Bob...All...
The answer is: Yes ...and No.
Kato has been absent from the HO Locomotive market for several years now and the most recent announcement of the C&NW C44-9W 'Dynamic Duo' now has been cancelled ,supposedly due to older tooling that has been 'irreparably damaged'.
I spoke to Leon at Kato about 6 months ago and when I asked him about the HO future of Kato, his reply was that there had been discussion about doing a new model - the SD70 ACe - in HO scale, but when Athearn announced that they were doing that model and MTH had already tooled for an HO production model with Sound and DCC capability already onboard for under 250.00, the decision had been made to drop the plan.
More recently I had an email encounter with Michael from Kato in response to a prior email inquiry into why there had been an absenece of HO products.
His response was almost retalitory in tone - and he stated that due to the economic climate and the dollar/ yen exchange rate, that most modellers would not be willing to pay between $200-$300 for a HO Kato engine with no sound or DCC. And then, proceeded to ask me if I was willing to. My response was that based on Ebay auctions, many people are paying just that for older run locomotives...its supply and demand.
Leon has made the arguement in the past that Kato USA has offered models in HO in the past and they have NOT sold well --- inventories of HO models apparently stack up in the warehouse and dealers don't order them because the retail prices are no longer competitive against other manufacturers.
Kato, being a Japanese company, is in a tough market against the Chinese builders.
I made a suggestionthat Kato should consider re-running the AC4400CW's in new Schemes and road #s
An example that I would go for would be the BNSF with noew numbers or maybe a Swoosh paint scheme. AND... the Union Pacific with Yellow frame stripes and new number options.
The SD40-2 could be offered on many different road names and #s with variations.
This is just to name a few.
Since the tooling is already done this would save a lot of production cost and make the modes more attractive to exisiting kato buyers. This may have been the intention of KATO with the C&NW models.
We'll never know now. If the tooling is lost, I predict the existing 44-9W models will skyrocket in price as the existing models become harder to find.
Michael DID state that KATO DOES have interest in continuing to offer HO scale products and 'are looking at every possible measure in which they(Kato) can offer new products to the HO modeler at a competitive price'.
In keeping with that, Kato has just released a new set of road #s for the TTX and BNSF Maxi Well cars, a new set of #s for the EMP container sets, along with a new set of HO crew figures which are very nice.
Kato has the designs and production capabilities to produce many new HO products, many which have already been offered in N scale. It will be awhile before we most likey see a new HO locomotive, only because I believe the economic climate will prevent any ambitous production of any NEW HO model - I could be wrong. Based on the quality of their products - many of which I own, I sincerely hope I am.
HeritageFleet1
