As I see it, there are very few folks that produce 1/6th modern parts. Personally with the economy the way it is, hobbies will take a back seat to providing for the family. I don't see anyone producing parts for a 1/6th Abrams, M113, Bradley, or Soviet tanks. You could start by producing parts for existing 1/6th scale vehicles (like the M113 since there is one built by Plastic Panzers in 1/6) and once you have some capitol, get into producing the riskier parts. There are lots of 1/8 modern tanks available. If it were me, I would try to find a market that is not already saturated with parts, but it will take some time to build a base of customers and/or a good reputation of producing good parts. Don't rush things. Give people long production times and deliver early. Don't promise parts and then take 6 months to actually deliver the first part. Be realistic. People are fickle and loose interest if the time between seeing the proposed product and delivery time is too great. It's a gamble, but if it were me I would be working out all the bugs and creating a working prototype, research production costs, then offer/gauge public interest once I have the ability to deliver the parts in a short period of time. From what I know about HDPE, it doesn't take well to glue or paint. Probably not a great material for tanks IMHO. PVC takes paint much better or ABS.
Derek On Thu, Jan 5, 2012 at 5:46 AM, Loren <[email protected]> wrote: > Most of the links I find related to RC tanks, particularly large scale > tanks like we use, are all WWII. That era seems well represented, but > it's much harder to find parts and stuff for modern tanks. > > Most of what I'm looking at doing in the hobby eventually will be more > modern machines. I'm seeing little support for these, not so much in > interest but in useful parts. I've mentioned on here getting a CNC > router to make parts, and I'm thinking this would be part of what I > offer(the router would be part of a much more general purpose shop). > I was looking mostly at running gear and small details--tracks, > sprockets, some wheels, cupolas and hatches and such in 1/6 and 1/8 > scale. Computer models can be scaled though, so a tank that's > slightly off could be accommodated with a bit of work but no problems. > > I was looking at using HDPE, and tracks with links(like the Abrams, > the pads are connected via a small link) would have the links from > aluminum. Detail parts would be designed to fit on flush surfaces, to > be compatible with the wood tanks common in this community, and that > would be most likely for others to make. > > I was looking mostly at offering the more common/popular designs, WWII > and otherwise, with only odd stuff needing design time to make. M60, > M1 Abrams, Leopard 1/2, Soviet equivalents, etc. How much interest > would there be in stuff like this? I might eventually do whole tanks, > but for that I'd probably be charging similar to the other makers in > the few thousands, so I don't see a market for that. > > -- > You are currently subscribed to the "R/C Tank Combat" group. > To post a message, send email to [email protected] > To unsubscribe, send email to [email protected] > Visit the group at http://groups.google.com/group/rctankcombat > -- You are currently subscribed to the "R/C Tank Combat" group. To post a message, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe, send email to [email protected] Visit the group at http://groups.google.com/group/rctankcombat
