adb968008

A Liliput BR01.10 with working middle cylinder

 

Next how about some inside smokebox door action...

Barrier and Juncker don’t care, they don’t need to.

 

Just like our trains come from China, they can quite easily arrive at the Hornby Rivarossi, Joeuf or Electrotren locations (oh didn’t they close the Madrid office ?).

 

Whilst Boris can talk about German cars and effect on sales... Merc’s and BMWs are made in South Africa and imported to the UK directly.. so Brexit doesn’t affect the EU here either.

 

I suppose French wine might be an issue, but whilst we can source from elsewhere, Ozzie’s are already prepping up, I’m sure there’s enough drunks in the EU govt alone to soak it up.

 

Brexit doesn’t affect much other than EU prestige being hurt and the inevitable kick backs of anti-Britishness many have felt for years anyway. If that mean Brits widen their horizons beyond the costas that’s not a bad thing, we still have a few sunny islands in remote shores (i’d love to go to St Helena and Ascension) and if some money was thrown at them instead of Spain that could benefit us all.

Blimey - longer than a Class 37, that I never realised.

 

​Roy

And longer than a class 47 too.

 

The more I read of these the more intruging they are.. 2X 1000hp Engines delivering less power than a pair of Class 20’s, but designed to rival a Class 40, yet being less powerful than the 40, and the Warships too.

They just seem massively inefficient.

The Hymeks looks a much better proposition by comparison.

Very nice.

 

Will the buffer beams be lined out too, note the buffers themselves are different shades of red/maroon to the buffer-beam.

In addition to the redlining on the outer edges of the tanks/cab etc, their is redlining on the wheel rims.

Trivial but The whistle looks different to the prototype also.

 

But.. very nice, very nice.

 

Anyone notice 323 has a single row of rivets at the rear of the smokebox, where as 178 has front and rear.. exactly as prototype. :-)

I have been participating on the Internet now for over 26 years, and I have never in that time been accused of pursuing personal vendettas, plotting something sinister, or behaving like a child.

 

Thus it would seem I am no longer welcome here.

I've sent you an olive branch via pm.

It would be kind of ironic for Bachmann to do an Avonside,

 

Peckett and Avonside we’re rivals for years, so it goes without saying it’s a good match for Hornby.

I agree with just about every point you make in your post with the exception of this one.

I would change shaking to pruning.

Bernard

Yep ! :-)

Yes, but anyone noticed the 50010 and 50007 in the background. Looks like two MORE Hornby models on the horizon. 50010 has not been done by Hornby (although Lima did it with Rails/Traction), and 50007 has only been done with Red Nameplates, and Weathered for the old Collectors Club.

 

Regards,

 

C.

Noticed that ! Hope it comes with 4 buffers though :-)

 

D600 looks good, didn’t realise it was that long in length though

What gets me about all these overpriced layouts where the sellers don't seem no know a lot about railways and the value of models is that they never have anything that is actually worth anything on them. Even the recently built layouts just have worthless tat and Railroad. Couldn't they have bought a bulk lot a Bachmann Polybulks or TEA tanks from Hattons when they were cheap and include them with their job lot if they don't seem to know the worth of models.

As someone having had to recently handle a late estate sale, it is often the case the seller does not know the value, or even know how to operate the layout, nor even where an engines name is in these circumstances.

Going down the high street and asking your model shop to take a look also no longer works as there’s no high street or shop or dozens of miles. Ebay becomes the only choice.

 

(I recently even asked on the wanted site on this forum for help moving stuff that drew a blank.. if no one on a model railway forum can help.. what chance has a guy who knows nothing about it got ?)

Back to birdcages. They also ran with standards, here a BR 3MT (I have not found any pictures of birdcages with a 3MT but 4MT was common enough) and a Brighton built Fairburn 4MT. Below some pics:

Overall compared with the LSWR Maunsell rebuilds, the overall quality is about the same. Bachmann have better painted interiors (though Hornby have painted some interior parts as well I believe) but this is really redundant on tightly packed small windows, you certainly will not notice the two different seat colours running on a layout. It is hard to justify the price difference except for the fact that Hornby reuse their standard Maunsell coach chassis whereas Bachmann have tooled up the lot from scratch.

