Athearn - MDC Roundhouse Now Dead?

An assertion that is not supported by the increasing number of DCC products on the market, or the increasing number of DCC users.

My suspicion is that you are simply a tightwad, and you assume all others are as well. :-)

What? You BOUGHT a model aircraft?

Ummm, yeah. Being as I've spent some $800 on model RR supplies in the last two months, that shouldn't be too much of a surprise. Mostly scenic materials, and ummm, no, I've been down the food color and sawdust, paper mache and plaster route already, you aren't going to find me twisting tree armatures out of tag wire either. Using a rotary wire brush and foam beats the hell out of plywood forms, paper stuffed under it, then more layers of paper, then plaster and hope like hell you never have to move it. Besides, learning to work with the new stuff is fun, too.

Greybeard

I have yet to see any loco, diesel or otherwise that I couldn't put a couple of hours work in and have it run better. Then again, I don't know many people that would have the machines and instruments that I have to revert to their ways of being a "professional a**hole." as I can.

It's been a while since I contributed here. Busy, busy!

I can confirm that Horizon does NOT have a strict storefront requirement. They did, initially. Some months into the Athearn purchase, they changed the requirement. Non storefront dealers must meet a number of requirements, key ones being a website with its own domain name AND being located in commercial space.

One such dealer is Tom's Trains of Connecticut. Tom started as internet only, eventually opened a storefront, and later closed it. He was, and is, a Horizon dealer, with their blessing. (IIRC, he actually came here and stated that, although I can't come up with the right combination of search terms to find it.)

Non-storefront dealers such as Big Al, who operate out of their homes, are not allowed by Horizon.

I should comment that this isn't meant to put either of the above businesses in a bad light. Both are run by fine gentlemen, and are fairly well known and respected here on this group.

I'd also like to add that, contrary to popular opinion, Walthers does not have a strict storefront requirement, either! They do allow internet-only dealers, with similar restrictions to Horizon. (EXCEPT that they do not require dealers to be in commercial space.)

As for "the demise hasn't happened yet", while the takeover was about a year ago, Athearn and MDC have only been out out of the Walthers catalog for about 4 months. Not that I believe that they will go out of business because of it, but I don't think they'll feel the full impact until the 2006 catalog comes out. I still believe that, eventually, Horizon will be trying to get back into Walthers. They can't advertise everything every month, and the Walthers catalog is still wildly popular as a source of what's available, even with the internet available.

Another often-ignored point is that, prior to Athearn and MDC, Horizon was a minor player in the model railroad market. They may be a powerhouse in other hobbies, but before last year, there was no real reason for a trains-only store to buy from them. Virtually every line they carried could be had from several other distributors. If you had 8 other sources for Atlas, and didn't need RC planes or plastic model kits, why would you need another account? (Remember, these remarks apply to shops selling TRAINS ONLY, not general hobby shops. I understand why a general hobby shop would want Horizon as a major supplier.) For all practical purposes, Horizon was buying their way into model railroading by gaining control of a major manufacturer. And in light of that, it's clear why they pulled out of other distributors. It's not strictly about keeping all of the cash from an Athearn sale. It's also about "forcing" (for want of a better word) a certain segment of dealers to buy from them, when they previously didn't need to.

I don't think any of the dire predictions will come true, but the last chapter isn't written yet. And that chapeter is going to dribble out over the long term.

Peter King in NY

OH, NO!!

Actual acts thrown into a mrr discussion.

How could you?!?!?

Mike Tennent

"IronPenguin"

Err, make that "facts"

IronPenguin Electronics

Aw, shoot. I was looking forward to seeing some juggling, or tap dancing. ;-)

Hiya, Mike!

Peter King in NY

Lubliner and Cathcart are friends from way back.

-- Why isn't there an Ozone Hole at the NORTH Pole?

Why? I addressed that particular remark to Greybeard, not all retired seniors living on a fixed income who are model railroaders.

If you think DCC is too expensive, that's your prerogative. It's still a subjective opinion, not an inherent failing of DCC.

Well, I'm one of those who think it's too expensive, and I've never been called a tightwad. I am, however, a retired senior living on a fixed income. There are a lot of us in model railroading. If it weren't for the smiley, I'd say you owed us an apology.

Tap dancing... That's all we do around here, some days...

CL

Exactly what do you find wrong with the aircraft on the market. If you want to harp on big corporations making "lead aircraft" I'd say you haven't done your homework. There are hundreds of models produced under Horizon, Great Planes, and others as proprietary aircraft. The Top Flite kits are exclusive to Great PLanes. Hangar 9 to Horizon. Apparently you haven't seen many of these planes fly. Check out a Top Flite fighter or Hangar 9. Think the new Funtana models are made of lead? Well let me tell you that "lead planes" do not hover, roll, and loop as these agile planes do. So please tell me what you have been looking at that are made of lead.

Dave

As is the assertion that DCC is somehow "superior". It all boils down to a matter of need, first, then finances, then if someone just wants a new toy to play with.

But to answer your question, I'm such a tightwad that I dumped $700 for a lathe, just to find out if it's as bad as the people on the metalworking group said it is.

(It isn't.)

Greybeard (Who is now drooling over Bachmanns Climax. Maybe next month.)

Zeppelins perhaps?

Starting place, RCM trainer 40. I have one that was made by Bridi, and even in that incarnation, it's a piss poor trainer, and heavy flying. Since great planes, it's even heavier. A plane that will hover suffers from too much engine, no plane should need even a 1:1 thrust/weight ratio to fly at all. (And don't point to the square loop, I've done them with a Balsa USA Smoothie and a K&B .40, 10-6 wood prop and FAI fuel.) Hobby Lobby, Circus Hobbies, Tower Hobbies, almost all of their "house brand" kits are disgustingly heavy. I don't fly on the engine, I flew on the wing.

Agile depends on what you call it, with my CG sometimes at 50%MAC, I call it agile. Everyone else says "twitchy."

The other names you give, the only one I know is Top Flite, but since I stopped flying ukie, I didn't need any more Combat Cats. When the norm at the field became someone with too little experience, too little common sense and too much engine, I stopped going there. Spending the day looking over my shoulder somehow takes all the fun out of it.

However, some of the people that I've taken advice from are probably considered unknowns, like Joe and Eddie Konefes, Jim Noonan, Wally Simmers, I've even been known to speak to Carl Goldberg. All who had the same advice, a heavy airplane is a poorly designed one. Building to crash is inferior to building to fly. I'll take a Flyline kit long before any of the last crop I looked at.

Greybeard (Who still flys HLG in the football field across the street, and loves it.)

In article snipped-for-privacy@individual.net, Larry Blanchard at snipped-for-privacy@fastmail.fm wrote on 1/26/05 17:40:

Larry...a "fixed" income? When was it broken? :-)

Dieter Zakas

Which, as you'll no doubt be aware, is not an assertion I've made.

Well, the shrub keeps telling me that Social Security is broken :-).