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So what evidence do we have that a large prairie is being made ?

 

I’ve only seen two very circumstantial pieces...

 

A picture of one in the background of a well known retailer known for dropping future unannounced models in the backgrounds whilst showing something new, but that in itself could mean nothing at all. (And said loco has not been seen since).

A visit to Didcot by a scanning team, who may or may not have scanned one.

 

Unless there are any other clues I’ve not seen, then this seems to be a thread about nothing.

I often think it's amazing how the SECR C Class has commanded such high prices whilst the LBSC E4 in umber hasn't risen in price at all. Is it that green is pretty but brown just isn't?

C class is preserved, is a Bluebell Loco, is running in that current livery, is a pregrouping livery and is pretty... it checks all the boxes.

The two Bluebell P’s are the same (and are Hattons 1&2 in their list).

 

Hornby missing 263 really would be missing a trick, but if done as a limited edition for the club it would certainly be penance for their current (arguably must be loyal die hard remaining) club members.

 

 

If the real Birch Grove was in that current brown the model may have done better, as it is the collectors club edition of it in 1960’s brown has moderate interest. I suspect 473 in Green as preserved has done well.

 

Preserved locos will always do well but in the hierarchy, Bluebell, KWVR and NRM prototypes probably have the bigger following, ELR for diesels.

 

The other lbsc brown one is just a non-preserved loco without any stock to run with,an LBSC 4-4-2 may do the same, though you may get away with disguising it on Pullman’s, but I think 32424 in Black will outstrip the rest, even if the real one hasn’t run yet.

Buy a load of seed trays and set up a stall at Warley, everyone here will be there.

Ebay is fine.

If your a Railway modeller in london, with limited time at weekends, it’s pretty much your only choice.

Anything turns up not working, press the “return item” button and get the seller to give you a return stamp in full comfort that your refund is guarenteed.

If it wasn't a gloss finish, I would buy it a heartbeat. Ohh well.

Alex

Fear not...

 

Here’s one of the previous non-gloss versions.

 

https://www.thejunctionbox.net/shop/steam-engines/Hornby-r2323/

Trouble is I have quite a few already  and the postman is not that discreet when delivering such items.

Disguise as something other than a Western till you get it to safety.

Really? I'm sure that I recall seeing, years ago, most of the split chassis as spares in Mainline packaging, in R&D Models, Cambridge.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

I don’t know for mainline, but Bachmann produced a good number of chassis in blister packs for Jubilees, 4MTs and I think possibly 03’s, J72s and Pannier tanks. They were straight swap replacements for Mainline equivalents and were sold as such.

How is that off topic? It's a direct comparison between directors in Hornby and what the PM gets paid. You may feel that's not typical but it's still a point of comparison

How about a realistic comparison...

 

https://www.bdo.co.uk/getmedia/e280403a-cd23-4e6f-b518-51143b3506d7/AIM_Directors__Remuneration_Report_Final.pdf.aspx?ext=.pdf&disposition=attachment

 

Average AIM listed CEO salary for retail is £375k

 

Remember any person seeking a job (any position in any job) will always seek higher than average.

Similarly any company hiring will want the best, and if that person will settle for less,it’s a warning sign.

In Hornby's last full accounts (to March 2016) Hornby Group paid out £5.31 million in wages & salaries and the payments to directors, including pension contributions, alone came to £1,374 million and the highest paid director was on £276,000 plus £53,000 pension contributions. If people are looking to save big money starting at the top is always a good bet.

Then who would negotiate with the banks, the shareholders and the other holders of Hornbys debts ?

Taking joe blow out of the warehouse and sending him to the AIM offices in London isn’t going to do the company much for confidence ? (Remember it used to be FTSE).

 

Corbynite communism might sound good, but in reality money talks to money. If you take money away, it leaves you penniless.

People might believe that you can strip wealthy of their cash and they will smile, reality if they will strip their own wealth and take it someplace else. It’s pretty simple really, as any fisherman will tell you, if you keep taking the big fish out of the sea, eventually the catch will get smaller and smaller. (Just as the pound goes Lower and lower...you see the connection here, Britain’s running out of financial fish food ?)

 

As directors salaries go, £273k isn’t that much and I doubt this is a pleasant job, little security, battering by the markets, creditors, customers and suppliers in what is a micro-industrythat few know much about, little chance of major change, influence or growth on an industry scale. How many management changes has Hornby had in the last few years ? This is pie eating division 4 football, not Chelsea.

