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Obtaining Atlas Track Locked

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Posted by richhotrain on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 5:18 PM

Drew4950

Re-coop Research and Developement costs? Come on...Surely they have re-cooped those costs long ago.

LOL

I thought the same thing when I read that R&D argument.

Rich

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Posted by BRAKIE on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 3:11 PM

Carl,That's great!Thumbs Up

e-Bay can be a blessing at times.

Keep looking and that righthand switch will come up at your BIN price.

Larry

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Posted by AVRNUT on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 1:32 PM

Well, speak of the Devil! I'm halfway home. Someone just listed a new Atlas Code 83 #4 Left Turnout on Ebay with a BIN for $15. Grabbed it! Now just need a Right. There's one up there, but it's on open bids & already over $18. + shipping with 3 days to go.

Carl

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Posted by BRAKIE on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 1:30 PM

alco_fan

It is odd how many of you forget that ME has gone out of stock at times for months, too.

 
True that.
 
But,here's the fly in the buttermilk..
 
When I built my temporary 3 track switching yard layout Atlas track  was out of stock.This force me to go with Peco switches and M.E flex track-both  competitors of Atlas track.
 
Since then ordered enough Peco switches and ME flex track to build Slate Creek come cold weather.
 
Again,I found ME flex track was superior to Atlas flex.I can't say enough about Peco switches..As Tony the Tiger would say: They're grrrrrrreat!
 
 

Larry

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Posted by Burlington Northern #24 on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 1:09 PM

I'd rather pay out the nose for atlas stuff than ME stuff, I've got one ME switch and I have to say I'm very disappointed. loco's die as soon as they touch that frog, why? because extra wiring is needed, where as atlas stuff is easy to set up and not very complicated to use. on top of that I've found places with the atlas track I need for cheaper than the ME #6 turnouts, I could buy two atlas turnouts for the price of one ME turnout.  

SP&S modeler, 1960's give or take a decade or two for some equipment.

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Gary DuPrey

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Posted by Soo Line fan on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 11:48 AM

I think Atlas is one of the best MR companies on the planet. Never used any other track.

I have always found track on ebay during the shortage so for me this was a non issue.

Jim

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Posted by alco_fan on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 11:40 AM

It is odd how many of you forget that ME has gone out of stock at times for months, too.

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Posted by AVRNUT on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 11:40 AM

IRONROOSTER

They have improved and expanded their track over the years.  When I started many years ago their code 100 turnouts were brass.  They had brass flex track on fiber board ties.  NS was just starting to come out.  Now they have Mark IV turnouts, a code 83 line, Tru Track line, more items in code 100, etc.  R&D is ongoing and if you don't do it, you'll be sitting with a warehouse full of brass track that no one wants.

Paul

True, R&D is ongoing to a degree, but we're not talking areo-space nano-tech here. It's model train track. How much R&D is required to switch from brass rails on a fiberboard strip to nickel-silver rails on an injection molded plastic strip?

I think at this point Atlas should be asking themselves which is worse: Sitting on a warehouse full of track that no one wants Or sitting with an empty warehouse that SHOULD be full of track that everyone wants but we're not giving them? Either way, bottom line is the same. You aren't selling any track. It hurts them, it hurts their customers & it hurts the hobby. You maintain your business by creating satisfied customers, who keep returning for more product. When you can't do that because the product is not available & your customers have to go elsewhere, it's time to consider serious re-thinking of your production.

Carl

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Posted by AVRNUT on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 11:23 AM

I'm running up against the shortage of turnouts now myself. I'm starting work on a section of layout that's in a confined space, both in width & in length. It's a double track section confined to an area bordered on one side by a river bank and on the other by the back end of a row of downtown businesses. Within that has to be the double track with a connecting turnout at each end, a freight station, 2-3 small freight warehouses, a parallel to the track road access along the back of the stores, about 3 feet of length for the double track portion of the line before re-joining to a single line of track just before crossing a road that then immediately goes onto a bridge over the river! All of this in a space about 3 feet long and about a foot wide. Only way I can do it is with the much shorter #4 turnouts at each end of the double track. Cannot for the life of me turn up any Atlas Code 83 #4 turnouts anywhere! I have several #8's, but they take up way too much room (length) for this particular scene. I will either have to use Atlas Code 83 Wye's (which for some reason DO seem to be available) or bite the price bullet & go to ME turnouts.

