They gave us such a bombshell of an announcement with Flying Scotsman back in July that I'm not really disappointed with this year's catalog, at least in the HO scale range. As Bachmann have eluded to, this allows the team to catch up on previous announcements, and we're all more than aware of the turbulent economic times we're currently living in. I'm happy to see that the 20 ton brakevan tooling from the cancelled 80th anniversary set is still getting a separate release as I've been wanting a new brakevan for sometime. It's also nice to see the introduction of FQC wagons as well. I do however find it interesting that the blue wagon got announced in N scale when its HO counterpart hasn't been active for sometime.

Overall though, I'm content with this year's catalog.

I appreciate Bachmann taking the time to publicly acknowledge the concern surrounding Knapford, as well as explaining in detail what happened during production and how they plan to avoid the recent pattern moving forward. Considering that all the new and upcoming products, (besides Flying Scotsman), have prices listed, it does check out that Bachmann is including prices first before publicly announcing said products. Hopefully, Flying Scotsman will have his price listed soon too.

With this new direction of no longer announcing products unless it's certain that they will be out, waiting times between announcement and release could also be reduced. Bachmann tends to announce products much too early, long before they even know the cost before going into production, so we end up waiting years for them to be released, with some being cancelled. It literally took five years for DCC Sound Thomas and Percy to be released in HO Scale.

The biggest cancellations that disappointed me were Duncan, and the 80th Anniversary set. Thankfully, that's not going to happen anymore going forward. No more announcing a product unless it's guaranteed to be coming, that it's economically feasible to get into production. Many bullets will be dodged. No more being disappointed that a certain product isn't coming. As of right now, the only announcements will be products that will be released. Avoiding more cancellations in future.

Quote from: Yard Master on January 27, 2026, 09:59:24 AMHi everyone,

We want to apologize for the cancellation of Knapford Station and other items- it's just as disappointing to us as it is to the fans.

In trying to keep up the rate of new product announcements and releases from years past, our engineering team and factory were not able to keep pace and over the past few years, the length of time for them to study a project and submit a tooling cost and retail price increased. Compounded by tariffs and the general state of the economy, when we did receive costs, they came back higher than expected.

To elaborate more on Knapford Station: We made the new version half the size and half the number of parts as the first release with the goal of reducing the price. The cost we were given by the factory was higher than the last time we sold it, for a kit that was half the size- It wouldn't be economically feasible for us, nor would it be fair to the consumer to raise the price that much.

We think that this year the production delays have stabilized, and that we will be able to get costs much faster than we have the last 2-3 years. And we are no longer going to announce products until we receive a final cost from the factory, so that we are not announcing projects only to cancel them when they are not feasible.

I'm very glad that you are going to break this habit on announcing certain products, only to be canceled at the last minute. I can understand Duncan, but after the 80th set and Knapford kits canceled, I was starting to lose hope. But at least you guys will promise to not announce anything until you are very sure it'll be something you'll commit to.

I welcome the response Bachmann has made to address the issues regarding productivity and canceled items. Had a feeling that's the reason for implementing the quarterly announcements to ensure that future cancellations will be avoided. Glad to learn the prices will be paired along with the item so that consumers will have an idea of the cost before any potential problems arise. Lastly, I'm happy that the delays in production has improved to ensure that they release in a timely manner. There's a chance that Flying Scotman's price will appear at some point within the next 6 months.

I think the reason Bachmann hasn't announced Luke yet is because they're not ready to announce him yet, that they need to see if his tooling is feasible first, in order to avoid another situation like Duncan. So there won't be a repeat of what happened with Duncan, with all of us looking forward to him, only for Duncan to get cancelled, especially over a year after being announced.

We most likely won't see Duncan back on the cards until after Douglas finishes overhaul. That way, Bachmann could actually make Duncan based on Douglas, instead of his CGI render like originally planned. Rusty was based off his CGI render, which is very different from how Midlander is now. Because Rusty was smaller and simpler, so he was more doable. He's unfortunately too small for an open cab for crew to fit inside.