How Just One Mistake Destroyed Hornby – The Legend of British Electric Trains

Comments · 127

• V.

  @v.narayan · 1 month ago (edited)

  Viewer from Asia here. In 1953 my father bought a large Meccano set to make things out of. It is still with me with its hundreds of girders, flanges, gears etc all still in very good condition. Now I'm preserving it for my grand children! The Lego mechanical sets just don't have that learning built into them.

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• PA

  @paulwestwood4417 · 2 months ago

  I owned a model shop between 2006 and 2010 and stocked Hornby. What killed the shop was the banking crisis. Many of my customers were pensioners who bought models for their grandchildren. They mostly had extra cash off the interest of their savings. When the banking crisis hit, interest rates were drastically cut and overnight my business fell off a cliff. During the closing down sales I couldn’t bare to sell all of my rolling stock and kept a lot back as a personal collection.

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• PE

  @peterconnor4193 · 2 months ago

  I was born in Liverpool in 1968 , I can remember people who worked in that factory 😢 , I have a love hate relationship with these videos, I love seeing the history and craftsmanship I hate what happened to all these industries

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• MI

  @MickDiggles · 1 month ago

  I am very grateful for my gift of a Meccano set as a kid , I made many things and leaned much !

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• GE

  @gerrycurtis5547 · 1 month ago

  I was given a Meccano set for Xmas 1954 when I was 11 . I loved it and played with it constantly building cranes, bridges, and funny vehicles. When I was given a clockwork motor that was a huge boost. Finally I got a Mamod steam engine and made a traction engine by adding wheels and gears. Wonderful fun.

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• BR

  @brucejoseph8367 · 2 months ago

  There is plenty of original Dublo three rail still going strong. For nostalgia I've just bought the same loco, track and even power controller that I had when I was an eight year old. Because of it's bullet proof construction it all still works after 60 plus years.

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• MI

  @mikecroper8422 · 2 months ago

  A perfect description of how a fantastic market leader just didn't move forwards with the times. Imagine if Hornby Dublo had designed their product to run on a two rail system from the start.

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• HA

  @hanslembl9103 · 1 month ago

  The failure is never the failure of the workforce. It's always the management that fails.

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• TO

  @tonypacke6954 · 2 months ago

  A nice nostalgic video.  The later sets were something that was out of my dads price range.  Bevel gears that you could make steering systems and more intricate models.  I did end up going into engineering as an apprentice so maybe that did influence my choice of job.  I'm 74 now so a lot of those job opportunities are now not available to the youngsters.  Happy days, well some of them were.

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• JO

  @johnjames9195 · 2 months ago

  I bought my Dublo set in 1940 on my 11th birthday,  having saved for two years. Tank engine in GWR colours. It cost 62/-   (£3.10 in modern currency). Big blue box, very heavy as I carried it home.

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• MB

  @mbpinder · 1 month ago

  Brings back memories!

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• XE

  @xenon53827 · 1 month ago

  I have a huge Hornby-Dublo railway. It runs great. Where else can you back a goods train of 20+ wagons, backwards over 4 sets of facing points and know that it will not derail? It certainly was quality.

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