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1/72 Dragon Armor "Limited" Editions

Posted: Thu Mar 23, 2006 2:52 am
by gehena
I see that what they call "Limited Edition" ranges from 500 (Otto Carius) to 2000 (Ardennes King Tigers)... Does anyone know what is the "Regular Edition"? I am guessing that about 10,000 but is just a guess, not even educated!

Posted: Thu Mar 23, 2006 7:57 pm
by Philip
I've always thought that 1000 and less constituted a Limited Edition, but that is only a guess. Lightning2000 should know this.

Posted: Fri Mar 24, 2006 2:07 am
by Mr. Football
Dragon usual LE's range at 1,500 or less.

Only a few, Carius Tiger and the 60121 Tiger...maybe one or two others were limited to just 500 pieces.

Limited Editions

Posted: Sat Mar 25, 2006 11:07 am
by ltcbj
Limited to: Demand - 2??

Limited Editions

Posted: Sat Mar 25, 2006 11:23 am
by lightning2000
Hi,
It all depends upon how you define the term "limited edition." In my mind, anytime the manufacturer includes a serial numbered card within the item's box which quantifies the total production run, then you can call it "limited edition." Otherwise, an item could be deemed short run, whereby the manufacturer decides, voluntarily or not, to reduce the production run vis a vis another similarly produced item. For instance, I'm sure that some items aren't produced in the same quantities as the more popular items, but the manufacturer isnt obligated to reveal the production numbers. Keep in mind too that an item could end up being a short run if the amount of unusable product coming off the assembly line reduces the production signature. So, if a company initially set out to produce 10,000 pieces but found that 1/2 were unusable, then they're now down to 5,000 pieces.

As far as Cyber Hobby's products go, you'd have to conduct an informal survey to see how many pieces were produced by asking people what their serial numbers are. Some items are also more popular than others, such as Wittmann's tanks, so it may seem as though less were produced when in fact more owners may be reluctant to part with them. In the case of the Carius Tiger, I think, but cant say for sure, that the production run was probably as large as say some of the other Cyber Hobby Tiger I tanks produced around the same time. I say this because manufacturers usually set a minimum number of pieces to be produced since it takes time to run off the packaging and cards, not to mention re-train the workers to produce a new item. I cant imagine a manufacturer giving the go ahead to produce say, 500 pieces of such a small item as this, due to the downtime involved and materials needed to produce the item. If I had to speculate, I'd venture to say that the Cyber Hobby tanks were probably produced in lots of 1,000 pieces.

Lightning2000
www.themotorpool.net

Posted: Sat Mar 25, 2006 12:50 pm
by Trojan99
I don't know what the previous "regular run" quantity was, but I heard that Dragon recently made a business decision to reduce production runs of their new armor units. There is a report that DM has already sold out of the Hornisse 60060 and Stug 60118 models. Seems like they haven't been out that long.

Tim