Talk:Hornby Railways

Untitled
How would you place Zero-1 in the digital category? As far as I can remember the decoders were fully analogue-based, as opposed to today's DCC decoders which contain a microcontroller. --Arpa 21:00, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

http://www.digitrains.co.uk/DCC.htm "There was not great progress until the late 1970s when a number of sytems began to be developed of which Hornby's Zero 1 was an example along with others such as the Dynatrol system in the US and the Marklin/Motorola format in Europe. All of these systems are forms of Digital Command Control but had the drawback that they were competeing manufacturers sytems incompatable with each other."

May not have been compatible with the NRMA DCC standard (which hadn't been developed then), but it was still digital.

--83.104.250.96 10:26, 6 May 2006 (UTC)

Hornby Railways Category?
Is creating one a good plan? The following articles could go in a Hornby Railways category if it was created:
 * Arnold (models)
 * Frank Hornby
 * Jouef
 * Hornby Railways
 * Hornby International
 * Lima
 * Lyddle End
 * Meccano_Ltd
 * Tri-ang Railways
 * Smokey Joe
 * Skaledale
 * Hornby Virgin Trains Pendolino —Preceding unsigned comment added by XsandaSC (talk • contribs) 09:27, 17 August 2008 (UTC)

--Zabdiel 13:08, 21 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Done - see Category:Hornby Hobbies. Rgds, --Trident13 (talk) 09:20, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Skaledale/Lyddle End Merge?
I don't think Skaledale and Lyddle End satisfy the notability criteria for products so they should be merged. --Zabdiel 10:01, 22 August 2007 (UTC)


 * No, don't merge - Hornby Hobbies missed out on purchase of Graham Farish, and Lyddle End is an obvious pre-cursor copy of the Bachmann strategy of just downsizing OO scale models into the Nguage market. How long before we have Hornby in the Nguage market - not long I would suggest! Rgds, --Trident13 (talk) 09:23, 1 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Well, it's almost 2024, and Hornby still isn't making British N-gauge trains. 223.19.13.140 (talk) 13:00, 31 December 2023 (UTC)


 * Yes - Unless the articles can be fleshed significantly, and I don't think they can, they do not justify their own articles. Thedarxide (talk) 16:13, 27 July 2008 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Hornby logo.jpg
Image:Hornby logo.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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BetacommandBot (talk) 23:48, 13 February 2008 (UTC)


 * I've added a fair use rational Zabdiel (talk) 11:26, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Proposed merge
Hornby Trains and Hornby Railways appear to cover the same company in separate articles. As this is the older article, I propose that Hornby Trains is redirected to this page, with any useful unduplicated material from that article merged into this one. Any thoughts? —  Tivedshambo   (t/c) 22:05, 30 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Agree - this article seems much better structured and "wikified" than Hornby Trains, and hence it should be kept. BTW, | Hornby's website says the company used to be called Hornby Railways and now "Hornby Group Plc". Regards, DPdH (talk) 03:35, 1 May 2009 (UTC)


 * Comment -- should we be keeping separate Hornby the company (which was Hornby Hobbies for a while, and also owns Scalextric, Lima, Airfix?, Corgi?, etc) from the "Hornby" railway product range? I would have thought that there is sufficient documented history to support two such articles. Where the common history is placed would need to be determined, but is a recurring problem for many WP articles. EdJogg (talk) 09:25, 1 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Comment The two articles should be merged but I don't think we should keep either name. I suggest merging Hornby Trains into Hornby Railways and renaming to Hornby PLC. Neither Hornby Trains or Hornby Railways are accurate, both are previous names of the manufacturer. The company is now simply Hornby PLC. Even DPdH's suggestion of Hornby Group Plc isn't correct any more. The About Hornby page isn't clear but you'll note it says it is simply called Hornby which the latest report from the company confirms. So in my view, if there weren't any conflicting names, "Hornby" would be the most appropriate name but giving the company's full legal name of "Hornby PLC" serves to disambiguate the article. At this current time I don't consider it necessary to split between the company and the product range of model trains especially considering that a huge part of Hornby Trains is unsourced and so should probably be removed. Adambro (talk) 11:56, 1 May 2009 (UTC)


 * As there seems to be no objections, I'll redirect Hornby Trains to this article. It seems to be a fork from this page in the first place. —  Tivedshambo   (t/c) 09:18, 16 May 2009 (UTC)

Split into separate "Hornby Railways" and "Hornby Hobbies" pages
I agree with EdJogg above, I think that a separate "Hornby Hobbies" article is justified.

