Flames of War

[Leon]

Surely they should see the way the wind is blowing and embrace the competition by officially allowing their models in, but then go ahead and invest in their own plastic injected range. The tooling for such is expensive and time consuming, but production is cheap and quick once set up, there is no way PSC and Zvesda can do everything needed. A "Budget Battlefront" range would be a more progressive and popular solution surely? And given the money they have already made, I'm sure BF could invest in more plastic injection moulded items than their rivals put together.

A switch to plastic would make more sense to me as well.  Tooling for the plastic 15mm vehicles we're seeing on the market at the moment is around £8-10k I believe, plus the cost of the 3-up masters.  I think BF are paying somewhere in the region of $1500-2000 for their vehicle masters from speaking to ex-designers, so god knows how much they'd be paying for a '45mm' master model as it were.  Still though, with their kind of budget, it wouldn't be a problem at all for them.

An interesting perspective may be the perceived lower cost of plastic to the consumer, so they couldn't charge the same pricing?  With resin, they can claim any kind of custom resin excuse, ala Finecast, and keep the pricing up?

[NTM]

The plastic 15mm tanks are CAD designed rather than 3 ups IIRC. The Perrys and Warlord use 3 ups on their 28mm figs though. Apparently BF are trying out CAD, 3 ups and another method for their plastics. Ironically perhaps they are using Renedra for the tooling and moulding.

[Leon]

The plastic 15mm tanks are CAD designed rather than 3 ups IIRC.

That would make a lot more sense actually!

[Squirrel]

The plastic 15mm tanks are CAD designed rather than 3 ups IIRC.

It's the way pretty much every other industry designs plastic mouldings, the CAD file is fed straight into the machine to cut the tool. With something like a vehicle it can be drawn more accurately quickly than sculpting.

Organic shapes, ie figures are more realistic if sculpted hence why the Perry's use 3 ups.

Cheers,

Kev

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Back track and compromise has been announced by BF:
http://www.flamesofwar.com/Default.aspx?tabid=57&art_id=3380

Sounds like they are listening... 

[Steve J]

They will definitely be 3D CAD as opposed to 3 Ups. The fit on the Zvezda kits is amazing and could not be achieved any other way.

[Leon]

Back track and compromise has been announced by BF:
http://www.flamesofwar.com/Default.aspx?tabid=57&art_id=3380

Sounds like they are listening... 

Well that was quick, kudo's to them for actually listening to people.  They're still calling it the 'FoW hobby' though, which has an unnerving ring to it...

They will definitely be 3D CAD as opposed to 3 Ups. The fit on the Zvezda kits is amazing and could not be achieved any other way.

I've always wondered how much it costs for a CAD designer to draw up the designs.

[Steve J]

Our CAD designers are charged out at about £800 + per day. If you had good 2d reference drawings, they would take a few days to model up. You could probably get reasonable freelance designers cheaper, but you need ones with injection moulding experience.

The problem comes with scaling stuff up to allow the plastic to flow through the mould. This is where the experience element comes into it. You can get simple tools made for anything between a few hundred pounds up to a couple of thousand.  Runs would then be up to about 10,000 units before you had problems with tool wear etc.

[sebigboss79]

Just to clarify my doubts about Flames of War and Battlefront (insert GW/Finecast here):

It is the modern way of doing bussiness to tell your customers where to buy, what to buy and charge them insanely for prodcts of questionable quality?

It is OK if a big company bullies smaller competitors, its retailers and customer base with "rules" and "guidelines" and re-inventing rulebooks whenever they feel like it?

It is cool to segment markets and tell retailers to whom to sell and to whom not?



Lets just say I am glad I can still choose who gets my money and that Pendraken (and others) still do business a bit more the oldfashioned way....

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

What's interesting is sevel of the 'Old Guard' have completely unsubscribed from the Forum...

Including one each of the US, UK and Antipodean big  hitters!

[sebigboss79]

Still enough people to feed the greed....

Sad but true.

[Steve J]

They have obviously struck a raw nerve if 'Old Gaurd' members have un-subscribed. They really need to look at the way the Plastic Soldier Company and Zvezda have really changed the market in the past few years. If they can do it, so can Battlefront.

I'm just happy that my 'lead addiction' has moved to 10mm .

[Hertsblue]

I cannot for the life of me understand how Zvezda can afford to turn out excellent 1:144th plastic kits that retail for £2.50-£3.00 here in the UK. I would have thought distribution costs would have been more than that. Or have the Russians transferred production to the Gulags? 

[sultanbev]

I heard from a friend who has Russian contacts in re-enactment groups over there that they are 97p a box in Russia, equivalent of.....

[freddy326]

Last time I was in Russia, the tanks were 77 roubles each which works out to about £1.50 and that shop was known for being expensive!