 

I’ve never held shares in Hornby, no way, I know too much about the hobby to make me steer clear of it. It was amazing to see those highs in 2011, but I never believed it then either. The best outlook is stable at the current low but to me that’s optimistic, borderline fantasy, it’s got a valley to cross first and I don’t see a footpath yet which means more risk of a tumble, or a Rover style sell out before a complete fall and rebirth. I doubt it’ll be the end of the name, and the tools they will survive in a new entity. Sorry but that’s what I think and I’d estimate it within 3 years the new team might grasp the nettle now and you might see it in months but big change is coming.

Do we know what the dbso will be like for those of us on DC ?

 

Will it be just another dark carriage experience ?

Ripe for a commission from a retailer then?

Would you take the risk of Hornby not doing this to your sales...

https://www.Hornby.com/uk-en/railroad-gwr-0-4-2t-4837-class-14xx.html

(It was £35 last week), the Warley 1450 is advertised the same.

 

This was £35 two years ago.

https://www.Hornby.com/uk-en/k-esr-0-6-0-sutton-aix-terrier-class-Hornby-club-exclusive.html

 

If advertised soon enough, they might even get one out before the commissioners new one... like the cl 71 and ensure there’s armfuls of them available too.

 

plenty of J94’s still being released, who knows they too might decide an MSC one looks good in 2018 too.

 

Hornby has shown they will defend their territory.

Increasingly he point of pre-ordering is NOT to guarantee prices - but rather to ensure that you obtain one in the first place!. With the SECR H class proving to be just as much of a hit with buyers as Bachmann's 592 was the simple truth is likely to be no-pre order = no loco, whatever price it eventually retails at.

 

Might work with the H, but not with most other stuff in the range... i’m not scared of holding back on not ordering a 4mt, terrier, j94 etc etc etc.. not even sure it will hold water with the Peckett, especially if another rtr industrial was to suddenly rock up next to the Barclay and Peckett.

Better planning and sales technique is needed especially from Hornby reps, who, and I was there when it happened, would not reduce an order to what the shop could afford, and instead simply sold nothing!

 

No deal is better than a bad deal...

 

I’m sure I’ve heard that line somewhere before ?

I thought I would add the 41st post, to suggest that we have 41 posts about an existing Hornby tool that Bachmann hasn’t (publically) even hinted they would make, by pointing out on the Hornby thread there are now 6 pages about a Bachmann coach that Hornby hasn’t (publically) even hinted they would make either.

 

It’s gone from wishlisting to fantasy-toolings, is the next step virtual retailing, then ghost modelling followed by holographic mazak rot !

 

This is how they did fake news in the old days, but even the fake news was a fake reaction to the fake story.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/radio/what-to-listen-to/the-war-of-the-worlds-panic-was-a-myth/

 

So let me seed this 51xx story with a bit of fakery..

 

A Chinese model manufacturer is producing a 51xx, they forgot to scale the CAD drawing to OO and accidentally created the toolings and motors for a full size 51xx.

As the CAD engineers are in a different location to the tool cutters no one noticed until the tools were made and the first test shots made.

As the EPs were too big, photos were sent to the commissioner in the UK who signed them off, and the paint samples too, noting how realistic they look.

As it was Chinese New Years, the staff were new and didn’t question it, until 250 were made.

Ships were loaded and the 61xxs arrived in Southampton.

The commissioner was informed via email that due to unexpected amounts of materials were needed the price had risen since inception and each model increased from £125 to £125k.

On the same day the £ crashed and hyper inflation makes £125k the same price as a Big Mac, so they immediately sell out.

The commissioner mistook the k for the yuan currency symbol and duly paid.

Buyers are being contacted to hire low loaders to collect their new 51xx purchases, but the limited edition certificate will be sent in the post.

However in this case, all models will be sold unboxed, but they are 750v 3rd rail DC ready.

 

It’s true, I promise, bloke at Platform 4 at Basingstoke saw a fella driving 4 of them up the lswr tonight...

Hat.. coat.. exit...to the ebay bargains thread looking for the first one to appear on the new “RealRails” username representing 1:1 gauge modelling.

Hmm

 

I doubt we’ll see manufacturing will ever return from China, indeed quite the opposite.

 

Chinese businesses love a bargain, especially floundering companies with strong names sold in fire sales.

 

What we might see, is the prices rising to a point where some manufacturers fail.then the Chinese factories buy the toolings for a song, and start out reproducing the older models at Chinese cost prices.

 

A £160 Loco could feasibly turn up by an unknown Chinese manufacturer with a new website sold for £50 including delivery they make margin, we get cheap, no middle men, no catalogs, limited marketing, use of ebay etc. No nostalgia.

 

What we won’t see is innovation, no new tools, no new models, and possibly increments errors due to knowledge gap creeping in (wrong numbers/names perhaps).. but we will get cheap.