Carl

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Posted by IRONROOSTER on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 11:10 AM

They have improved and expanded their track over the years.  When I started many years ago their code 100 turnouts were brass.  They had brass flex track on fiber board ties.  NS was just starting to come out.  Now they have Mark IV turnouts, a code 83 line, Tru Track line, more items in code 100, etc.  R&D is ongoing and if you don't do it, you'll be sitting with a warehouse full of brass track that no one wants.

Paul

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Posted by claymore1977 on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 10:48 AM

Carl & Drew:  Sorry to be confusing, but I was not referring to the R&D costs of the track.  I was referring to the use of profits from track (and other products) for R&D on future products.  

You are both right that the track R&D surely must be more than paid for and has to be one of their major profit makers.  So, when they got their manufacturing legs cut out from under them, loss of that profit has seemingly had cascading effects through the company.  That's all.

Dave Loman

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Posted by AVRNUT on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 10:20 AM

BRAKIE

trwroute
Gee whiz...just use Micro-Engineering stuff. It's made in Missouri and is readily available. My layout is completely done with ME code 70.

I found ME C83 track is superior to Atlas "floppy" track..I use to be 100% Atlas track now,I prefer ME flex track with Peco switches.

And therin lies the rub. All these delays & issues with Atlas are merely driving customers to other brands that ARE made here. And you end up paying the somewhat higher price for those brands anyway. (And, as an added bonus, you discover a superior product in the process!) How much money on track sales do you suppose Atlas has lost the past couple of years due to these issues? People are obviously willing to spend the money for their competitors track in order to get what they want WHEN they want it. Otherwise companies like ME wouldn't still be making & selling track.

As to recouping R&D costs, Atlas surely recouped that many, many years ago, a thousand-fold. How much R&D does it take to make Track?

Carl

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Posted by Eric97123 on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 10:19 AM

I am good with track but I need some switch machines.. I have one that melted and want to replace a few manuals with electric switches.  If they dont come soon I might have to look at upgrading to stall switches.

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Posted by BRAKIE on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 9:55 AM

trwroute
Gee whiz...just use Micro-Engineering stuff. It's made in Missouri and is readily available. My layout is completely done with ME code 70.

I found ME C83 track is superior to Atlas "floppy" track..I use to be 100% Atlas track now,I prefer ME flex track with Peco switches.

Larry

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Posted by Drew4950 on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 9:40 AM

Re-coop Research and Developement costs? Come on...Surely they have re-cooped those costs long ago. Geez I was buying N-scale code 80 track in the 1970's. The only thing I can see that changed is that Atlas Flex Track is a lot more flexibal than it used to be....

But I am very glad that I have saved most all of my track from then and I bought more a few years ago when it was available. And then I bought a huge collection of Kato Unitrack this past winter, much of which was still in original packaging. Other than turnouts I am pretty well set for my next railroad.  

Modeling a railroad hypothetically set in time.

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Posted by trwroute on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 7:49 AM
Gee whiz...just use Micro-Engineering stuff. It's made in Missouri and is readily available. My layout is completely done with ME code 70.

Chuck - Modeling in HO scale and anything narrow gauge

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Posted by claymore1977 on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 7:45 AM

While I do subscribe to the general notion that companies, on average, shoot for too high a profit margin, I think the posts thus far have failed to take into account the cost of Research and Development, especially when done onshore. (I'm talking from a US perspective but I realize this is an international audience).

R&D is a cost that a company has to pay upfront, to be recouped later. And R&D is EXPENSIVE!

Personal Example: I'm currently working on a product to sell in the hobby. It's simple and there are products similar to it, but none with the quantity of features I will be offering. I also aim to have the price <50% of the current, lower feature, competitor offerings to date. I've been chipping away at this project in 30 or 60 minute chunks over the last year or so, and I'd say I've put in about 100 hours of R&D time to produce a single prototype. Now that its done, I can make other instances of the product quickly.  If I valued my time at $10/hour, that's a $1000 R&D cost to produce this single instance of the product. If I only expect to sell 100 of these products over the next few years (trying to plan realisticly), and I'd like to recoup the R&D cost, then I have to add +$10 to the price tag of each product instance. I was planning on selling the units for $10, so the R&D costs just doubled the unit price to $20 and put the price right up there with the competition!