Still some very nice coaches from both makes.

image.jpg

image.jpg

Am I looking at a model railway in the kitchen ? (Looks like the kitchen sink in the top corner),

Good man !

- anyone got one in the bathroom ?

 

Everyone who collects has their own reasons.

Some collect Bulleids, some collect Hornby, some collect Southern, each to their own.

At the end of the day it’s not relevant.

 

Shareholders money is sunk into a company, who’s value is diminishing.

 

Thing is, nothing is finite. Hornbys own range is a mish mash of various manufacturers acquired over the years. This in part may be part of its problem. Every tree eventually tops itself in a storm, it’s life.

 

Yes Hornby has shareholders, but right now it’s largest shareholder is the one that has taken action, it’s not Hornby, it’s direct shareholder intervention into the companies management.

 

In other words in this particular storm it’s not the tree shedding branches, but the guy who owns the tree is the one about to do the shaking.

 

They don’t do that just to scare modellers, collectors, RmWebber’s, preserve Hornbys history or just make the range look nice, there is a plan.. it’ll be related to return of investment for shareholders, by however and whatever means that needs to take.... and unless it’s our money invested then there’s nothing we can do... we’d be a minority anyway, so ordinary shareholders have a choice, join the ride or sell, but the offer to buy just expired.

 

As an aside back in the mid90’s I spent time on one particular model railway company’s factory floor, It was making feeding bowls for pets at the time, that were supplied wholesale to supermarkets... that company made money using its model railway tools for non model railway purposes... business is business... If Hornby decided to drop railways altogether and make bird trays.. then if it makes money good luck to them, as a return for shareholders is what the business is about...

 

FYI I doubt collectors of that company bought feeding bowls to make their ranges complete either !!!

I was going to respond to an earlier post but It’s pretty much been definitely answered.

 

I think there is a few clear facts here...

Hornby isn’t a railway modellers charity, it’s a business, it serves multiple markets, and modellers here tend to forget about the High st and overseas brands.

 

1. Hornby is the only high street name most people in the UK could give for a train, and with that implies track, scenery etc etc.

2. Detailed modellers don’t care who’s name is on the box, as long as the model is the most accurate it can possibly be... if Oxfords box was used for a Hornby West Country, I doubt collectors would care... certainly when Mainline Class 56’s came in Dapol boxes no one batted an eye lid, neither did they later when they came in Hornby's, and who knows if they would care if that original tooling ends up in Railroad.

3. Hornby, like it or not, is shrinking, losing money and sucking up additional shareholder funds now for multiple years, regardless which division is making money.. the company is heading downwards.

4. Shareholders don’t care who’s name is on the box, or what product goes in the box, who made the product, or where and how it’s sold.. so long as it costs less to make, than it does to sell, and that what is made is sold, and brings a return on the shareholders investment. (Ethical, legal, moral duties obviously).

 

It’s fair to say the last 5 years our Hornby super detailed models have been subsidised by the shareholders, there hasn’t been stacks of new investment in other ranges, so this must be where the cash went to. Hornby can dance around Sanda Kan, then Bachmans line, the new ERP system, the website, Spain’s operations, Margate’s shutdown.. every year there’s a new excuse, the Olympics was 5 years ago. But we modellers, and retailers have become attuned to a plethora of new expensive toolings being made each year, but 18mths later finding them in the bargain bin...each pound reduced comes from shareholder cash injections.

 

If I were a Hornby shareholder, i’d Be concerned at all Hornby IP, business plans, R&D being exposed to a competitor, but it appears it is Hornby majority shareholder that’s done this... which means they either have an interest in both companies, or see benefits in bringing these two companies together.

That doesn’t necessarily mean one eats the other.

 

 

It could mean a short relationship where they trade skills, resources, management and yes assets.. then at a point down the road, divide their interests once again.

 

It might be that Hornby may buy into Oxfords production line, and gain longer term production stability, but it hasn’t got stacks of cash to do so, without more borrowing, which right now is probably not what Hornby needs.. but it could do some bartering... and if it’s refocussing it’s business they certainly do have a lot of capex tools that are of value to trade, and off load some debt to a more profitable partner at the same time. That could give Hornby some much needed stability, a new focus and possibly a reduced range of products, brands and hopefully.. debts.

