Where are the Hornby models?

[andyman7]

Indeed, live and let live!

['CHARD]

Bit of a shame - building model trains should be a more rewarding exercise - a model that will be cherished for years, rather than an electronic device disposed of after 24 months.

 

I doubt the average Chinese worker sees it like that - a box of parts to assemble in an aggressive target time, I imagine the fiddliness of some models must make the job wretched at times.  I could imagine that having nightmares about assembling little trains from a foreign land that you have no connection with would get the employee sick of the sight of the models.  In comparison, electronics assembly for handhelds and portable devices (assembly I'm talking about, rather than soldering etc) is probably far less annoying. 

 

I will avoid making the obvious comment about building from scratch or kits being more rewarding,

 

 

I don't imagine that any Chinese factory worker has ever made this comparison.

[robmcg]

Again off topic, but what the hell... Although it is not my kind of modelling, I really enjoy your illustrations. And I admire all the artistry and work you've put into them. Your illustrations of the Hornby Star also made me look with other eyes on my own  model, and made it come more alive. Keep on posting! (In a separate thread?)

 

Thankyou. My actual modelling skills are quite limited, and I do love these models. Many of my pictures are in the Hornby section in the 'Large Green and Powerful Locomotive' thread, where I regularly show new material.

 

Today I am pleased to have bought a weathered Duchess 46252 'City of Leicester' in early BR lined black, with the British Railways lettering and a good dose of grime from heavy WCML work in bad weather...   great fun, and good use for my BR red-crimson Staniers.

 

So as to the thread title, many of the Hornby models are in my hands, in front of my camera, or soon will be!

 

As an aside, and discussed here and in other recent threads, it remains to be seen whether Hornby will sustain or improve on the standards reached in the last few years, and this 2004 model still looks pretty good.

 

(these pics from seller)

 

 

[coachmann]

Rob, Im not meaning to be cruel here but in all honesty the loco looks like its been plastered with a heavy dose of pIg swill. 

[robmcg]

To my eye it's not too far off some photos in Irwell books showing early 1950s running condition.

 

edit;  I don't find people to be in regular agreement about weathering, nor about greens and blues for that matter...   what I do like about the weathering done by the seller (linesideandlocos1) is the rendition of lubricant around rods and driving wheels and the effects or rain and speed on boiler etc.  It matches what I saw in the real world of 50s and 60s...

[robmcg]

Clearly I have gone off-topic in mentioning Hornby models which I have rather than the ones in the supply pipeline.

 

It's a bit like the calm before the storm, with so many models ear-marked for release in December. Oddly most of the models I want are already made, and appear from time to time on Ebay or in second-hand shops. I am not expecting a significant improvement in the standard of models this year, but look forward to 'Glastonbury Abbey' very soon.  The DoG and P2 are not hugely redolent of 1950s and 60s BR steam, and in my own selfish way I just want Hornby to continue to make models of the standard of a few years ago.

 

Has anyone got an idea as to who owns the dies for Hornby's excellent models since say 2002 and whether these can be moved easily into other factories?  I suppose this is what is meant when the interim report refers to 'strategic partnerships' with new production contractors.

[Ozexpatriate]

I suppose this is what is meant when the interim report refers to 'strategic partnerships' with new production contractors.

I'd interpret "strategic partnerships" as being more in line with guaranteed production slots, flexible volumes or expedited production.

[robmcg]

I presume therefore that Hornby owns and can use the dies from its excellent A3 A4 and other models to places other than those controlled by Kader? Sorry if I am naieve, but I would have thought such to be essential before negotiating labour and supply contracts or partnerships.

[Ozexpatriate]

Naïve? Hardly.

Who owns the tooling is a good question. My expectation is that Hornby owns their tooling (they did pay almost $2M in the 6 months up to September 30 for new tools). The tooling is both intellectual and physical property. If they didn't own it Kader could start reproducing all of the Hornby range previously made in a Kader factory.

Now whether those tools are easily portable from one factory to another is a different question and one I can't answer, though I would think there would be some dependencies on the specific injection moulding equipment used. Presumably the dies themselves go into some kind of machine-specific gasket. There are a lot of parts to the tooling.

