RC10Talk - The Net's Largest Vintage R/C Community

scr8p wrote:I wasn't complaining about them remaking parts. I was complaining about them asking if we want them to remake parts. We've been adking for many years, just make some crap already.

I understand, but they are trying to gauge whether it is worth their investment. They can't just go ahead and make parts that don't sell. Yes, they have received requests for some time to make these parts, but if they haven't done it yet, then that means those requests were not large enough in volume. I think they're being pretty smart about it by trying to gauge demand before committing valuable company resources.

If they do, hopefully it will be the old type nylon and not bright white pvc plastic.

transamman908 wrote:If they do, hopefully it will be the old type nylon and not bright white pvc plastic.

x2

Since when does RPM use PVC?

THEYTOOKMYTHUMB wrote:

scr8p wrote:they can take a break from making flesh toned nut sacks long enough to do that now?

That made me !

Same here.

Although, I probably would buy some Dirty Danglers if they were available in the old translucent white.

Every time I go to my LHS I ask if they got them in yet. He says the owner won't let him...which means he has tried lol

In past discussions on here about RPM not wanting to produce more of their old products, that nut sack comment has been brought up in the same context. It's a very good point.

It's funny, the other night I was randomly thinking about how they discontinued the 10T trans not too long ago. I have a NIB one so I looked on eBay and see they're fetching between $50-60 which is crazy. Looks like I'll be putting mine on soon for that price, and before they potentially start remaking them again.

I see a lot of responses for Clod parts. The comments are claiming that they're big again? Where is that taking place because I haven't seen it. I periodically look at Clod stuff and it's been doing about the same prices as usual. Maybe I missed something.

More than likely it will be the bright white lookin stuff again. They already have that stuff on hand and it wouldn't cost any more to use it. Just hope they don't just run black. Would personally like the neon yellow and blue again but hey whatever (if anything) comes to light about this I'm sure someone will complain about it.

Yeah, the dirty danglers in transluscent white would pry be the only way to go . Might have to re'tool' the 'tool' though for that one...

as far as them running them now...just to make a buck off the re-re crowds which is fine. Just business. Could've earned a few customers more that just the re-re guys with continued support all along instead of the constant form letters to reply to requests about this stuff. If they actually did want to 'help' the vintage situation all they had to do was search rc10 on ebay to see that there was a demand for the stuff.

Todd

All this talk really wants me to get a look at their numbers of buyers of their various products. They must be much greater than my suspicions if they consider the products we'd like to see such a questionable venture. I'm not taking sides, as I simply don't have a dog in this hunt. It really does arouse my curiosity though.

OK, here's the latest I just received from RPM. (I've been talking to them through email)
If you care to read the whole thing start from the bottom up as they are the oldest.

Guess we need to post a poll on the 1st and foremost part that we really need the most.
I just don't understand why they would recycle or trash a mold that costs so much money, it's not like for the size of the parts they are molding it could possibly take up that much room.


"Dear Randy,
Thank you for your thoughts. We value your opinion and yes, we have been watching what is being said on our Facebook page. We post those questions because we are genuinely interested in our customer's viewpoints. Presently, we are considering an item or two to re-release just to see what the demand would be. However, we also have several parts in-process right now so anything we do pursue would not be available for at lease 2 - 3 months at the earliest.
The vintage market has been around for quite some time. Many RPM parts for the RC10 were only discontinued 3 - 5 years ago. The only reason we ever discontinue any RPM part is because the sales dropped below a certain threshold here, and that threshold is very low (we stop producing parts when sales drop below 50 packages in three months). We will always continue to offer parts that are viable and selling. Once they drop below that point though, we stop. Our decisions are based off of our knowledge of the industry as well as information coming in from parts such as our a-arms. If the vintage market is strong, sales on our a-arms will rise and rise noticeably, even though our a-arms are still available.
With respect to the T2, our sales on T2 parts were weak when that truck came out so I'm sad to report, we won't be re-releasing anything for that truck. The only items we will be considering are for vehicles that are currently out, such as the RC10 classic. It's a shame I didn't speak with you a year ago because I gave away a complete T2 to a friend - no charge!
Lastly, please remember that it is hugely expensive to build molds. A typical a-arm mold can cost $5,000 - $20,000. That means we would need to be able to sell roughly 1,200 - 5,000 packages just to break even on that mold. Since most of our older products' molds have been recycled or destroyed, we would have to start from scratch to build those molds. Is the demand for our parts really that strong? That is the question we need to ask ourselves before we begin.
Again, this doesn't mean we won't make anything, it just means we are being very cautious to see where to begin and what the market wants. Try this... Post up a question at www.rc10talk.com and see what people want from us FIRST as a vintage re-release. If we were to remake one item to start, what would they want? For reference, we will not re-release chassis kits since they are too expensive to build and too risky as a vintage item. Give it some time then e-mail us the link once you have some decent feedback and we'll see what is said and how much interest is generated. With that, I'll forward it over to our product development team and see what they say. Take care and please let me know if there is anything more I can do for you.