The "Hornby" model railway brand started out owned by Meccano Ltd (which already has its own company page), so I think that giving HH its own page too would produce a more consistent and logical structure. HH owns so many other toy brands (including other model railway brands) that already have their own separate wiki pages, and has so much history that interfaces with all those brands, that there should be no problem filling a page with just the main HH company history and crosslinks to all the other relevant wiki pages - it'd be quite a strongly-linked page. But having a single page that attempts to be a "hub" both for a single ongoing product line (which spans different companies' histories) and the current "owner" company (whose story includes so many different brands) seems anomalous, and IMO doesn't really do justice to either. ErkDemon (talk) 16:13, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

File:V.R_B_Class_Diesel_1976a.jpg may be deleted
I have tagged File:V.R_B_Class_Diesel_1976a.jpg, which is in use in this article for deletion because it does not have a copyright tag. If a copyright tag is not added within seven days the image will be deleted. -- Chris  00:18, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Who Wrote This???
"It is generally accepted amongst railway modellers that Hornby models generally outclass Bachmann models."

Who ever wrote this must be a hornby fan boy, please remove it or I will do it for you. I would say that Bachmann are far superior have you seen the Hornby 66? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.112.140.41 (talk) 10:29, 24 May 2009 (UTC)

Scalextric
It would be good if the article could mention the Scalextric model car division somewhere appropriate. —Sladen (talk) 15:51, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I think that that's the sort of thing that would fit nicely into a separate Hornby Hobbies company page. ErkDemon (talk) 16:17, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

James May says ..
In this (interesting!) BBC programme, James May mentions a few additional snippets about the Hornby Triang evolution in the 50s and 60s. The Re-assembler. 58.153.66.47 (talk) 17:03, 20 September 2018 (UTC)

Requested move 29 September 2018

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: Not Moved L293D (☎ • ✎) 14:52, 18 October 2018 (UTC)

Hornby Railways → Hornby (model railway manufacturer) – Hornby dropped the "Railways" from their name in 1999, they are now solely referred to as Hornby (when not directly referring to the company of Hornby Hobbies) by most media outlets and stores. Eldomtom2 (talk) 14:52, 29 September 2018 (UTC) --Relisting. Dreamy Jazz 🎷 talk to me &#124; my contributions 19:44, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
 * If it has to be moved, then Hornby PLC might be better. Note that neither currently have redirects, and the WP:LEAD still states Hornby Railways.   It was previously Hornby Hobbies. —Sladen (talk) 16:07, 29 September 2018 (UTC)


 * Oppose per COMMONNAME and the long history.
 * Hornby PLC isn't good because it's not easily piped. Andy Dingley (talk) 16:11, 29 September 2018 (UTC)
 * Hornby Hobbies remains the name of the company. As for COMMONNAME, all recent news articles (for starters) solely refer to it as "Hornby". Eldomtom2 (talk) 17:02, 29 September 2018 (UTC)


 * Comment - it's a tricky one. Eldomtom2 is correct that they are officially 'Hornby', not 'Hornby Railways' any longer, but I also suspect the proposed disambiguation is a little clunky? The difficulty is that there are essentially two entities - Hornby as a model railway brand, and also Hornby PLC, the parent company of Scalextrix, Airfix, Humbrol and lots of European model railway brands too. I wonder whether the argument about the common name is best here, even if technically incorrect? Bob talk 20:46, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
 * If this article is about 2 entities then the shorter title "Hornby" (some qualifier)" is probably better, otherwise the scope may be restricted.  Crouch, Swale  ( talk ) 20:50, 6 October 2018 (UTC)
 * For clarification on the company name, Hornby Hobbies Ltd is a private company wholly owned by the public Hornby PLC. Hornby Hobbies seems to be the one directly involved with production of all Hornby-owned brands. Hornby PLC has other subsidiaries, but these seem to be solely for distribution purposes. Eldomtom2 (talk) 13:40, 7 October 2018 (UTC)
 * Oppose as per COMMONNAME. – Davey 2010 Talk 19:51, 17 October 2018 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Requested move 1 April 2022

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: not moved. Calidum 05:54, 10 April 2022 (UTC)

Hornby Railways → Hornby PLC – Hornby Railways has long been replaced as the brand name by simply Hornby. Hornby PLC is the publicly traded company that owns the various companies that are presently part of Hornby. Here is evidence supporting that "Hornby" rather than "Hornby Railways" is the commonly used name:


 * "Hornby" subforum on major model railway forum
 * "Hornby" section on major model retailer site 1
 * "Hornby" section on major model retailer site 2
 * "Hornby" section on major model retailer site 3
 * "Hornby" section on major model retailer site 4
 * Review of "Hornby" product from model railway news site
 * Review of documentary about "Hornby" in the Daily Telegraph
 * News article about documentary about "Hornby" on ITV website
 * News article about "Hornby" in the Times
 * News article about "Hornby" in the Guardian
 * News article about "Hornby" on the Sky News website
 * News article about "Hornby" on the BBC News website
 * Official "Hornby" website
 * Official "Hornby" Twitter

