What ever happened to the AMT Ertl backhoe?

[the60falcon]

Just out of curiosity, are the molds still around for the AMT John Deere backhoe? These things bring a lot of money and look great in the back of a lowboy trailer. 

[Dave Van]

MY UNDERSTANDING: 

Ertl kept the John Deer tooling as they still had, and have, a license with JD.

 

[Biggu]

It was the excavator advertised in their catalog back in the ‘70’s that never materialized I always wanted and still do , that would be epic …

Edited December 2, 2024 by Biggu

[PintoKING]

2 hours ago, Biggu said:

It was the excavator advertised in their catalog back in the ‘70’s that never materialized I always wanted and still do , that would be epic …

You meant this one?

I'd like to get it too!  BUT I'd be EXTREMELY surprised if round2 would produce it.

I personally believe that a more modern excavator would be more profitable to kit. If ever.

But in the meantime, may I recommend this youtube video about a DIY scale modern excavator:

 

[Biggu]

Just now, PintoKING said:

You meant this one?

I'd like to get it too!  BUT I'd be EXTREMELY surprised if round2 would produce it.

I personally believe that a more modern excavator would be more profitable to kit. If ever.

But in the meantime, may I recommend this youtube video about a DIY scale modern excavator:

 

Yes, that's the one ! I remember as a kid , just drooling over that possibility..... oh for sure, I'm sure there is no chance we will ever see it, BUT if there are moulds for it, and enough of us ask , cry and cajole, who knows? LOL!  I will check out the video.. thanks... the catalog pic brought back some memories for sure...

[the60falcon]

2 hours ago, PintoKING said:

You meant this one?

I'd like to get it too!  BUT I'd be EXTREMELY surprised if round2 would produce it.

I personally believe that a more modern excavator would be more profitable to kit. If ever.

But in the meantime, may I recommend this youtube video about a DIY scale modern excavator:

 

I've seen that ad, definitely wish they'd produce it too! That one in the video is pretty wild! I believe it's Aoshima makes a modern Hitachi but I think it's in 1/35 scale or something. I do have one in the stash 

[Brian Austin]

Tomy owns the ERTL brand.

[Goose1957]

Well, we never thought we'd see the Garwood garbage packer either, yet it was finally released. Maybe.....

Jeff

[stavanzer]

1 hour ago, Goose1957 said:

Well, we never thought we'd see the Garwood garbage packer either, yet it was finally released. Maybe.....

Jeff

Of Course, We don't know how far along the Link Belt Power Shovel was, either.

[slusher]

I saw one on EBay not  long ago..

[Rbray47]

I saw a sealed backhoe at a swap meet not long ago. The guy had $100 marked on it. I almost made an offer but I'd probably never build it. 

[Biggu]

1 hour ago, stavanzer said:

Of Course, We don't know how far along the Link Belt Power Shovel was, either.

Makes me wonder where all the information and tools have been stored over the years. Hope it was ‘t destroyed …

[Biggu]

Wonder if someone knows the “ whole story “ on this missing piece ? It would be interesting to find out…..

[stavanzer]

IIRC, the "whole story" is that the tooling for the Farm Machinery stayed in the US, with ERTL (or it's Corporate successor), and was never part of the various deals over the years that saw other ERTL truck kits get owned by Round2 now. A Lotto Winner could probably hire lawyers to reach a deal with the current holders of the tooling to perhaps run off some copies, but I suspect it would be like mating elephants. I think someday something could happen, but obviously nobody has the time, money or need to produce the kits now. I'm sure the existence of the tooling remains at Round2, but I suspect that the ROI on Tractors just isn't there to support Round2 spending the effort to get them out there. And, you have potential conflicts with Diecast toys also.

Just before Scale Auto Collapsed there was a great article on the ERTL Tooling and it's history, with a comprehensive list of kit numbers and ID. Finding that would give better answers than my memory and guesses.

[tim boyd]

19 hours ago, stavanzer said:

 

Just before Scale Auto Collapsed there was a great article on the ERTL Tooling and it's history, with a comprehensive list of kit numbers and ID. Finding that would give better answers than my memory and guesses.

Alan, I believe you are referring to the article i did for Scale Auto with the working title "Ertl before AMT".  It did appear within the last couple of years of Scale Auto although I don't have the issue data in front of me now.  It covered all the styrene kits that Ertl produced before they purchased the AMT/Lesney assets in the early 1980s.  IIRC there were about 40 separate kit numbers, including some that are not at all well known.  I do not recall, however, addressing the status of the John Deere tooling in detail in that article. 

I do have the Ertl John Deere farm tractor (not the backhoe) tentatively set aside for a future "Classic Kits" column for FineScale Modeler (the column that appears in every issue of the last page of the mag where I cover mostly unknown or unusual model car//truck kits from our past). So, this discussion of where the tooling lies and under what ownership is of considerable interest... thank you all for your contributions on this subject....TB  .   

[stavanzer]

7 hours ago, tim boyd said:

Alan, I believe you are referring to the article i did for Scale Auto with the working title "Ertl before AMT".

Yes, that is the article I was referring to. It was great. I'm soery if I attributed to you statements you did not make.

[tim boyd]

3 hours ago, stavanzer said:

Yes, that is the article I was referring to. It was great. I'm soery if I attributed to you statements you did not make.

Alan, no worries, and I certainly didn't read that into your comment.  And thanks for the feedback on that article!   Cheers....TB

[niteowl7710]

Another big problem is the licensing for John Deere - to just pull it out of space, rather than utilizing a long standing one like Tomy/Ertl has - is ridiculously expensive. Likely in itself would cost more than the ROI of the kit sales would produce because the last run of those kits sold like moldy produce. If there's one thing that kiboshes kit projects faster than anything, it's past sales data.

[RickRollerLT1]

At one of the NNL Easts i went to, i asked the guys at the Round 2 table some tooling questions. As i was leaving the table i overheard someone ask about the Ertl tractor tools and one of them replied something along the lines of "we have all Ertl model kit tooling but the tractors are controlled through Ertl-Tomy under exclusivity from John Deere". That means they likely have the tools but would have to do an expensive licence between the two parties or produce them for Tomy.

[Force]

It's not just the ERTL John Deere, Massey Ferguson and International farm tractors, plows and wagons and the John Deere backhoe that's missing, the tooling for the International Transtar II Eagle wich last saw daylight 1996 is also under some tarp somewhere, the kits with the metal components like the Volvo N10 and some others are also somewhere in some unknown location.
I don't know but Tomy who owns ERTL might still sit on them but they don't do model kits so I can't understand why, it's not like the model kits are in competition with their die cast line.