 

As I said before.. if there’s nothing in it for Oxford and it’s management... why would they step in to help a competitor ?

Same thing for the majority shareholder.. why would they risk their investment further ?

 

If Hornby simply buys Oxford, i’d be concerned... didn’t some guys mortgage a castle to buy Rover and manage its debts at one point ?

 

I think (hope) it will be a negotiated trade between these businesses, but at the same time I think there will be a refocus at the company and some other brands may be offloaded or run down aside of these two companies.

 

Whatever the plan is, i’m Sure we’ll find out, it will be a solution that benefits the shareholders.. at the end of the day it’s their money.

I’m surprised no ones commented about the interior detail...

It looks, unlike most coaches, like a real interior...all that’s missing is a bunch of passengers crawling over luggage, and scruffy tables of food bags

I never made reference to anything illegal or fake, but my interpretation of Crosland’s post may have been trying to suggest, claim or insinuate a slur about me, to which I am asking him to confirm if that’s what he was intending to do... as such a claim would need evidence in which to defend it.

 

His silence is deafening, but unsurprising.

 

I don’t really care but as the goal was open I thought i’d Challenge it any way :-)

time to move on.

 

Note smily.

Can anyone tell me whether this new Black 5 has (a) an adjustable drawbar and (b) customised provision for a speaker?

It’s not out yet.

But the two previous releases R3323 / R3299 had a fixed draw bar, plug to the tender and fittings in the tender to add a speaker and DCC chip to the DCC socket.

 

Here’s my R3299 awaiting a place in the queue for renumbering (i’m Thinking 45025), Although it has several holes, you’d need to physically cut the drawbar as it would be pushing under the wiring cable, probably easier to make your own.

Oxford Rail are known (by their track record) for producing cheap, inaccurate railway models.

 

Why would you want to move the highly detailed, accurate Hornby models to a company with that reputation?

 

Why would you want to move the product line that is helping to save the company to a competitor? (*)

 

Why would you want to saddle Hornby with a struggling division(**), which after getting rid of the profitable parts, would likely further deteriorate the Hornby financial situation?

 

 

Reputation is perception, taking off the rose tinted hobby glasses, and put on a raw business head..

Oxford makes money, Hornby loses money.

Oxford has clear strategy, Hornby’s is at best ambiguous, at worse Extremely diverse.

Oxfords expertise is being given the opportunity to influence a much larger company that’s struggling.

 

I kind of feel Hornby is fighting too many wars on to many fronts at the same time.

 

If separating a multilayered company into several divisions of excellence and failure..

 

merging the successful super detail toolings to a successful company with its own production facilities is putting strong with the strong, and serves a known specialist market, and steers away from the high street market that is less interest in detail, price sensitive, misunderstood but is the only brand name they know.

 

Same again for Corgi, which Oxford has been competing aggressively and successfully, makes sense to combine.

 

Putting Hornby’s name, with a cheaper range to a high street market that is highly competitive and price sensitive, but is the strongest name for the range in the high street.. your again putting strong with the strong... here i’d See Hornby, Scalectrix, Humbrol, Airfix etc.

 

Then weaker brands can either be paired down or sold off... (there’s nothing compelling the high street brand not to include overseas HO toolings in that high street range too if they were cheap enough.. think like atlas editions, indeed it may even be a selling point, remember HO/OO means nothing to John Doe).

 

If their was a higher investor, with interests held in both companies, moving assets around centres of excellence is a good way to restructure and benefit from both companies strengths and reducing risk, and ultimately the bottom line for the investor.

 

Put it another way, if simply put, Hornby eats Oxford, how does 2 deans goods, radials, mk3’s even motorrails add value, profitability, sales and efficiency to Hornby? Oxford is doing nicely, so it doesn’t need to sell up or give their IP away cheaply. The Oxford name, nor is its customer list isn’t of value to Hornby, so all that remains is a factory and a competing range of model vehicles... and whilst that’s very useful, it doesn’t solve the business and financial problems, indeed it adds more debt to the pile.

 

The alternative, is the management moves house from Oxford to a bigger home needing renovation at Hornby, but renovations aren’t cheap and Oxfords profits won’t cover it, which means pairing Oxford down or selling it off...which just doesn’t make sense... so there must be bigger money than Oxfords here, what’s been bought here for Hornby is skill and expertise, and maybe a factory but what is that price ? -50/50 split ?

