling said:

Depends on period. AIUI "standard gauge" has drifted about by a few mm over time.

 

John

1 mm in 1:120 is .00833 mm... that few millimetre difference you mention is basically within tolerance for NEM or RP25 standards...

[britishcolumbian]

But if you really are that attentive to thousandths of mm, then rest assured, Proto:120 is also possible - I've seen it done as an experiment, and it works.

[Flying Pig]

54 minutes ago, Porfuera said:

 

However the best I can do at the moment seems to be an Era 7 (TOPS) BR blue Class 08 and three TTAs. At a stretch I could add the six Era 8 (Sectorisation) HAA MGRs but that seems to be as far as it goes until Phases 3 and 4, and even then the pickings will be fairly thin.

 

And am I the only one that thinks that shunting TTAs and HAAs would be an odd mixture...?

 

You could add the 21t mineral and the 12t vans instead, though you might want to adjust the liveries.  Those wagons also give you standard 10' and 12' underframes if you want to scratchbuild or print some bodies for more variety. 

 

With the mixed brake types you really need a brakevan and for some reason Hornby have chosen a type that probably wasn't in revenue service by the 1970s, so that would need reworking as the later type.

[LBRJ]

1 hour ago, Tim Dubya said:

As an aside.

 

I asked on Facebook if LCut Creative were going down the TT route and they are interested in doing so, which is good news.

 

There's a bit of interest in some of my friends about TT, which suprised me as they're generally not into model railways now there in their 50's.  One would be into a class 50 and/or 37 and coaches / freight set and got quite enthusiastic about it, once he realised he could get a decent layout on the dining room table*.  Of course this all ended up with watching the C4 program from 20 odd years ago all about "bashers".

 

We did both agree that it's a trainset we want, just to sit and relax while it's goes around doing it's thing. Top stuff.

 

* behind every man is a woman rolling her eyes!

 

 

 

I am pretty sure that middle aged and older folks with some spare cash and a liking for toys, is a large section of the targeted market.

What one may think of as The James May Effect.

[009 micro modeller]

46 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

 

I knew a couple early exponents of O-16.5 who quite assiduously sought out good s/h Series 3 back when it could be picked up for not much more than pennies at swap meets.

 

Probably because the sleeper spacing, while a bit wide for standard gauge, is quite appropriate for narrow gauge in a larger scale.

[009 micro modeller]

29 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

Depends on period. AIUI "standard gauge" has drifted about by a few mm over time.

 

There's also an issue of gauge-widening on curves, which would definitely apply to the sort of radii involved in train sets.

 

John

In some European countries I understand 1440mm is the standard used, rather than 1435mm, which would make 12mm exactly right.

[Porfuera]

1 hour ago, Flying Pig said:

 

You could add the 21t mineral and the 12t vans instead, though you might want to adjust the liveries.  Those wagons also give you standard 10' and 12' underframes if you want to scratchbuild or print some bodies for more variety. 

 

With the mixed brake types you really need a brakevan and for some reason Hornby have chosen a type that probably wasn't in revenue service by the 1970s, so that would need reworking as the later type.

 

Thanks for the ideas, although I think it supports my thoughts that very little of what's being released as RTR will run together, apart from rakes of express passenger trains.

 

However (as has been suggested a number of times previously) this may not bother those that have been identified as the target purchasers for TT120.

 

Fingers crossed that this will take off and that other manufacturers - including kits - will join in.

 

Cheers, Neil.

 

Edit: It might be easier to paint the Class 08 green! Just a thought...

 

Edited October 16, 2022 by Porfuera

[spamcan61]

1 hour ago, Tim Dubya said:

 

I understood that the gauge/scale ratio was correct?

 

 

It is, but rail height (for sure) and probably sleeper dimensions / spacing aren't necessarily prototypical; unsurprisingly for the target market.

[Ravenser]

3 hours ago, Tim Dubya said:

 

Where did you find this information please?  I'm genuinely interested in how this is being financed.  I had assumed that the funding was entirely separate from any other streams, and that would make sense as to why Hornby are going solo with sales (maximising profits for a fast return to investors/ bank loans).

 

The general feeling I get from small shop proprietors commenting on Facebook is that they've been 'stabbed in the back' by Hornby (again) over TT.

 

Cheers 

 

 

Funding for the tooling comes from within Hornby's budget , and therefore the TT-120 is competing for their available investment in new tooling with their other brands.

 

Arnold have no new releases in TT this year (except that the forthcoming TT Class 66 will also be released as an Arnold model on the Continent - this was slipped in earlier). If SK believes that Hornby are running out of credible options for new tooling in OO, we'll presumably see fewer new releases in OO, with the investment being switched to TT-120

 

In context the point I was making was that this is no skin off the noses of N gauge modellers. Hornby are not in N:  Bachmann, Dapol and Revolution will invest just as much in new N gauge tooling as if this had never happened. It's wildly unlikely any of those 3 will produce anything for TT-120 in the new 5 years: they are fully committed to N as their small scale offer, and I can't see why they would do anything to support a rival scale

 

I don't doubt that small shop proprietors are extremely unhappy over Hornby's commercial policy here. However I'm not sure many of them ever had any real enthusiasm for TT-120 as a product in the first place, or saw it as a genuine business opportunity for their shop. I think its more a question of the small shops fearing that if Hornby can make TT-120  fly without the shops they could go the same route with OO.

 

Hence I suspect a segment of the retail trade will now want TT-120 to fail completely and Hornby to be given a very bloody nose over the whole thing - to teach them that Hornby cannot survive without the active support of the small retailers, and the smaller retailers must be given acceptable terms, without Hornby attempting direct selling on any significant sale. Many retailers probably do not want yet another range to stock, and I suspect they would have been much happier if Hornby had quietly abandoned the whole idea of TT long before it saw the light of day

 

 

[Phil Parker]

1 hour ago, gwrrob said:

Sorry if this has already been posted but Hornby are attending this show in a fortnight for those who want to ask SK about the range in person or possibly see same samples. This show is organised by @Phil Parker local club and I'm sure he'll be eager to see them himself with his BRM hat on.

 

http://gbmrs.com/

 

It's not organised by the L&WMRS, but they do supply stewards and barriers plus a couple of layouts. Paul Appleton is the man in charge.

 

I should be there, with my HCC magazine columnist hat on, but I'll certainly be taking a camera... 

[britishcolumbian]

5 minutes ago, Ravenser said:

Hence I suspect a segment of the retail trade will now want TT-120 to fail completely and Hornby to be given a very bloody nose over the whole thing - to teach them that Hornby cannot survive without the active support of the small retailers, and the smaller retailers must be given acceptable terms, without Hornby attempting direct selling on any significant sale. Many retailers probably do not want yet another range to stock, and I suspect they would have been much happier if Hornby had quietly abandoned the whole idea of TT long before it saw the light of day

Unfortunately for the small shops, it won't work out that way. The story of the bookstore vs Amazon is the pattern that this will probably take: the only brick & mortar bookstores still doing well are the big ones (who also do mail/online order), the very niche ones (locally I can think of ones that are focussed on the political hard left and the naturopathic/new age scenes), and the second-hand/antique handlers. For better or worse, the future is online.