 

It’s happening already at the smaller end.. there any number of Chinese businesses on ebay selling generic railway signals, lights, scenery, model cars, stations etc, much of it costs peanuts and is very acceptable. We just saw the Atlas HO gauge BR class 81 appear in Hong Kong..

 

Why buy 6 Preiser figures for £12 when you can buy 100 painted figures for £1.50 inc pp on ebay ?

Electronics has gone this way already, so has oodles of other generic unbranded household goods, Rover did too..

I always find it amazing that by reading a few newspapers people can always come to the conclusion that country x or y is doomed to fail, yet the problem with these prophecy’s is the end date is always being extended, usually inline with falling sales and a need to address it, or by politicians pointing elsewhere to offset our own bad news.

 

It’s easy to say the end of someone else’s world is coming, but rarely look at their own , let alone be brave enough to say the end of someones world isn’t imminent after all.

 

Just because someone’s culture doesn’t match our own doesn’t mean it’s doomed to fail, different cultures survive because they adapt to their local conditions, not to our conditions.

 

I just flew to Dublin today (actually to the railway works on business) just for the day and picked up the UK paper out bound, and the local Irish paper on the return.. same story, same hysteria two opposite angles.. both sides selling papers with stories panicking the populace about borders, brexit and the perils of no deal.. each paper blaming the other party and saying their own politicians need to react to it.

 

Bottom line.. same rubbish, different paper, same hysteria, different country, it’s almost as if the same media org wrote both stories and simply did a find/replace swap...it’s not as if the media would possibly do that.. would they, really, nah...., next thing we might even suggest media hype actually creates stories by provoking extreme reactions, and causes some of the events that occur..all in the name of selling papers.

Hmm, I thought that Hornby were honouring pre-order prices ?

That’s a bit naughty to creep up the price on pre-orders.

 

I ordered mine from the Hornby website, with the collectors club 10% discount, and usually save a year on price rises too as the order price is honoured.

 

However with the demise of the discount and the dishonouring of prices by retailers, there’s little point preordering at all now, loyalty does after all work both ways.

Is the mag known for non-Hornby products in? The picture of the schools, with 3 marks 1’s and Hornby tanks has a 2 car emu in the background that really doesn’t look like a 2bil, maybe a class 207 or an emu with half yellow panel in green.

Oxford rail’s website lists an RRP of £34.95

 

http://www.oxfordrail.com/ORalljan17.pdf

 

Due for release Q4.

It does say in the catalog that the next price list is due in October.

For that reason, I got my pre-order in, as lights or no lights, I don’t think we will see this price again.

 

If it turns out to be a dud, or if the price isn’t honoured, you can always cancel, but from what I’ve seen, it looks pretty good, and the price/quality ratio is very good.

I am particularly interested to find out what colour they used, I bought tins of Precision Paint P116 BR Coach Crimson (1949-55) and P108 BR Maroon at Scaleforum but neither seem to match what has been used for the 4TC. I would love to know if anyone has any definitive information as I managed to get a prototype model from Kernow at the Taunton RMWeb event and I would like to have ago at producing the new livery. I did speak to Chris at recent show and he didn't think it would be likely to appear from Kernow.

 

Is it not LUL red ?

Maybe look for bus paint ?

 

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3a/Stagecoach_East_London_bus_LT239_%28LTZ_1239%29%2C_Regent_Street_Bus_Cavalcade_%281%29_%28cropped%29.jpg

 

You can see the difference between maroon of the 37 and the red of 4TC, though I think WCRC use a different shade on their diesels to their coaches.

This is taken from the safety of my garden - does it count?

 

6233.jpg

 

 

Oh - wrong thread.......

 

Oops.

 

Cheers,

Mick

You have a nice garden.

Must have cost you a few bob to get a Duchess in it. :-)

I think the thing that stops a new terrier being made, is the market is so definitely diluted with older terriers.

 

This model has been done done done and twice baked, pan-fried and done again.

 

There are 110 terriers in ebay tonight, 131 sold in the last 60 days, with the average price being around £50.

(Compared to 60 J94’s including the DJ one new, 86 sold... the markets nearly half the size and that’s with 3 versions out there).

 

Their success is the collectibility of them, one could have 30+ different numbers and liveries, and paid approx £1000 for the fun of it, spread over 25 years, even if two years ago Whitechapel and Sutton were £35, the last two have tripled that price and I suspect that will be the end of them.

 

Any new terrier, will be £100+

 

If you’ve bought the last 30, are you going to dump the lot and buy 10 new ones (as the common theme of new commissions is 10 variations at once), or buy 1 or 2 of the new ones, or just say enough’s enough and stick with a nice collection of old terriers ?

 

Either way ebay will put 101 dalmations to shame with all these terriers swamping the market, collectors with gaps will fill their ranks and further risk the success of the new one.