So as a small business guy who has used hobby time as R&D time, it is very easy for me to wave off recouping the R&D costs and keep my prices at my original $10 price point, but when you have a larger company, like Atlas, whose R&D is performed by paid employees, R&D becomes a very real cost that cannot be ignored. I'm certain the atlas employees get paid more than $10/hour too. So a company cannot stay in business when they are shelling out $30K+ in R&D and not recouping anything. :/

So, understanding that the end buyer will, on average, not give a hoot about Atlas' incurred R&D costs and rather only care about quality and the price tag on the box, the company will do everything it can to keep manufacturing costs down. If the manufacturing is brought back home, then manufacturing costs soar. Sure the company could cut into it's profits in order to counter the soaring labor costs, but profits today == R&D budget for the next item.

In Atlas' (and many other's) case, when they have the production cut for one of their major sources of profit (aka R&D budget) lines, like their track, then they either have to raise prices, stop current R&D initiatives, or run in the Red and dip into savings (which came from past profits).  Stopping R&D temporarily will push new product delivery dates out and further anger the customer base and delay further profits which delays further R&D which pushes out new product delivery dates and further angers the customer..... vicious cycle.

So... it's really a tough spot for a company to be in. Personally, I do not see Atlas as a pseudo-evil high profit business where the owners are simply rolling in cash. If there is any fault with Atlas, as I see it, it would be not having enough redundancy in their manufacturing sources.  Seems they had a single failure point in their business model.

Just hang on gents, the hobby ain't dead. Perhaps this is the Hobby trying to push us all to Micro Engineering track, or even push us back to 100% hand laying track again :)

Dave Loman

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Posted by IRONROOSTER on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 7:45 AM

galaxy

....

 

I agree With Carl. Who Wants to join me in my track endeavors? Now WHERE Do we ge the capital?

Geeked

Uh, you have a business plan

Paul

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Posted by galaxy on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 6:14 AM

Carl says:

 

I will never be convinced that the same items could not be produced here & retailed for the same prices"

I was watching Henry Ford on PBS last night. He took his workers from a $2.50 a day wage to a $5 a day wage litterally overnight, to reduce employee turnover and training costs, which raised profits. At the HEIGHT of the Great Depression, he INCREASED wages to $7.50 per day! AND in Any of the  cases, still made HUGE profits. He also produced 15MILLION Model T cars and never gave thought to a new model {though demand was growing for "other cars"}.

 

I agree With Carl. Who Wants to join me in my track endeavors? Now WHERE Do we ge the capital?

Geeked

-G .

Just my thoughts, ideas, opinions and experiences. Others may vary.

 HO and N Scale.

After long and careful thought, they have convinced me. I have come to the conclusion that they are right. The aliens did it.

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Posted by richhotrain on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 5:41 AM

AVRNUT

The only real reason that so much of this stuff is produced in China now is not to keep retail prices low, but to keep profit margins high. Just look at the prices on some of these things.......hundreds of dollars for a locomotive, produced in a country where workers are paid pocket change per hour. Thus, the profit margins on these things are surely several hundred percent, even after factoring in shipping costs. I will never be convinced that the same items could not be produced here & retailed for the same prices. The only difference would be a 50% or 100% profit margin instead of a 300%-400% profit margin.

As China's industrial base expands, the workers there are starting to demand better more livable wages & they're starting to get them too. Costs of overseas shipping are constantly increasing too. It's inevitable that sooner or later the costs of producing this stuff in China will reach a point that it is no more profitable than producing the stuff here. Might just as well bring the production back home now, be done with it & have the items readily available. Even if they are at a slighly higher cost, at least you would be able to get them when you need them. These ongoing shortages, production issues & profiteering are not doing the hobby any good and are only driving up prices anyway.

Carl

All arguments to the contrary aside, I entirely agree with you, Carl.

The notion of producing goods in China to lower the cost is a myth.

Rich

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Posted by AVRNUT on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 5:35 AM

The only real reason that so much of this stuff is produced in China now is not to keep retail prices low, but to keep profit margins high. Just look at the prices on some of these things.......hundreds of dollars for a locomotive, produced in a country where workers are paid pocket change per hour. Thus, the profit margins on these things are surely several hundred percent, even after factoring in shipping costs. I will never be convinced that the same items could not be produced here & retailed for the same prices. The only difference would be a 50% or 100% profit margin instead of a 300%-400% profit margin.

