Blade 700X on final approach...

[dnj1985]

Originally Posted by Brian James

This is utterly untrue. It is a business decision plain and simple. Horizon Hobby has chosen to focus on segments that we have been historically successful in. Personally, I would love to see the Blade Pro-Series models stick around, but I understand why they aren't, and I support the company's decision.

That being said, The Blade 550x and the Blade 600x are discontinued. The 700x is still in stock and available.

As for us (Horizon Employees) not commenting further, it is Horizon's policy to not comment on our future product plan.

The 550x and 600x owners will have parts support. Historically, we have supported discontinued models for years after the model was discontinued.

hmm and why cant I find a 700x kit only anymore?? hmm maybe just stock is left,, kinda like the 550 /600x,,,, theres a few combos out there but that's it,, funny how one could try to bend the bar in there favor?
im gonna go ahead and say it , the 700x is discontinued ,,, hh just hasn't told you guys yet

[OnTheSnap]

Have a look on Facebook. Blade guys are flying 700 goblins. I think the message is pretty clear?

It's too bad they can't comment on the situation and guys buy not really knowing. So have a look on Facebook and see what the guys are flying. It's crystal clear indirect messaging

[Uriah]

Originally Posted by OnTheSnap

Have a look on Facebook. Blade guys are flying 700 goblins. I think the message is pretty clear?

It's too bad they can't comment on the situation and guys buy not really knowing. So have a look on Facebook and see what the guys are flying. It's crystal clear indirect messaging

To add to the craziness, if the Blade guys can't comment on the 700X being discontinued, even though they know that's the case, why would they want to continue representing Blade? Since the 550X and 600X are already officially discontinued, surely they're not sticking it out to represent the 180CFX or 300CFX? If I was a Blade rep, I wouldn't think there's a serious product to fly for and represent anymore, and my sponsorship or team position would now be backed by the 180CFX and 300CFX. Since the Blade guys are probably considered Horizon Hobby reps, the products they represent may go outside of the Blade series lineup. But what are pilots like Stefan Finster going to be representing now that the Pro Series is gone? I'm not dissing either the 180CFX or 300CFX, but I'd be a bit insulted if I was brought on a team to fly 550-700 size birds and am now being expected to fly little apple dumplings.

[Iskareot]

In all honesty and what was said prior in this thread... they will focus on what they do best... I admit, BLADE and it's micro /300 400 series size is hard to beat for price, access to parts and entry level fun.

I am happy about the 180cfx.. SURE the non normal flying mode and straight speed is a bit sucky but I love the heli overall. As for the 300cfx, I love mine I thrash it around and really it flies flat out amazing and I am quite happy with it. The 450x for the buck is wicked and all my other blade Helis really are rock solid with little to no expense to maintain.

In the end most of us know the size they are best at and have been for years... I hope they continue to be good at that.

It is sad they are out of the big show.. but at least they are still around for some of our fun

[OnTheSnap]

Here's my wild guess on what may have happened. None of this is fact. Just wildly speculating.

In the end, Horizon is a business, not a hobby or some guys passion (meaning a small company like what SAB was building a product out of a personal passion).

Now some great passionate guys designed the 700x, but the first year out, it obviously far underperformed the sales targets. During that year it had a recall, and never gained much momentum. Had some gear issues, but at that point the fairly small blade team probably had to make a choice. Laser focus on execution of the 180cfx and probably some other products, or step back and pour man hours into a (so far) failing (from expectations) platform.

When a company gets to a certain size with a large collection of projects and products, there is internal competition for limited resources. Pretty clear that it made no sense with the Horizon leadership to allow its Blade division to direct resources into products that are vastly missing targets when the queue is so full of projects with far more money making potential.

So here you have a platform that needs some v2 attention, but no resources or justification. The Blade designers likely anxiously wanted to work on it if anything to perfect what they had engineered. It needed to get over that profitable hump in the first year to get any support from the internal politics that obviously exist in the company. Really any large company.

Anyway. All my personal speculation based on experience working and helping start a few businesses hat grew quite large. Politics happen. And from the outside it can be hard to understand the logic.

[Greg B]

My thoughts exactly.

[Nytro97]

The 700x now shows on back-order at Horizon. Its the end of the road.

[crashcopterman]

Originally Posted by Nytro97

The 700x now shows on back-order at Horizon. Its the end of the road.

A very short road!!

[KiloXray]

Originally Posted by OnTheSnap

Here's my wild guess on what may have happened. None of this is fact. Just wildly speculating.

In the end, Horizon is a business, not a hobby or some guys passion (meaning a small company like what SAB was building a product out of a personal passion).