 

If anyone other than a Hornby made it, they could find Hornby rediscovers their ability to make them for £35 again, just like the 14xx.

 

What I think would happen is many collectors will cash out, and just buy 1 or 2, it’s success wouldn’t be repeated.

 

The safer route is a new prototype, and right now industrials are in vogue..., needs to be preserved and weirder the better...

 

Haydock Founderies Bellerophon (and it’s 5 sisters) would be my obscure vote.. especially as two of them doubleheaded used to work passenger services over the L&Y :-), this ones been all over the country and had 3 liveries just in preservation.

 

But a more sensible one would be an Avonside 0-6-0t , Manning Wardle 0-6-0T, Hudswell Clarke (MSC canal tank) or an RSH 0-4-0ST, given their prevalence in preservation.

 

But could the Andrew Barclay chassis be used for an Andrew Barclay Crane Tank...3 Preserved in the UK, maybe others overseas, quite a number of prototypes.. now that would be different ?

 

http://www.srpsmuseum.org.uk/images/10012/10012_1.jpg

http://paulbartlett.zenfolio.com/img/s1/v54/p2138763583-3.jpg

I went to the USA twice in 2007 and the £ never hit such a high rate against the $ the highest was $2.10 on one day in November (the 8th)

https://www.poundsterlinglive.com/bank-of-england-spot/historical-spot-exchange-rates/gbp/GBP-to-USD-2007

At exchange I got between $1.95 and $2.00, To get $2.12 the actual rate would have been nearly $2.18.

In 2000 we had to convert a lot of $ to £, luckily it was early in the year when it was around $1.60 when July rolled around it was down to $1.40.

Oh so slap me with a wet kipper, I was out by 2c, I guess the difference between a bottom of 1.23 and 2.10 vs 2.12 makes all the difference in the world when it comes to prices ?

 

All statistics can be manipulated to prove a point but we do have a habit of thinking the grass is always greener on the other side, when in reality it isn't, it's just the same.

Quite, just like this one...

 

I think there are a few people in Greece who wouldn't share that opinion.

Greece was “world leader” some 3000 years ago, comparing one of the worlds biggest economies of the 21st century, rapidly falling down the global league tables, to Greece is somewhat demeaning to Greece.

 

They still have the euro, it’s still at its strongest against the pound than its currency ever been has since its introduction, baring occasion even worse crashes where the pound fell.

 

Maybe the next comparison to defend the UKs rapid decline on the global scale is to compare us to up and coming countries like Zimbabwe. Or instead why not look at Poland, constant growth, no recession, constant construction, high employment and increasing wages, increasing spending power, yes the government isn’t popular, but they come and go, at least there’s tends to be more stable even if they aren’t the most popular.

 

Try comparing the Uk to it’s Peers, US, Japan, Germany.... the UK standard of living, spending power, currency strength is all failing, regardless employment..just because everyone here has a job doesn’t mean it’s a well paid job...and it doesn’t stop inflation either.

 

The currency is the nations share price, if its its heading south, that’s usually because the country’s heading south too... people are taking their money out, and there’s a lot of pounds out there still waiting to be sold as less people willing to buy. Asians think we’re mad, Europeans are against us, Americans and Aussies smell bargains.

 

Bottom, line bring this back to topic.. if high inflation, high employment, low pound, raising interest rates, increased debt, falling gdp, low salaries, Quantitive easing, falling tax receipts, increased taxation, reduced benefits, airlines failing due to low seat sales, factories closing due to lack of orders, Brexit are all so good for the country, why is everyone whinging about the price of model railways, if were all so flush with cash surely we can all afford double, triple or quadruple our current orders - what’s stopping everyone..???

 

Oh.. maybe it’s because “the good times we are living in” are coming to an end.

 

Anyway we should get back to topic.

Following the fall in the pound, post the Brexit referendum last June, it has been steadily rising against the dollar over the last 9 months.

Only a couple of weeks ago, the pound was trading at 9% down on the pre- bexit vote exchange rate at $1.35.

It has since fallen back again to around $1.30

(Edit: now back up to $1.32)

Ron

10 years is such a long time ago.

I paid £180 all inc, for flights to NYC for a weekend, spending $2.12 for £1.

 

I don’t think this country will ever recover from the crash of 2007, Brexit vote was a second helping, and i’m Sure there’s a third to come. The rest of the world is doing fine, just our lonely island sulking.

A shame  - would have looked good  - http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/33639-Dapol-western/page-29&do=findComment&comment=828199

I know, wasn’t that the one that came out weathered for Kernow ?

Please don’t tell me some hit the streets pristine.. i’ll Have to get dressed and go door to door looking for one.