As China's industrial base expands, the workers there are starting to demand better more livable wages & they're starting to get them too. Costs of overseas shipping are constantly increasing too. It's inevitable that sooner or later the costs of producing this stuff in China will reach a point that it is no more profitable than producing the stuff here. Might just as well bring the production back home now, be done with it & have the items readily available. Even if they are at a slighly higher cost, at least you would be able to get them when you need them. These ongoing shortages, production issues & profiteering are not doing the hobby any good and are only driving up prices anyway.

Carl

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Posted by Burlington Northern #24 on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 2:24 AM

galaxy

gee, maybe the hobby WILL "die out" if there is NO TRACK to be had.

Either the hobby is bursting and track is in high demand { likely}

Or they want to be SURE to "sell out" and "create demand" for the track, instead of just relying on when someone will purchase it. {more likely}.

If I had the money, resources and plant, I'd build a product like Atlas and give them a run for their money!!! Maybe even put them out of business if they can't meet the demand.

Geeked

 

 

 

how much to kick start N scale code 55 galaxy?

SP&S modeler, 1960's give or take a decade or two for some equipment.

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Posted by galaxy on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 2:17 AM

gee, maybe the hobby WILL "die out" if there is NO TRACK to be had.

Either the hobby is bursting and track is in high demand { likely}

Or they want to be SURE to "sell out" and "create demand" for the track, instead of just relying on when someone will purchase it. {more likely}.

If I had the money, resources and plant, I'd build a product like Atlas and give them a run for their money!!! Maybe even put them out of business if they can't meet the demand.

Geeked

 

 

 

-G .

Just my thoughts, ideas, opinions and experiences. Others may vary.

 HO and N Scale.

After long and careful thought, they have convinced me. I have come to the conclusion that they are right. The aliens did it.

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Posted by Burlington Northern #24 on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 12:59 AM

wcu boy

I am fully aware that many on this board have discussed the Atlas Train Compnay track producation problem(s.) As of today, does anyone know any updates as to when Atlas track will be available. Walthers has very little at all. I would appreciate any and/or all input as to when this crisis may cease. For all we know it may be like the world economy-uncertain at all times. Some of us want to get modeling and need some track.

AJuly(for N scale sectional) November (for N scale Turnouts), here's a track shipment from atlas http://www.atlasrr.com/containershipping-track.htm . I agree with the thesis on stockpiling, Though unfortunately due to the track shortage I've shrank my layout and ultimately changed it. at this rate people are gonna have to pay out the nose until atlas track ships. 

SP&S modeler, 1960's give or take a decade or two for some equipment.

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Posted by alco_fan on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 12:12 AM

willy6
I wonder what the Atlas employees do all day if they have nothing to sell..

They have hundreds of different freight cars, engines and other stuff to sell in multiple scales. You knew that, right?

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Posted by alco_fan on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 12:09 AM

wcu boy
Some of us want to get modeling and need some track.

modeltrainstuff has Atlas Code 83 and Code 100 flex in stock

Peco Code 83 flex and switches are available as are Walthers

If you need track, buy some.

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Posted by Darth Santa Fe on Tuesday, June 25, 2013 11:39 PM

I was talking to the owner of my LHS a few days ago, and although he's gotten some flex track and sectional track, it's been a year since he's been able to get any switches! Atlas is apparently supposed to be shipping new switches this fall, but he's not really getting his hopes up. From the sound of it, getting anything at all from Atlas is about like pulling teeth. It's about the same with Athearn. Typical wait times for Athearn products, like freight car trucks, has been about 6 months minimum.

Now when it comes to US manufacturers like Kadee, he can get anything in stock almost immediately.

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Posted by willy6 on Tuesday, June 25, 2013 11:09 PM
I wonder what the Atlas employees do all day if they have nothing to sell...stand on the roof with binoculars hoping to see that Fed-Ex or UPS truck headed their way loaded with track...
Being old is when you didn't loose it, it's that you just can't remember where you put it.
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Posted by skagitrailbird on Tuesday, June 25, 2013 8:28 PM

The web site for Hiawatha Hobbies shows all Atlas track items in stock, both code 83 and code 100.  I have no connection to the company other than as a satisfied customer.

Good luck!

Roger Johnson
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Posted by richhotrain on Tuesday, June 25, 2013 8:27 PM

IRONROOSTER

I suspect the past shortage is making it worse.  Someone who would normally only buy 3 or 4 turnouts because that's all he needs right now, might buy 8 or 10 when they come in so he has them later on.  So not only past demand but stockpiling is probably driving the shortage.

And you can bet that there are some profiteers out there scooping it up for later resale.

Rich

Alton Junction

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