Arnold (models)

Arnold (metal toy factory K. Arnold GmbH & Co ) was initially a German company that tin toys and model trains, mainly in N gauge, manufactured. Later it was bought by the Italian company Rivarossi and now belongs to the English Hornby group.

History

The company was founded on October 4, 1906 in Nuremberg by Karl Arnold and produced there, mainly tin toys. 1913 the company moved to its own building work at the Nuremberg ⊙ 49.45414911.060291 Blumenthalstraße, which was later extended to the German men's town. During World War II Nuremberg all plants were destroyed. Production was resumed after the war in the branch operation in the Upper Palatinate Mühlhausen until the Nuremberg plant was also rebuilt.

Due to the gradual decline of the paragraph, tin toys in the late 1950s moved to focus on the development of a novel model railway system. In 1960 models (N for " Nine Millimeter" ) were first at the Nuremberg Toy Fair as " Arnold Rapido 200 " presented at a scale of 1:200 in N gauge. Starting in 1962, the models of Arnold Rapido were made ​​on the amended 1:160 scale. This was standardized in 1964 for the gauge N in NEM 010 internationally. Arnold was thus a pioneer of N gauge and was regarded for many years as a leader, however, had to be adjusted from 1964 to increasing competition from the products ' Minitrix ' ( from the House of Trix ) and from 1969 " Fleischmann piccolo ".

Arnold initially produced almost exclusively models in N gauge was only in the 1990s, the product range to include a few vehicles in the nominal size TT has been extended. In addition to rolling stock and tracks Arnold also created accessories at a scale of 1:160 in a limited selection. Among them were several buildings and road vehicles.

Arnold developed many innovative products with which one a certain technical superiority drew on the model train market. Thus, a novel trace -N coupling was introduced in 1963, which has already collected a year later from MOROP to the European standard. In 1973, the simplex adapter for automatic uncoupling anywhere on the layout.

After many successful years, Arnold was forced to declare bankruptcy in 1995. In 1997 the company was taken over by the Italian competitor Rivarossi. The Nuremberg property has been sold and is in the episode with residential and commercial uses. In 2001, the production in Mulhouse was set, and the model forms were brought into Italy. 2003 Rivarossi was also insolvent. Subsequently acquired 2004 Hornby Plc. Parts of Rivarossi and thus, inter alia, also the brand name of Arnold and Arnold- forms.

Since 2006, Arnold model railway products are again available commercially. The development of the models was carried out first in England and Italy, since 2009 in Spain and Germany. After initially came many existing models in N scale TT and in revised form on the market, again completely new N gauge models have been developed since 2009 now. For 2013, the first time a model has been announced in the scale 1:148 for the British N gauge market. It is a model of the five- Pullman electric railcar Brighton Belle.