# Sealab III - Dead



## david-5877 (Mar 14, 2000)

I was contacted via e-mail stating that the Sealab III reissue has been cancelled do to lack of interest. What a shame it's the second attempt to bring back an old Aurora because of lack of interest. Hopefully the will try again with something else in the future.


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## Richard Baker (Aug 8, 2006)

It's a shame- when I built mine I did not have the skill set to do it justice, was hoping for another shot at it.


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## BWolfe (Sep 24, 2013)

Well, there is always scratchbuilding and kitbashing to recreate it!


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## Spockr (Sep 14, 2009)

I still have mine (or at least most of it) and its built but I only did minimal paintwork on it. Its a project I can't ever see revisiting so I may jest let it go if somebody wants it and makes a reasonable offer.

Regards,
Matt


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## SUNGOD (Jan 20, 2006)

I can't say I was that interested but I think there's a danger of relying too much on these kickstarter or pre-order things to gauge interest. Especially when reissuing an older kit.


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## finaprint (Jan 29, 2006)

I agree. They now seem to want the money all at once rather than waiting for it over time like old school businesses did. And it just seems hard to commit when there is no guarantee of it even happening. So I am committing to exactly what they are with those kickstarters. Nothing.

What ever happened to risk? The firm belief that you had a product the public wanted? Maybe they have lost the one thing that made a business man, the burn inside to take the world on and make it his you-know-what. Now they want it all right now and no risk at all. And they want to pass as much of the risk on us as possible. If we wanted that we would step up and be business people right beside them. I have trouble with that as they certainly have no trouble with getting me to work as a temp, for wages that give up right NOW and nothing to really show over the long haul either even if I do choose to give it all I got. Or exactly what they are fleeing by using kickstarters.

The business guy is SUPPOSED to risk and I as the consumer simply consume. When he starts trying to get me to take on his risk, well, all I can say to that is I don't promise ahead for anything not real, but that all changes when I see it physically on store shelves. He commits, then I commit. The way business is supposed to work. 

Do enough empty kickstarters and some of these guys at least will simply close up shop and go home, the dangled carrot must at least LOOK like a real carrot.


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## TAY666 (Jan 8, 2000)

A little devil's advocate here.

In all fairness, after 3 months of solicitations they didn't even get half way. 
http://www.atlantis-models.com/preorders.aspx
Would you want to eat that $14,000 in production costs?
Me neither.
Atlantis does take risks, with their brand new kits. They seem to keep cranking out those flying saucers. But I think they got burned on previous reissues and ended up losing money on them. So they are being cautious.
And I don't blame them. Lots of people say they want this kit, or that kit reissued. But when it comes time for them to put their money where their mouth is, most disappear.

I'd rather they take the safe route and actually stay in business, than bet on one too many losers and have to close up completely.
They want to give us some cool older kits, but the market just isn't there to support them.
Honestly, I think most of the money-makers have already been done.
I can't think of any others that could possibly justify the costs of having new tooling made.


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## scooke123 (Apr 11, 2008)

As cool as the Sealab kit was it was a poor seller for Aurora and I really didn't think there would be enough interest to make it a go this time. 
As for kickstarters you are not out any money up front - they don't charge you until the project is a go. You really are not risking anything by pledging upfront you want something. Everybody seems to want cases of these but when time comes to put up most of them shut up. If I were a company I would use this method as well - at least you won't lose out if it bombs. I was surprised Atlantis got as much $$$ as they did.
Steve


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## Richard Baker (Aug 8, 2006)

3 months of solicitations - I wonder if it was assumed that every potential buyer cruises the internet forums and was aware this kit was even being considered?


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## harrier1961 (Jun 18, 2009)

In this day and age, yeah, I do think most potential buyers of old, reissued kits do visit the internet now and then.
Also, Altantis had the pre-order up on their website, so they were not just relying on forums.
Now, if you are totally anti-internet, well then, you probably wouldn't even think about anybody reissuing an old kit like this then.

Just my 2 cents.

Andy


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## Spockr (Sep 14, 2009)

Atlantis is also on Facebook and have 4,337 'likes' which means that that many people get updates in their newsfeed from them. Along with all the board postings it seems like they have good exposure.


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## Buc (Jan 20, 1999)

also got a lot of hits from the link I had on my page. Think the
kickstarter idea is also a good one.