Now some great passionate guys designed the 700x, but the first year out, it obviously far underperformed the sales targets. During that year it had a recall, and never gained much momentum. Had some gear issues, but at that point the fairly small blade team probably had to make a choice. Laser focus on execution of the 180cfx and probably some other products, or step back and pour man hours into a (so far) failing (from expectations) platform.

When a company gets to a certain size with a large collection of projects and products, there is internal competition for limited resources. Pretty clear that it made no sense with the Horizon leadership to allow its Blade division to direct resources into products that are vastly missing targets when the queue is so full of projects with far more money making potential.

So here you have a platform that needs some v2 attention, but no resources or justification. The Blade designers likely anxiously wanted to work on it if anything to perfect what they had engineered. It needed to get over that profitable hump in the first year to get any support from the internal politics that obviously exist in the company. Really any large company.

Anyway. All my personal speculation based on experience working and helping start a few businesses hat grew quite large. Politics happen. And from the outside it can be hard to understand the logic.

I think you probably nailed it, man. I bet Haley is bummin'. That probably really sucks from the engineers perspective.

[Temptation]

Originally Posted by Uriah

+1

I bought my Blade 500 3D fully aware the model had been discontinued. I bought my Blade 600X fully aware the model had been discontinued. I was fully aware of the talk over the Pro Series lineup being discontinued entirely. I bought an extra 600X kit for parts, which will practically pay for itself in the canopy and blades, alone. Like TomC, I will fly my Blade 500 and Blade 600 until I can't get parts for them anymore. I certainly am not in a position to complain because I bought both birds and applicable parts fully aware they had been discontinued.

I understand the frustration here, guys, but there's nothing abnormal going on in the way Blade has chosen to discontinue the Pro Series lineup. If a company per-maturely announces that a product lineup is being discontinued, they risk difficulty in liquidating their current inventory. Some companies choose to make an early announcement anyways; that is entirely their choice based on their own business models. It doesn't require a business degree to figure that out. They aren't legally obligated to tell us their business strategy. I would recommend you all just enjoy your birds and fly the heck out of them. Once parts become scarce, simply move onto other brands. I'm moving over to TSA Models and will be building a TSA 700N Platinum this winter for a first dip into owning a nitro heli. To make a long story short, chill. Life goes on.

This is a true statement but not one of good character.
"If a company per-maturely announces that a product lineup is being discontinued, they risk difficulty in liquidating their current inventory. "

So if things didn't look like they were doing well on the business side and maybe HH made a mistake then its ok to be misleading and take advantage of our inorganic so they could dump the stock on us. instead of the HH being forthcoming they painted a pretty picture to save their own a**.

Sounds like what the big guys do in the stock market to the individual who lose there life savings when they dump there stock.

For some of us we were told the pro line is here to stay. They were not honest.
It would be different if they would have said sale will not support this pro line therefore we are discontinuing said helis and now offering them at a discount price.

Now its our problems. That is the mindset of a thief rooted in selfishness. I guess HH management is just another typical corporate America company.

[Temptation]

Originally Posted by OnTheSnap

Here's my wild guess on what may have happened. None of this is fact. Just wildly speculating.

In the end, Horizon is a business, not a hobby or some guys passion (meaning a small company like what SAB was building a product out of a personal passion).

Now some great passionate guys designed the 700x, but the first year out, it obviously far underperformed the sales targets. During that year it had a recall, and never gained much momentum. Had some gear issues, but at that point the fairly small blade team probably had to make a choice. Laser focus on execution of the 180cfx and probably some other products, or step back and pour man hours into a (so far) failing (from expectations) platform.

When a company gets to a certain size with a large collection of projects and products, there is internal competition for limited resources. Pretty clear that it made no sense with the Horizon leadership to allow its Blade division to direct resources into products that are vastly missing targets when the queue is so full of projects with far more money making potential.

So here you have a platform that needs some v2 attention, but no resources or justification. The Blade designers likely anxiously wanted to work on it if anything to perfect what they had engineered. It needed to get over that profitable hump in the first year to get any support from the internal politics that obviously exist in the company. Really any large company.

Anyway. All my personal speculation based on experience working and helping start a few businesses hat grew quite large. Politics happen. And from the outside it can be hard to understand the logic.

I can go along with this, but I would rather support the one that had a passion for something and wanted to share it, then the one that wanted my money and was willing to to be misleading in order to get it. My hat goes off to the blade team, but its hard to trust HH as a company.

[dexterous]

I feel that Horizon would have been more financially successful if they wouldn't have tired to be all things to all people. While I personally find it very cool, I have an extremely hard time believing that the RC helicopter market could support having as many concurrently selling models as Horizon did in the first half of 2014. If they would have stopped at the 550X or possibly made an optional stretch kit resulting in the 600X I think we would have seen them last as the sales, support and development efforts would have been more focused.