 

 

Finally food for thought, If Hornby did acquire a factory, and it ramped up.. that would release a lot of spare manufacturing capacity in China with the others used today.. which could bring even more competition, or lowered manufacturing pricing which reduces the benefits you just gained.

I’m surprised everyone thinks Oxford rail will dissapear in this relationship.

 

Its Oxfords CEO Coming to Hornby, not vice versa.

 

Oxfords tip toe into OO, has to me been a slow drawn out process, but gazing from a higher view, setting up an enterprise and showing its successful intervention into a new market is a good way to impress an outside investor, who thinks you’ve got potential...regardless what you think of the product, they have demonstrated it, even if the Mk3’s seem to me to have been stalling for time..this now makes sense.

 

I only saw reference to Technical expertise and Marketing/sales consultant roles coming to Hornby, I didn’t see business strategists or finance coming to a company that has both a good market, good products but a poor financial record and business strategy.

 

If I wanted to take some assets from a company to my own, the two hires I need are the guys who knows what sells, and the guy who knows what exists.

If I wanted to turn the company around, I need financial advisors and strategists to sweat what assets I have in the most financially efficient way...but that’s not what I saw.

 

I could perhaps suggest, maybe those experts could identify the successful and detailed toolings and move them to Oxford as a brand for collectors, together with Corgi perhaps, let Oxford focus on these (mostly non-Railroad toolings since 2000)

 

Then Hornby & Scalectrix, with its well known high street brands could focus on the Railroad market, (older Hornby, Lima, airfix ranges) plus track and accessory ranges for which it’s been known for generations... a much smaller but focussed company using its brand name where it’s known most, the high street, mass market, with a much lower cost base, asset range and able to get a reliable source of production.

 

I would suspect Other manufacturers could be concerned by this announcement, similarly if restructured correctly, both companies could become takeover targets, by other overseas Railway modelling interests.

 

Minnows generally don’t eat Whales, unless the minnow has an even bigger whale to protect it.

 

I think Oxford may be the bigger winner here, if not why would they be interested ? And it’s not as if they need to sell out, and helping a competitor isn’t normal.

I’d don’t think this is H swallowing Oxford up. it looks more like a reverse take over.

David

That or maybe Oxford might considerably boost its super detailed range of newer Hornby assets (the recent toolings), take corgi, then cut Hornby's brand name from the collectors market and focus it loose back to its traditional roots of Toy trains and racing cars for the retail market perhaps ?

 

7 weeks to Warley, be interesting to see what the 2019 range looks like, might be too soon for visible changes, but a any new delay, or no news, on any announcements would be a sign in itself.

 

The two appointments are business development and product specialist, didn't see anything about financial advisors and strategy.

Maybe Hornby might have found itself a new factory.

 

I wonder which dean goods and radial will end up in railroad ?

 

I knew this was going to be interesting, but now it’s really interesting.

 

paint, scalectrix and the Oxford rail brand all suddenly look odd ones out if merged.

I reckon corgi may move.

There were over 800 black 5's but you will struggle to find more than about 5 or 6 models with different running numbers other than those which have been re-numbers since they left the factory.

 

Off memory, with gaps...

 

44666

44668

44694

44781

44871

44875

44908

44932

45010

45156

45157

45190

45293

45455

45458

45377

 

5000

5036

5055

5156

 

To be released :

 

45116

45274

 

That’s before the weathered ones, plus railroad and older ones., so that’s 22 to start with..admittedly that’s only 3% of the fleet and you can’t have enough black 5’s.

 

Though it would be nice to see some preserved ones, and more 1968 ones, even a cheeky preserved one, on the new tooling. 44806/932 looked nice in Green :-)

Happy to buy fake items or illegal copies then?

Was that a statement your trying to make ?

Imagine spending all day, every day, with a bottle of Loctite, gluing etched grilles onto locos! Or sitting with a pair of snips, cutting the same feeds off the same plastic components, thousands of times over. It's no wonder that they want reasonable rates of pay. (CJL)

It doesn't always work like that though.