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## RMC (Aug 11, 2004)

david-5877 said:


> i was contacted via e-mail stating that the sealab iii reissue has been cancelled do to lack of interest. What a shame it's the second attempt to bring back an old aurora because of lack of interest. Hopefully the will try again with something else in the future.



who did you hear this from ?


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## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

I'm still not sold on the kickstarter idea, but that is just me. I'd have bought three of four boxed kits if it came out. But I don't do kickstarters. I know a lot of other people with the same feeling. I talked about it just the other day at the local IPMS show. Most people honestly don't know they exist, even for small or niche market companies. And, that ultimately brings back a bigger issue I think - exposure. My local Hobbytown has never heard of Atlantis, Monarch, etc. If it isn't AMT or Revell its totally under the radar for them.


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## swhite228 (Dec 31, 2003)

They didn't offer them selves any way to gauge the purchases of local hobby shops and comic book stores. Of the stores I talked to 3 didn't even know it was up for repoping.
They were all interested in ordering it for stock but were held back by the fact that they would be purchasing an item that may not be made. The other big problem was there wasn't a dealer price they could find anywhere.

I wonder how it would have looked if dealers had been part of the preorder.


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## finaprint (Jan 29, 2006)

From djnick66...

'I'd have bought three of four boxed kits IF IT CAME OUT.'

The caps are mine and I apologize. Exactly the way I feel. I plan no kit purchases hardly at all, you go to the hobby store or cruise online and suddenly IT is there. Calling your name no less. That one will ALWAYS get my eye long before any wishful thinking which is what a kickstarter is. 

Somebody higher up posted 'they don't charge you until the project is a go.'; my view is they already have charged you an emotional cost. After a few hopes I have turned my mind off to them. They better hope it doesn't turn me off to the company itself, a real danger there. People do not like having their strings pulled. Just gimme the dang product, physical and in my dirty little hands. 

When I got my original Sealab I could have cared less that it was not a good seller, I considered myself lucky to have gotten it. I never saw another on the shelves ever again so that may well explain the dismal original sales. That one had my name on it brother. Just like a kickstarter, if you don't put it out there (physically) you will NOT be selling it. Promises mean nothing in today's liars world, look at politics. People get let down enough as it is and they draw a protective bubble around themselves even from things as simple as kickstarters. It's a human psyche thing. 

You can't play it so totally safe that you make nothing to lose nothing. Atlantis makes the flying saucers cheap and smaller-good idea but smaller kit=smaller profits as well. I also see a definite trend towards simpler design along with an increasing lack of true art, like skills cutting say a asymmetrical figure. Anybody can program a mill or lathe to turn in repeat circles or curves with a cutting tool, we pay $12/hr. here for people doing that. If interesting enough subject I'll still buy but I prefer real skills like hand artwork translated into multiple copies. Alas, ADD has now struck the machining world too. Could be a good plan to survive what is essentially a protracted recession now though, the world is pretty much no longer going to work like it used to. Kickstarters themselves are an indicator of that. I'll still take the smaller kits all day long over a promise that does not exist. 

Take the trouble to go all the way and somehow I will figure out a way to buy it. You commit, I commit. You don't I don't. I got no time for imaginary things, enough trouble keeping up with the real things and that includes model kits. 

It's the one major problem the kit makers will have with us older buyers who otherwise are the king kong cash cows...............we set priorities and stick to them much more than the child buyers do. Quarter (as related to half) efforts like kickstarters will never replace the item in the stores where you can look, touch, and feel. Even virtual efforts like Amazon pics are miles ahead because I KNOW IT TRULY EXISTS, get it quick, boy, before they are all gone!

And really, SOMEBODY should verify Sealab is truly dead..............


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## Richard Baker (Aug 8, 2006)

Problem with a Kickstarter is that it is asking a person to make a financial commitment to but something at an unspecified time. Yes I would have bought one, but when the kits would be shipping I would have to look at my cash flow and set aside something over a period of time. I rarely am able to preorder anything. 

If a company wants to produce a kit that is a business decision. It is always a calculated risk for a calculated gain. To me the Kickstarter was being used as a put up or shut up marketing pole. What it did however is find a narrow slice of the potential market of people- those who were aware of the Kickstarter program in the first place and of those some people who were willing to commit to purchase this kit at some unspecified date.

