The first stone of an avalanche?

[3rdrail]

The following appeared on the Rio Grande Hobbies website this morning:

Rio Grande Hobbies has decided to drop Precision Craft Models completely. All pre-orders for their products have been cancelled. We apologize for any trouble this may cause. However, we are not in a position to take advanced orders several years in advance with dynamic delivery dates. Thanks

Wonder how long before many other dealers do this? Have a feeling another supplier is about to "bite the dust" before it really supplied very much - one model, the E7.

[wm3798]

I wonder if the brain trust at Intermountain is listening?
Lee

[Sokramiketes]

I wonder if the brain trust at Intermountain is listening?
Lee

I didn't realize the brain trust was still at Intermountain.  Thought they all moved on...

[wm3798]

Right you are! ;D

Lee

[tom mann]

hmm...I thought this would have happened a while ago, but for a different reason!

[up1950s]

It's a shame as the E-7 was cutting edge with the sound , though an instant start up option was not there as I would desire . Otherwise I am pleased with the UP ABBA set , all with sound , I have . I was wishing they would have done the small UP turbines .   

[David Leonard]

Richie, the small UP turbines? I wouldn't call any of those things "small"!  But I know what you mean.

[Ryan87]

This starts to beg the question, what will happen to the tooling?

Apparently they had four or five diesel locomotives ready to go into production the E7, E8, PA & one or two that haven't been announced.

It will be interesting to see who picks it up.... Walthers? Horizon?

[wm3798]

Walthers already has the E units and PA in their stable, but that's not to say they might not be interested in the PCM sound chassis...

I'd have to think that the ultimate coup would be for Atlas to pursue Intermountain's locomotives...  No duplication, and a basically interesting roster that with some minor retooling to be done "the Atlas Way" and there would be dancing in the streets.
Lee

[3rdrail]

How did InterMountain get involved? The quote was strictly about Precision Craft Models. Compared to it, IMRC is a paragon of on-time deliveries. When was the PRR M1a first promised, mid-2006? Not announced, that was in 2005.

[Walkercolt]

Yeah, and PCM chops the legs out from under it's dealers by dumping their products to that Discount Trains outfit, in all scales. They aren't winning any friends in the business.

[daniel_leavitt2000]

Sad, I would have really liked their AC6000 in CSX.

[Dave V]

Well,

I've almost completely lost my interest in steam for the moment...  It was great fun to run my kitbashed PRR M1 on Todd Treaster's layout...  The old girl loved the 30" radius curves.

But now that I have my own M1, I really could care less what PCM does.  Stay, go, whatever.  I'm not shopping for PCM anymore.

[wm3798]

I mentioned IMRC because their announcement/delivery reputation is quickly dissolving.  Plus, when they do deliver something like the SD45-2, it's disappointing to see the low level of quality they let out of the barn.

I think they are as much at risk of failing as BLI/PCM as far as N scale locomotives go.

Lee

[Mark5]

PCM talks a lot ... but why even waste time with PCM - they've done one model in N scale. Their big splash in N scale ended up being a microscopic ripple. No loss there.

I don't know why everyone dumps on IMRC all the time (save for the ex-employees) - we'd be worse off without IMRC (at least I'd be).