I do recall someone quoting Mr. Kohler here that there were delays to (I think it was) Tintagel Castle caused by moving tools from one factory to another where they didn't work properly, only to have to move them back to the original factory, and then there were apparently problems with broken tools. I may have that anecdote garbled though.

[6959]

 

Naïve? Hardly.

 

Who owns the tooling is a good question. My expectation is that Hornby owns their tooling (they did pay almost $2M in the 6 months up to September 30 for new tools). The tooling is both intellectual and physical property. If they didn't own it Kader could start reproducing all of the Hornby range previously made in a Kader factory.

 

Now whether those tools are easily portable from one factory to another is a different question and one I can't answer, though I would think there would be some dependencies on the specific injection moulding equipment used. Presumably the dies themselves go into some kind of machine-specific gasket. There are a lot of parts to the tooling.

 

I do recall someone quoting Mr. Kohler here that there were delays to (I think it was) Tintagel Castle caused by moving tools from one factory to another where they didn't work properly, only to have to move them back to the original factory, and then there were apparently problems with broken tools. I may have that anecdote garbled though.

 

 

If a company supplies ready made tooling to another company for manufacturing parts, or a sub-contractor makes the tooling at originating company's expense, it is usual for the owner's name to be stamped, engraved or otherwise marked on the tooling. This is important in case the sub-contractor goes bust and the receiver puts everything saleale into an auction. When Filton built pylons to hang Rolls Royce RB211 engines on Boeing 747s, all drawings were marked 'Property of Boeing', and all tooling had stamped plates attached, 'Property of Boeing'. Some MRCA (Tornado) tooling was marked, 'Property of Nammo'. Some adaptor plates specifically to fit customer's tooling to sub-contractor's machine could fall outside of this scheme. If a sub-contractor makes supplementary tooling at its (sub-contractor's) risk and expense, that tooling would remain the property of the sub-contractor unless sold and paid for by the main contractor. There has to be a clear understanding between contract offices as to who owns what, and how customer owned tooling should be stored. If a sub-contractor stores tooling in a field or damp barn it will soon be unuseable. Over time the tooling could be forgotten and thrown out. A sub-contractor could charge the customer for storage and time taken for keeping the tooling in good order. In some industries like book printing, the tooling, i.e., reprographic media, printing plates, etc., is automaticaly effaced or thrown in a skip unless the customer stipulates that such items must be kept or returned with the finished product. Any customer owned tooling cannot be used without the express knowledge and permission of the owner. This creates an interesting situation regarding our hobby where a company is defunct for many years and someone finds some useable tooling.

[robmcg]

Clearly the ownership/whereabouts of tooling for existing and recent Hornby models is not a simple or public issue. Reliance on a single sub-contracted supplier really has hurt Hornby, but they SEEM confident they can do as good or better in the coming year. I certainly hope so.

 

In this and similar threads there is an element of goodwill towards Hornby in many posts, and sometimes, in a few posts, an absence of goodwill, but I imagine that the Hornby brand or name draws considerable value from the goodwill, so long as it has intelligent and positive governance. Again I live in hope!

[Legend]

I was brought up on Hornby and before that Triang-Hornby .It was the era of Richard Lines and while there was maybe only one or two new models a year, and these were nowhere near the detail expected today, there was a sense of excitement receiving the annual catalogue. The company had respect. When you got a new model out of the box it never occurred to you that it might not work. Now there is a sense of trepidation the first time you put it on the track.

 

The current management make much of their heritage ,ironically preferring to refer to Hornby Dublo heritage rather than Triang that was the real victor in the 60s ,forgetting that it was Dublo that failed producing high priced models and overly complex track. But unfortunately the company that is Hornby today is not the company of old . I know the reasons for moving models to China but for me the polish was rubbed off and the status of the company was diminished because of this. Really there is now little to distinguish Hornby from Bachmann, except that Bachmann are continuing to give us fine models at reasonable prices whereas Hornby have definitely lost there way and seem to be profit orientated. The dash to China was to get cheap manufacturing. It was ok for a while but backfired big time. Now it's design clever, clearly enabling lower cost manufacture (balancing increasing costs) and maintaining that margin and that too seems now to have backfired?