I am proposing to move the page to "Hornby PLC" rather than just "Hornby" because "Hornby" is already a disambiguation page. Eldomtom2 (talk) 13:27, 1 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Oppose The current catalogue (R8161) published in January 2022 shows "Hornby" on the front; and on the back, it shows that Hornby is a registered trade mark of Hornby Hobbies Ltd. It also gives the address: Hornby Hobbies Ltd., Westwood, Margate, Kent CT9 4JX. There is no mention of "Hornby PLC". -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 14:31, 2 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Would you support a move to Hornby Hobbies? And Hornby PLC does exist if you're accusing me of making it up. --Eldomtom2 (talk) 17:10, 2 April 2022 (UTC)


 * Oppose. Clear common name. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:11, 6 April 2022 (UTC)
 * How, exactly, is "Hornby Railways" the clear common name? What is your response to all the evidence I've assembled? --Eldomtom2 (talk) 13:21, 6 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Well, actually the clear common name is simply Hornby, but as there's no primary topic and in the interests of WP:NATURAL this is the best choice. Hornby PLC (or actually Hornby plc, which would be more normal) would be meaningless to most people. And generally we try to avoid company suffixes (plc, Ltd, Inc, etc) as disambiguators. You also have to remember that the article is not just about the company per se, but about its products. The brand is much better known than the business. -- Necrothesp (talk) 14:36, 6 April 2022 (UTC)

As Necrothesp says, the problem is that the name 'Hornby' is the name of the model railway brand, and that's mostly what is discussed in this article. But Hornby Hobbies is the listed company name, as seen at their investor site. It's a bit like Facebook/Meta or Google/Alphabet, albeit a somewhat smaller company. There might be an argument that Hornby Hobbies should be a separate article as a PLC, which would separate the wider company that owns Scalextric, Corgi etc from the railway brand - the nominator is correct that "Hornby Railways" isn't actually the name of either the brand or the company though. But as this article is mostly about the model railways, even before it became a PLC, it's not quite right to rename it to that either. I note above that there have been proposals to create a Hornby Hobbies article to separate the company from the brand, perhaps this is the time for that? Bob talk 15:31, 6 April 2022 (UTC)
 * What I would support is a split into two articles, one for Rovex/Hornby Hobbies, and another (possibly part of another article) for the model trains produced under the "Hornby" brand by Meccano. The article is currently a history of the brand, when it makes more sense to focus it on the company known as Hornby today (and leave the origins of the brandname to a separate article). --Eldomtom2 (talk) 15:58, 6 April 2022 (UTC)

Requested move 24 April 2022

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion. 

The result of the move request was: Not Moved - No clear consensus for new title plus the disrespect for the previous RM recent move decision suggests this article be move protected for 6 months. Work on the article not the title. Mike Cline (talk) 11:35, 2 May 2022 (UTC)

Hornby Railways → Hornby Hobbies – Hornby Hobbies is the official name of the company. Hornby Railways was a brand name used by them previously but now long dropped in favour of just "Hornby". Eldomtom2 (talk) 14:25, 24 April 2022 (UTC)
 * OK, so this is now the third RM that you have started for this page, each time with a different proposed new name. Only one of them can be right: why is this one any more "official" than the others that you have proposed? -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 20:11, 24 April 2022 (UTC)
 * I believed both previous suggested names had their merits, but after taking into account comments on the previous move requests, as well as studying the article name policy carefully, I believe that "Hornby Hobbies" is the name most likely to have a consensus around it as a satisfactory name for the article. For clarity on the "official" status of the name: Hornby Hobbies is a wholly owned subsidary of the publicly traded Hornby plc. Hornby Hobbies is the company that does all the actual work. The name "Hornby plc" is rarely used while "Hornby Hobbies" is widely used. For honesty's sake I must admit however that my primary motivation with these move requests is to stop the article being named Hornby Railways - I am less concerned over what the new title is. --Eldomtom2 (talk) 20:37, 24 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Per WP:AADP and indeed WP:JDL, this is not a good reason at all. You are now verging on WP:POINT. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 21:20, 24 April 2022 (UTC)
 * How, precisely, am I violating those policies? It is not personal distate for the term "Hornby Railways" - I have laid out what I feel are very good reasons why the article should not be named "Hornby Railways". --Eldomtom2 (talk) 10:21, 25 April 2022 (UTC)
 * You stated I must admit however that my primary motivation with these move requests is to stop the article being named Hornby Railways. -- Red rose64 &#x1f339; (talk) 20:55, 25 April 2022 (UTC)
 * That does not violate the policies you linked however. They simply state that personal taste should not be used as a motive. My motive is not personal taste; Hornby Railways is an outdated name that is no longer used, and as such the article should be moved to a different name.--Eldomtom2 (talk) 21:02, 25 April 2022 (UTC)