I might be comfortable today, but my mis-spent youth included working on two Uk model railway production lines, before the days of China, but also other monotonous jobs including loading car tyres in trucks, flipping burgers, mixing ceramic dust, frozen food factories, repairing bowling balls, fire eating juggling and even a Butlins bar man, many of these jobs have left this shore.

 

All are mundane and boring,(juggling and fire eating across America excepted), but as a hard up student pay important money that's lacking and give valuable life experience.

 

Did they pay what they are worth ?... well you have a choice..take it or leave it, knowing leave it means others will replace you and no one will miss you. Take it means the only way to earn more is increasing hours worked.

 

Working a hitec China production line, making tech products for well known Global electronics companies, under video surveillance, strip searches, managed accommodation, tight contracts and scrutinised working hours, or having freedom to open windows, walk around at will, chose your own accommodation and have daily variation on a model railway production line.. the environment is much better,

 

However, Business only works if they find a source willing to to make something for less than they can find someone to sell it to.

 

We can wax lyrical about the price we pay for models, but even if you volunteered an extra £20, the person building it won't get it.., but model railway factory conditions are a long way from the worst over there, you should consider offering more for your phone, dvds, camera, kettles, microwaves, clothes, car spares than your model train.

 

The LRC factory looks like luxury, compared to some places in the region and I'll guess the pay isn't that bad either, even if push fitting bits of plastic or removing flash isn't the most exciting job on earth, it's probably better than working a production line making pastry dumplings by hand !

The main eye watering increases are the J94 is now £120! The other I noticed was the Q1 is up to £150 from £110!

If that's right, I suspect they managed to grab defeat from the jaws of victory there.

 

They did that a year or so back with the K1.. roll on 2017, they are still £89 in some outlets, even if 62006 is now offered in a box with bizarre wagons at double the price, I wonder if that set has a price increase? , though I guess the value add it now brings is a "sell by date". But I can't help thinking Hornby maybe just gave us its own "Expiration date".

 

We could find a slightly unfair situation, where years old stock ends up stagnant in a Hornby warehouse, gets dispatched to retailers with a 24 month sell by date.

 

I suspect as modellers many of us are too price savvy for these increases, and retailers aren't your usual corner shop types they will respond intelligently to the t&c changes, knowing what's inevitably going to happen when cash flow gets tight n Margate ? Perhaps it's aimed at the retail/concession customers who maybe are less so and hoping they suck this up or maybe there's another strategy we don't yet know ?

If people think Hornby has been a soap opera it has been nothing compared to the downs of Roco over the last 20 years. I don't think they ever really recovered from their first bankruptcy, at one time they were the gold standard of HO (well, this side of high end brass) but after the first bankruptcy they lost a lot of ground as other producers improved. That said, Marklin has hardly had the best of times in the same period, nor Fleischman (now a sister company of Roco) and we all know what happened to Lima/Rivarossi.

Dare I suggest it's been at the risk of duplicating each other's models, putting new lipstick on old pigs, and repition of ranges year on year , the very thing that is becoming common in the UK.

 

To quote Piko's main man..(3 years ago)...

 

Why have there been so many economical problems among others in your business sector—Arnold, Fleischmann, LGB, Märklin, Roco?

 

Many of the old managers and owners lacked in long-term strategies and they rested on their laurels of the history. The firms had just earned magnificently for decades. They simply did not notice the changes in the market.

 

https://www.ttnut.com/interview-with-boss-of-piko-t2339.html

 

But also another warning, that several people have referred to for many manufacturers..

How much time do you personally have to spend on-site?

 

I'm there every second month by turns with my technical director. If you don't do that, you can forget it. Then you'll need a German manager there, that's also expensive. If you don't handle it the way we do, you'll be bankrupt in two, three years.

 

 

Why?

 

I like Chineses, but they do what they want and fetch whatever possible. They want to earn money, they don't care about the firm. The education is by far not as good as always suggested. That sounds fairly blanket, it is. Of course, there are also very well educated Chineses who get involved with the firm, but that's not the bulk.

 

Of course one way to mitigate is to change t&cs relating to Quality control by imposing limitations at the retailer instead.

Grafting a model train should be a criminal offence.

 

That looks absolutely awful.

 

What a fantastic job, if only the kid that did it in real life knew :-)

 

Excellent, indeed its brilliant.