 

Sorry it's not. The company it was.

[robmcg]

I don't think that Hornby had any real choice but to go to China if it was to produce models of any kind for under several hundred pounds, and high costs were part of the demise of the Hornby Dublo brand, as you say.

 

There may be a place for an 00 equivalent of Golden Age Models, but Hornby are or were mostly trainsets? I actually admire them for the quality they have achieved at the prices they kept for the last 10 years. I also recall that my model R1 0-6-0T bought c1961 in the early two-rail Hornby Dublo range as my xmas present was much noisier than a friend's green version.... so variability in quality is nothing new. That's not to excuse the errors now common, though, and my feeling is that the errors are still mostly minor, and consumer legislation still protects buyers.

[Fenman]

... I know the reasons for moving models to China but for me the polish was rubbed off and the status of the company was diminished because of this.

 

... Hornby ... seem to be profit orientated.

 

The dash to China was to get cheap manufacturing...

 

I think I understand the spirit of what you write, but I disagree with much of it.

 

I'm not sure why the status of the company was diminished after the move to China since that is what brought us a flood of the highest-quality models Hornby have ever produced.

 

Hornby may currently be profit orientated, but perhaps that is because recently they keep making losses. A business which does not make a profit is unlikely to be sustainable in the longer-term.

 

The dash to China may have been to get cheap manufacturing, but it was also to get higher quality - so not all the reduction in costs was taken as added profit but, instead, some of it was ploughed back into improving the product. To suggest otherwise is to ignore Hornby's very real achievements of the last decade. Compare the China-era Schools Class locos with the Margate-era version; I would suggest they are as chalk and cheese. You can, of course, pick any other comparator you wish; I can't think of a single China-era model that is inferior to the Margate-era version.

 

None of which is to suggest that Hornby is perfect, of course; quite clearly it has made errors, some of which appear to be sloppy, and some of which seem to me to be strategic (seeming to put most of their eggs into one manufacturing basket, for example). But it does feel to me as if your post was focused almost entirely on the negatives without any mention of any of the balancing positives.

 

Paul

[Oldddudders]

The dash to China may have been to get cheap manufacturing, but it was also to get higher quality

In which aim they were aping most of the rest of the Western World's manufacturers. China now has an enormous % of world consumer item manufacture. Hornby were hardly going in the wrong direction when they first went there. Managing a Chinese supplier takes time, effort and understanding, it would seem,however. Some companies do it as a matter of course, others struggle to find consistency.

[Legend]

I think I understand the spirit of what you write, but I disagree with much of it.

 

I'm not sure why the status of the company was diminished after the move to China since that is what brought us a flood of the highest-quality models Hornby have ever produced.

 

Hornby may currently be profit orientated, but perhaps that is because recently they keep making losses. A business which does not make a profit is unlikely to be sustainable in the longer-term.

 

The dash to China may have been to get cheap manufacturing, but it was also to get higher quality - so not all the reduction in costs was taken as added profit but, instead, some of it was ploughed back into improving the product. To suggest otherwise is to ignore Hornby's very real achievements of the last decade. Compare the China-era Schools Class locos with the Margate-era version; I would suggest they are as chalk and cheese. You can, of course, pick any other comparator you wish; I can't think of a single China-era model that is inferior to the Margate-era version.

 

None of which is to suggest that Hornby is perfect, of course; quite clearly it has made errors, some of which appear to be sloppy, and some of which seem to me to be strategic (seeming to put most of their eggs into one manufacturing basket, for example). But it does feel to me as if your post was focused almost entirely on the negatives without any mention of any of the balancing positives.

 

Paul

Yes probably clumsily expressed by me,Paul. Of course there were increases in quality going to China. I have a Merchant Navy and I still think its one of Hornbys best. But what I meant to say is Hornby ceased to be something special to me and became just another company subcontracting manufacturing to China. It's just the same as Bachmann, Heljan even DJM. And Bachmann do it better! Good quality less expensive.

[Jol Wilkinson]

Perhaps this has a lot to do with branding.

 

Does Hornby's two ranges create a somewhat confusing image for their products, whereas Bachmann appear to have done a better job. Bachmann seem to have aimed their product image more towards the modeller/collector, which is where most of the members of RMWeb are, rather than the train set market.