----- Original Message -----
From: *****
To: RPM Answer Man
Sent: Monday, February 03, 2014 11:57 AM
Subject: Re: I'm Begging...


Well I guess that’s pretty much a no...
I seriously doubt you’re going to see a strong increase in sales for just you’re a-arms, those are still easy to get and have not been discontinued. It’s just about every other part that you ever made for the RC10/T/T2/etc. and many more parts that you never did that are what people need and want.
I already have spare a-arm sets still in the package just incase you decided to discontinue those too. I search Ebay regularly for all of the rest of your parts for the RC10 series especially the RC10T2, and I buy all the reasonable ones that I come across. In the past 2 weeks I have been vigorously searching hobby shop sites for various parts to try to finish building a brand new T2 from scratch, and I’m pretty much convinced that I have found everything that was left. There’s still quite a few parts that I still need that I may end up having to just go with used parts, but what other choices to people like me have? To me this is a no brainer, there are sooo many companies making parts for the new RC’s today, but nobody is making parts for the vintage RC’s! There’s still a huge market for them, so why not take advantage of it and not have any competition to fight? Have you checked that vintage post on your Facebook page lately? It’s loaded with people asking for vintage parts, and what about all those people that don’t even know about the post?
If your basing future parts on the sales of 1 particular part that is already available and plenty to be had, then I guess I might as well give up now because you guys are not seeing the whole picture. There’s at least 20 part numbers off the top of my head that are in super high demand right now and they aren’t a-arms...

Randy

From: RPM Answer Man
Sent: Monday, February 03, 2014 10:45 AM
To: *****
Subject: Re: I'm Begging...

Dear Randy,
At present, there aren't any plans for RPM parts for the "new" RC10 from Associated. However, that can change at any time. If we see a strong enough demand for currently available RPM RC10 parts, we may decide to rebuild some of those old molds and re-release them. Unfortunately, many of those older molds have been either recycled or destroyed, which means they would need to be remanufactured. We would need to see some strong sales with the few RC10 items we still have available to convince RPM management to do such a thing. With a little luck, hopefully we'll see a surge of demand for RPM RC10 a-arms and have something available for you soon.
Take care and thank you for your interest and support of RPM products. If you have any other questions or comments, please feel free to send us another e-mail.


----- Original Message -----
From: *****
To: [email protected]
Sent: Friday, January 31, 2014 12:12 AM
Subject: I'm Begging...

PLEEEEAAASE consider another run of all of your Associated RC10/RC10T/RC10T2/etc parts, they are SOOO popular and ridiculously hard to find, and if you do find them they are 10 times more than what the list price was.
Please see for yourself how many people are looking for these older parts for all of these vehicles that are still wildly popular today!
I just ready through 20 pages of 50 posts per page on RC10Talk.com specifically related to the RC10T/T2 series and I lost count how many people are asking about where to find various parts that you and Associated discontinued a while ago! If you were to make another batch of these parts you will be amazed how fast they will go... I’m not sure why, but these older models are more popular now than they ever were. I’m actually building my very first T2 right now and would love to use so many of your parts! To be more specific I as well as many others are looking for the 80542 adjustable body mounts, T2 rear a-arm mounts in black (not sure you ever made these, but it would be awesome if you would (ASC7363)), 70722 short bumper, 80551 stealth conversion in black, 70892 bellcranks, and anything else discontinued. Most of these parts will fit several models, so that makes it an even bigger market.
I’m sure you saw how fast all of the rereleased RC10’s went, I’m sure your parts for them and the other mentioned discontinued models would go just as fast if not faster since there’s already so may people looking for them!

Please consider my pleas as well as many others to reproduce these parts again... (even if its just in black that would be great, black goes with everything.)

Thanks for your time,
Randy"

I've merged these together.

SOOO popular and ridiculously hard to find, and if you do find them they are 10 times more than what the list price was.

20-25 years post-production will do that-.... Try finding a GM Wonderbar radio for a Tri-Five NOS

I don't really see a big market for T2 parts...

And $5000 to $20000 to make a mold for a part thats a few inches big? I question that too. Maybe 20 years ago.

Mochanic wrote:(even if its just in black that would be great, black goes with everything.)

black does go with everything, but it would be far from "great". if they don't make rc10 parts in their old translucent white, they will lose the majority of guys that would actually buy the stuff. it's easy enough to make the parts black ourselves if needed.

The RC10 front and rear arms that don't sell are still in stock.

Sadly, it still sounds like we're at the "we need x amount of people to do a run" situation Without online and LHS support, I think we're SOL I didn't see ANY hobby shops with comments

With that said I do dig the one guy (or guys) idea of the RPM worlds kit / parts re-re Worlds or not, re-re parts would be cool and I'm sure I'd buy a ton in whatever color they chose and even if they weren't stocked by my LHS