Sorry to see how it turned out but personally I feel using Kickstarters like this is a lazy way to inaccurately judge interest. Round2 tried a similar thing recently and I think that trend will continue. As mentioned above it does totally ignore the on-the-shelf impulse buying and feedback from the actual brick and mortar store owners who know their customers.


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## david-5877 (Mar 14, 2000)

RMC and finaprint - It was a notification about the cancellation of my order from Atlantis.


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## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

Exactly, I have a decent disposable income for kits and hobbies. But I can not commit $100 to something that may no happen with the potential risk of being billed out of the blue at some point down the line. Now, if I go in a shop and see two kits and drop $100... I am out the money but go home with the kits that day. I don't like having some future debit hanging over my head. Its the same as when you order something and its on back order and 17 months later your bank account is overdrawn because the item suddenly comes in stock and they bill you.


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## SUNGOD (Jan 20, 2006)

And don't forget there's people like me. I'm not hugely interested in the kit but I probably would have bought one. As you guys have said producing these things is always a risk and no manufacturer would get anywhere if they just relied on these kickstarter like things.


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## finaprint (Jan 29, 2006)

We are not the ones who have to put up or shut up, they are, real kits out on the sales floor rule. 

Basic rule of selling to the masses, if it ain't there you DON'T sell it. I pass up plenty of stuff that if it is sitting there right in front of me I won't. It being turned into an intangible does not help the (potential) maker at all. He's not even a maker if he doesn't make it so halfway to obscurity right there. He better be REAL careful with that. 

Model kit buying is 75% impulse, we don't have to have a single one to still live our lives so they better coddle up to the consumer a little better than that. 

I just pulled up the last five kits I've bought, and thinking in hindsight on each I am sure if they had been a kickstarter no way would I have bought a single one of them. ALL were impulse buys, as is most of my hobby stuff. It's my drug hit, when I want it I want it right NOW. If I am forced to think longer than a few seconds about it then saving the money quickly takes precedence over it. What us old birds do.

Thinking about it right now. I would NOT commit to a Sealab kickstarter but being truthful with myself, if I see one sitting in the hobby store I am going to have trouble not buying it. A lot of trouble. It would be here then gone again forever.


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## Cajjunwolfman (Nov 15, 2004)

IMHO. No offense intended if my opinion is
Different from yours.

I believe the reason so many parts were used from these kits
In the movies is because the kits didn't sell back then. A big cheap surplus of "Greeblies". I can't understand how anybody thought this kit would sell now? 
However I would be willing to
Put up $1,000 of my own coin provided 30 other people would. We could produce the kit, own it, and take our chances on whether it is profitable.


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## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

Airfix has these kick starters going and they get zero results too.


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## fortress (Apr 1, 2006)

I am really sorry to here about the Sealab perhaps that is something a 
garage kit manufacturer might tackle I would like to see one done but
of course business is business, personally I would like for them to produce
a 1/35 scale Spindrift, but hey I'm sure that's crazy talk too. 


fortress:thumbsup:


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## fire91bird (Feb 3, 2008)

Round 2 had the Sealab III on their Wonderfest survey as a possible Kickstarter project as well. The Atlantis Kickstarter was already underway when the survey came out, if I recall, so the survey results may have reflected that. Perhaps Round 2 would be interested now. It doesn't seem that Kickstarter is popular among modelers, so they will have to be convinced some other way. It also seems like the interest is more for its parts and not the subject matter, so it's appeal might actually be limited. Round 2 would have to be convinced of that,too. A "greebly" pack with oddly familiar parts might be an alternative.


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## finaprint (Jan 29, 2006)

As a point of reference does anybody even remember what a Sealab cost back in the day? $10? $12? Memory is failing me here.


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## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

finaprint said:


> As a point of reference does anybody even remember what a Sealab cost back in the day? $10? $12? Memory is failing me here.


Not that much. Probably $5 tops ?


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## SteveR (Aug 7, 2005)

Probably $5. 
It wasn't a $2 car model, but neither was it a $13 1/25 Tamiya Tiger.

I loved the Sealab kit, but it would be a niche kit today. 
Sealab isn't in the news, undersea exploration isn't popular, it's not in any movie and it's not ... sexy. It also doesn't fly, roll, sail or shoot anything. 
It's really for a sub-group within a group: older modellers who liked the Sealab. And kit bashers.