 * Oppose. Clearly already discussed above. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:13, 28 April 2022 (UTC)
 * You have not provided an argument against why "Hornby Hobbies" is less recognisable than "Hornby Railways". Further, the second name means that this article is stuck being an article about a brand, with no article for the actual company. --Eldomtom2 (talk) 17:32, 28 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Very clearly provided above. This is becoming tiresome. -- Necrothesp (talk) 12:27, 29 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Your argument that a long disused name satisfies WP:NATURAL is dubious, and furthermore you have not addressed my second point. This article should be about the company, not the brand. --Eldomtom2 (talk) 13:36, 29 April 2022 (UTC)


 * Support. Hornby Railways is certainly a very recognizable name. It is also not the name of the company, nor a presently-employed brand, and apparently hasn't been for some time. Keeping the article at this title with full capitalization isn't natural disambiguation, it's asserting something to be an official name when it isn't any longer. That any of the disambiguated titles are "awkward" isn't a good argument. If the company's name is Hornby then it's Hornby. I think if you're going with the COMMONNAME argument you need to show that sources are continuing to use "Hornby Railways" to refer to the company/brand. Is that occurring? I've seen it asserted but not substantiated. In the last move request, Eldomtom2 posted a number of news stories using "Hornby" and not "Hornby Railways". That points to a move, yes? Mackensen (talk) 21:43, 29 April 2022 (UTC)
 * However, we can't move it to Hornby as it requires further disambiguation and that is not what's being proposed in any case. WP:OFFICIAL means that any arguments about official names are completely spurious. As has already been argued, the brand of model railways is far more significant than the company that manufactures them. -- Necrothesp (talk) 00:17, 30 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Certainly, but the article is about the company. The lead of the article says Hornby Railways is a British model railways manufacturing company. I think we're all agreed that as a statement of fact this is historically true and presently incorrect. At the very least, the article needs to be somewhat rewritten to reflect the distinction between the name and the company. Mackensen (talk) 00:28, 30 April 2022 (UTC)
 * "As has already been argued, the brand of model railways is far more significant than the company that manufactures them". I have not seen this argument made. Furthermore, as Hornby Hobbies is an important company in the modelling field, producing many famous brands, it deserves its own article. --Eldomtom2 (talk) 09:02, 30 April 2022 (UTC)
 * I made it in the previous RM above! Also proposed by you! -- Necrothesp (talk) 00:52, 2 May 2022 (UTC)
 * But pretty much every single business-related Wikipedia article is about the company, not the brand.--Eldomtom2 (talk) 09:12, 2 May 2022 (UTC)
 * Just looking at their website shows their full name as "Hornby Hobbies" https://uk.hornby.com/about-hornby-hobbies BUT their social media uses just "Hornby" or "Hornby Model Railways" as names. It does seem to suggest Hornby Hobbies is the corporate names, and Hornby or Hornby Railways is a marketing name choice. Xboxtravis7992 (talk) 02:37, 30 April 2022 (UTC)
 * Support moving somewhere. "Railways" may have been historically correct, but it doesn't seem to be now. I am not British but I don't see much supporting commonname here. Moon Joon (talk) 11:14, 2 May 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Humbrol (and others): brand or subsidiary?
Is Humbrol (and others)a brand or a subsidiary? S C Cheese (talk) 16:45, 11 July 2022 (UTC)


 * According to Hornby plc 2022 annual report, the active subsidiaries are Hornby Hobbies Limited (which does "development, design, sourcing and distribution of models") and the distribution companies Hornby America Inc, Hornby España S.A. (Spain), Hornby Italia s.r.l. (Italy), Hornby France S.A.S (France). Hornby Deutschland GmbH (Germany), LCD Enterprises Limited (UK)
 * LCD hold the shares of Oxford Diecast and Hornby bought it from Lyndon Davies, the CEO from 2017.
 * The interim 2021 repot identifies Hornby, Scalectrix, Airfix, Humbrol and Corgi as main brands. GraemeLeggett (talk) 10:41, 18 June 2023 (UTC)

Ridiculous
I know this has been discussed before, but I still think it is worth saying again that it is ridiculous to title this page "Hornby Railways" as there is no entity with this name any more. Saying that it is a "British owned manufactuer" is also ridiculous, as HOrnby makes its railways in China using contracts. It does not actually make any of its trains. 182.153.95.138 (talk) 04:01, 1 January 2024 (UTC)