 

People like to buy into "premium brands" (e.g. Apple, BMW, etc.) which is where Bachmann may have scored over Hornby.  I don't buy RTR but get the impression from what I see read that Bachmann produces a more acceptable product.

 

On the question of Hornby being "profit orientated", why would anyone run a business just to break even or make a loss? "Profit" seems to be a dirty word in the UK, but is the basis of the ability to make future product investment.

['CHARD]

I doubt the average Chinese worker sees it like that - a box of parts to assemble in an aggressive target time, I imagine the fiddliness of some models must make the job wretched at times.  I could imagine that having nightmares about assembling little trains from a foreign land that you have no connection with would get the employee sick of the sight of the models.  In comparison, electronics assembly for handhelds and portable devices (assembly I'm talking about, rather than soldering etc) is probably far less annoying. 

 

Having just rebuilt an iPhone 4 yesterday, I'm not sure how much of the Apple fiddly stuff the average Chinese assembly line worker actually does, and how much is automated. 

 

Taking the mother board out isn't for the faint-hearted, I know that.

[Coombe Barton]

I had a convesation with an owner of a very well known West County model shop on Friday, he had informed me he had cancelled 3/4 of his next order with Hornby as they could not guarantee supplying in time for the Christmas rush the chap was not pleased that he would be letting so many of his customers down, how bad is that? 

And of course he'll be speaking to the potential purchasers as well, and telling them why. It's not easy to build a good reputation, but it is easy to lose one.

 

Now he will want to keep those potential purchasers as customers, so he'll be trying to suggest alternatives - I know that I would be in the circumstances. The model shop's reputation won't suffer anything like the manufacturer's

[andyman7]

And of course he'll be speaking to the potential purchasers as well, and telling them why. It's not easy to build a good reputation, but it is easy to lose one.

 

Now he will want to keep those potential purchasers as customers, so he'll be trying to suggest alternatives - I know that I would be in the circumstances. The model shop's reputation won't suffer anything like the manufacturer's

Hmm, but i do wonder what alternatives are open to him to supply? Yes, there are some other new models out there but a lot of delayed ones! 

[Coombe Barton]

Hmm, but i do wonder what alternatives are open to him to supply? Yes, there are some other new models out there but a lot of delayed ones! 

Totally agree, but the retailer has to try something otherwise his Christmas is going to be looking a bit bleak as well.

[lofty1966]

Can't be anything worse for a retailer than getting your Xmas stock after the event. Shedloads of stock that you have to pay for and no b#gger to buy it as they spent their money elsewhere.

There won't be any modelshops left for Hornby to supply as they go out of business waiting for something to sell.

[andyman7]

Can't be anything worse for a retailer than getting your Xmas stock after the event. Shedloads of stock that you have to pay for and no b#gger to buy it as they spent their money elsewhere.

There won't be any modelshops left for Hornby to supply as they go out of business waiting for something to sell.

If you live in London there are virtually none left anyway...

[luke_stevens]

Can't be anything worse for a retailer than getting your Xmas stock after the event. Shedloads of stock that you have to pay for and no b#gger to buy it as they spent their money elsewhere.

There won't be any modelshops left for Hornby to supply as they go out of business waiting for something to sell.

 

One thing that is worse is getting in on 23th or 24th which means you might be able to them if they can answer the phone and make a mad dash in. I've been in two model shops when it happens and it is the most disheartening thing.

 

Luke

[The Stationmaster]

One thing that is worse is getting in on 23th or 24th which means you might be able to them if they can answer the phone and make a mad dash in. I've been in two model shops when it happens and it is the most disheartening thing.

 

Luke

In some respects it makes little difference even if it arrives that late and is still in time for Christmas because meanwhile retailers' cash flow and business plans have been knocked to heck by repeated delays in deliveries and then rationing when they do receive supplies.  And in some instances the financial effect means they miss out on supplies because their credit with Hornby has expired as well (although poor business planning might not have helped).  All of which helps to explain why some businesses have developed their secondhand stocks, and displays for selling that stock as well as anything else they con do to keep money flowing through their business.