I own damn near all of the Blade lineup but I find that my personal flying habits tend to push me into clearly defined sizes. For example, the most frequently flown Helis in my fleet are my 300x and my 600x. Even though I have a 450x and 500x sitting there their usefulness (and future) is somewhat in question because there's not enough difference between the 300x's size and the 450x. The 500x needs a large area and if I am going to go through the motions of flying the 500x I may as well fly the 600x. I am sure I am not alone in this and I feel that it directly effected Horizon's bottom line.

[jadewarrior]

Originally Posted by megawhacker

Will parts be available from HH for the 500/550/600/700 five years from now? Time will tell.

My gut feeling is no. Parts are being discounted and cleared out.

I don't think they'll be available for long, either. Why would they keep making expensive parts for helis that are no longer being produced and all the old stock is sold out? They didn't sell all that well, comparatively, in the first place which is why they were discontinued quickly, therefore the market demand for spare parts is not going to be that great. Plus, people who are flying Pro Series helis generally aren't crashing nearly as much as the people flying the cheaper BNF stuff. They flat out know that not many Pro Series parts will be sold in the future. Those CNC machines are enormously expensive and they aren't going to keep them in a dedicated setup for these parts. They'll be re-tasked/re-programmed for other things. I have a feeling once these Pro Series parts are gone, they're gone forever. I don't see the aftermarket sector picking up the slack, either, for discontinued helis that weren't produced and purchased in huge numbers. Sure, companies like Lynx will make upgraded parts while a heli is still "alive" but, after discontinuation, will they gear up and start making replacements for all the rest of the stock parts? Nope.

[jadewarrior]

Originally Posted by Brian James

That being said, The Blade 550x and the Blade 600x are discontinued. The 700x is still in stock and available.

Too bad this word couldn't have been put out months ago instead of letting the rumors fly rampantly around. HH/Blade could have really saved some face had they done that, but I guess all the discontinued kits still had to sell, so...

Also, as for the 700X... "In stock and still available" <> still being produced and not discontinued, but we all already know that, now.

The 550x and 600x owners will have parts support. Historically, we have supported discontinued models for years after the model was discontinued.

That means ALL the parts need to be available. Having an entire heli grounded because a part or two isn't available isn't "parts support". Having a small fraction of a heli's parts on hand at any given time with no availability for the critical parts that EVERY heli has isn't "parts support". True parts support means complex-to-make parts like bearing blocks, frame plates, CNC machined head/tail parts, etc are available and not just things like booms, skids, blades, etc that are easily sourced elsewhere with little-to-no modification.

[JGDeavers]

Perhaps another company will aquire the rights or designs and have production continued, just sold under another name?
Other clones are out there...not bad designs at all...maybe even hobby king would sell them.
No secret they were made in China anyway
...just random thoughts from a guy who likes his blade 500, but no more or less than my trusty ol trex 500.

[jadewarrior]

Originally Posted by jgd65

Perhaps another company will aquire the rights or designs and have production continued, just sold under another name?
Other clones are out there...not bad designs at all...maybe even hobby king would sell them.
No secret they were made in China anyway
...just random thoughts from a guy who likes his blade 500, but no more or less than my trusty ol trex 500.

I doubt it. Selling off your design to a bottom of the barrel clone company is basically admitting complete and utter failure. They very well could make a model WORSE and it would still be forever associated with the original company, which would be Blade in this case.

[JGDeavers]

I was merely attempting to offer a little positive outlook to all those down about the loss of the helis above 450 size.
I would lose no sleep if blade just disappeared...plenty of other brands out there to spend my toy money on.

[VP5000]

Yea that was me that claimed they don't make heli's anymore. They said they did, I said ok just so you know "as if you couldn't" all your blade customers are going else where so when are the new series coming? They reply "It's our policy not to discuss future blade products". LOL well, its our policy to buy things from companies that support there products for more than a year lol.

[jadewarrior]

Originally Posted by VP5000

well, its our policy to buy things from companies that support there products for more than a year lol.

All they had to do was keep us informed of what was going on with the current Pro Series helis. That would have involved no discussion of future products, Area 51 type research, etc but, instead, they chose to stay silent and let the rumor mill that they KNEW would take over go right on ahead in full force. That's what killed it for Blade with me in the future. Lack of information, not the very short run of the Pro Series. However, I don't think that was because of the Blade team. I'll bet they were chomping at the bit to let us know what was going on, but they had a gag order from on high that probably would have put their jobs in jeopardy if they had said anything until Brian James was finally allowed to let that horse out of the barn.

[vebbyson]

Let's all move on to a new heli... Whose heli will become our primary machine to fly ... Be interesting who we bump into on different forums I'm now building a goblin 570 and found Rich K there also. And for those naysayers who said horizon and blade weren't bailing on the pro-line and bought and now are dismayed...