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Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Tue Oct 08, 2019 7:46 pm
by Kestrel
I had an e-mail from Hatton's today advertising their forthcoming Project Genesis which involves 4 and 6 wheel coaches from the pre nationalisation era.

https://www.hattons.co.uk/newsdetail.as ... n0%3D#lner

There will be six body styles with various liveries but am I correct in saying this is harking back to the old Hornby clerestory coaches which were of a generic design and available in various liveries?

Surely one particular design wasn't used across the country by the various companies.

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Tue Oct 08, 2019 8:04 pm
by Atlantic 3279
Nothing I or several others can see so far to indicate that these are any other than generic designs and the computer image renditions suggest something not remotely similar to panel style of GNR 4 or 6 wheelers for a start.

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Tue Oct 08, 2019 11:17 pm
by john coffin
First glance suggests they are trying to go for the Thomas market of those who want to become more
"railway modellers".
However, nothing convinces me so far that they are making Doncaster rooves for the teak stock,
plus of course the lengths are a little passe.
Still for 30 quid I can see many seeing them as a good starting point, although they may never
be accurate for most railways as one would like. What they may do is get modellers to think
earlier for their layouts, since they can be smaller and fit within modern households more
effectively.

Now what are they going to do about the relevant locos??

Paul

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Wed Oct 09, 2019 1:16 am
by Woodcock29
Agree with others they don't capture GN characteristics.

I've recently taken delivery of two of Bill Bedford's new resin GN 6 wheelers - they certainly look the part. Be interesting to see how they look when finished.

Andrew

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Wed Oct 09, 2019 8:25 am
by mick b
What they can or could be, are a base for etched sides for the more "selective/expert" modeller.

A lot of people will simply run them as they are , Hornby are still selling items far worse in detail and correctness, no idea why?, but people are still happy to buy them.

Hattons have identfied are large hole in the market, and have jumped on it , good luck to them. With the lack of suitable kits , which gets worse almost weekly, what alternatives are there now to buy anyway? , sadly very few.

I doubt if over a year from now, they will be anything like £30 a time however.

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Wed Oct 09, 2019 9:12 am
by 65447
Hattons are just puffing up the state of the modelling market in the 1920s-50s, where a generic model was given a livery and labelled something it clearly was not. Retro may be fashionable but this is just profiteering and tantamount to misrepresentation.

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Wed Oct 09, 2019 9:36 am
by Hatfield Shed
There's a market. Hattons as a large retailer will have a good idea of the scale of it. We don't castigate Dapol and Hornby for their continued production of a wooden construction 12T RCHish mineral wagon on a 10' wb to carry any and every private owner livery, including complete fictions. These coaches are aimed at the same market sector that buys those.

For most posting on this site 'Nothing to see here, move along now'.

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Wed Oct 09, 2019 11:49 am
by D2100
Hatfield Shed wrote: Wed Oct 09, 2019 9:36 am There's a market. Hattons as a large retailer will have a good idea of the scale of it. We don't castigate Dapol and Hornby for their continued production of a wooden construction 12T RCHish mineral wagon on a 10' wb to carry any and every private owner livery, including complete fictions. These coaches are aimed at the same market sector that buys those.
And if sales to that sector bring in income, some of which goes to producing models I do want to buy, I'm happy enough. It's maybe an unpalatable fact to some, but businesses need cash cows

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Wed Oct 09, 2019 7:06 pm
by mick b
Pennine MC wrote: Wed Oct 09, 2019 11:49 am
Hatfield Shed wrote: Wed Oct 09, 2019 9:36 am There's a market. Hattons as a large retailer will have a good idea of the scale of it. We don't castigate Dapol and Hornby for their continued production of a wooden construction 12T RCHish mineral wagon on a 10' wb to carry any and every private owner livery, including complete fictions. These coaches are aimed at the same market sector that buys those.
And if sales to that sector bring in income, some of which goes to producing models I do want to buy, I'm happy enough. It's maybe an unpalatable fact to some, but businesses need cash cows

Well said, as usual if you dont want to buy them , then dont.

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Wed Oct 09, 2019 7:10 pm
by RayS
Interesting project anyway - out of the usual - not my period but I could see a use as grounded bodies for primitive passenger/parcels storage as done on the GE.

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Wed Oct 09, 2019 7:36 pm
by JASd17
RayS wrote: Wed Oct 09, 2019 7:10 pm Interesting project anyway - out of the usual - not my period but I could see a use as grounded bodies for primitive passenger/parcels storage as done on the GE.
If I was creating a railway I would want the static objects to be Just as accurate as the moving ones.

The suggested use as departmentals suffers from the same problem. That is an interesting area of research on its own.

Further to an earlier comment, if Hattons wanted to create a 'cash-cow', perhaps model railways isn't quite the business?

John

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Thu Oct 10, 2019 10:20 am
by kimballthurlow
I have pre-ordered a few of the GNR coaches from Hattons.
Good on them.

The lack of 6 wheelers on the RTR market has been a problem.
Many modellers understand that compromises in RTR fidelity may be for economic reasons.
As eruditely stated by Pennine MC and mick b the model railway/toy train market is a big pond with myriad life.
Manufacturers, distributors and retailers will swim in it while earning a living.

I take my hat off to modellers appearing regularly in this parish with excellent representations of Howlden coaches, kit-supplied Valours and bashed pre-LNER adaptations.
And I console myself with the thought that my attempts at modelling are not for display at a museum.

Kimball

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Thu Oct 10, 2019 10:49 am
by Atlantic 3279
But they are emphatically not GNR pattern coaches, are they? I don't know if you could pass them off as former MS&L, LDEC or GER stock and that is something I don't really need to know.

Whatever Hatton's may or may not need to do for money, some may consider it greatly regrettable if the availability of some generic 6 wheelers diminishes the potential market for some proper GNR type RTR ones, thus persuading a prospective manufacturer to regard production as unviable. Whether any such accurate RTR model may ever have been in prospect is of course open to doubt.....

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Thu Oct 10, 2019 12:33 pm
by D2100
JASd17 wrote: Wed Oct 09, 2019 7:36 pm
Further to an earlier comment, if Hattons wanted to create a 'cash-cow', perhaps model railways isn't quite the business?
Well, that's the business they're in - and have been since 1948 iirc, so maybe they do actually know a thing or two about it

But whatever, cash cow: "a consistently profitable business, property, or product whose profits are used to finance a company's investments in other areas". Other definitions may be available, but that's one that suits the context of my comment.
Atlantic 3279 wrote: Thu Oct 10, 2019 10:49 am Whatever Hatton's may or may not need to do for money, some may consider it greatly regrettable if the availability of some generic 6 wheelers diminishes the potential market for some proper GNR type RTR ones, thus persuading a prospective manufacturer to regard production as unviable. Whether any such accurate RTR model may ever have been in prospect is of course open to doubt.....
I think the one caveat I'd apply is that it's a shame that they are truly generic; I'd have thought they could have based them more closely on something that did exist. They'd then be right (or right enough) for some prototypes, and the others would arguably be no more wrong than a generic vehicle. In much the same way as the PO 12/13T example quoted upthread

Re: Hatton's PROJECT GENESIS

Posted: Thu Oct 10, 2019 9:02 pm
by Atlantic 3279
The briefest of glances at diagrams and photos now reminds me of course that even if it's okay above the waist, round-cornered recessed panels in the lower sides won't do for MS&L six wheelers either, applied beading producing square-cornered panels being the norm down there, as on GNR coaches. Unfortunate, given that a five compartment third and a centre-lavatory composite would both be suitable, although I'm not sure if there's a good case for a van-third with so much van. Dow, vol 2, shows a van composite with only a short van section, and a very short 3 compartment van-third again with short van section, almost like Hattons proposed 4 wheeler but on a 6 wheeled frame.

I had only looked because I'd wondered if I could use the vehicles to sufficiently represent MS&L six wheelers that were photographed still making up full trains in North Lincolnshire after 1923. Not close enough to the right sort I feel.....