But you know, with the instruction sheet, some measurements and a Plastruct catalog ... the thing should be easy to scratch.
But yeah ... I'd like to see a reissue ... in yellow styrene. Someday.


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## Cro-Magnon Man (Jun 11, 2001)

I agree with what's been said above - that the Sealab kit is highly desirable but a risky project for a niche market, and that most of the likely reissues have now been done. 

It's good to get our hopes up, but when that Russell Crowe 'Gladiator' film was in cinemas there was hope expressed here that the two Aurora gladiator kits would be reissued; then when the Pirates of the Caribbean became all the rage there was hope of a Bloodthirsty Pirates reissue (we got Blackbeard at least); right now there's a Man from Uncle film in cinemas, but I doubt there's any point in hoping for a reissue of the Aurora Man from Uncle kits. Sad...


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## spawndude (Nov 28, 2007)

Agree with the two previous comments. People in general are just not interested in science related subjects like the Sealab. Back when the kit first came out there was considerable interest in the oceans. Jacque Cousteau was very popular around this time. His programs were on prime time TV. To my knowledge he didn't have any connection to Sealab, it was a US Navy project. Despite this related subject the kit was never a success even back in its day. America had finally made it to the Moon and interest in science began to decline.


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## Cro-Magnon Man (Jun 11, 2001)

Yes, perhaps one way to reissue the Sealab kit would be as an 'old-time' kit, stressing its dated subject, rather than try and sell it like it was current, cutting-edge science. There have been some 'old-time' reissues of Monogram military kits, I think, with exact replicas of the box design from the 1950's or '60's, stressing that you're buying a nostalgia kit in its dated-looking old-style box. Sealab's image might fall into a similar category by now, but I can't see it happening. At least all space kits possess the potential for disaster and alien attack that we've absorbed from watching movies. The Sealab theme is too tame, it needs a beast from 20,000 fathoms adding to it!


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## fortress (Apr 1, 2006)

Wondering cause I don't know if Atlantis found an original kit and had it reverse-engineered is a smarter alternative for them to do as opposed to an all new tooling?


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## swhite228 (Dec 31, 2003)

fortress said:


> Wondering cause I don't know if Atlantis found an original kit and had it reverse-engineered is a smarter alternative for them to do as opposed to an all new tooling?


They reverse- engineered a donor kit that was loaned to them. The kit has been returned to it's owner.


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## SUNGOD (Jan 20, 2006)

Maybe the only way they can reissue a kit like this is to jack the price up?


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## djnick66 (May 2, 2008)

The reverse engineered kit is still all new tooling. They have to cut a mold. From what I have read about the process from comments from Round 2 and Moebius, the process is not really "inexpensive" any more hence you don't see that many kits being done that way now compared to the 90s when Round 2 started doing it.

The reissue Sea Lab kit was going to be fairly expensive anyway, wasn't it? $70 or so? Not that a price like that is out of place any more.


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## finaprint (Jan 29, 2006)

Sadly the Chinese have learned just like every other country we have gone into to exploit, that we are really NOT their friends and they have to reorder the business arrangement themselves since the American businessmen will not hear of changing it on their own. 

I don't blame them a bit for doing it. Their business tanking in the Chinese stock market will have them looking even closer at that, bigger changes coming I feel.


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## Atlantis1 (Sep 16, 2013)

Just to clear things up on the Sealab
28k Tooling costs. That's all we wanted to raise on our site not Kickstarter.
We would have had to put up an additional 30 to 35k to actually go into production and have 3000 units sent to us from China.

We were still willing to risk that. But I am very happy we do not have to.

I asked distributors about the kit and if they would buy it, the excitement was lets just say a big yawn. We have to sell to them at deep discount.

We are moving on to other things look for Big News in the next couple of weeks.


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## John P (Sep 1, 1999)

Well there go go.


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## Spockr (Sep 14, 2009)

Atlantis1 said:


> Just to clear things up on the Sealab
> 28k Tooling costs. That's all we wanted to raise on our site not Kickstarter.
> We would have had to put up an additional 30 to 35k to actually go into production and have 3000 units sent to us from China.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the clarification and update Pete! Looking forward to see what you guys have coming up next. :thumbsup:

Regards,
Matt


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## Cajjunwolfman (Nov 15, 2004)

Thank you for giving some
Realistic cost figures.
Always wondered about that.


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## finaprint (Jan 29, 2006)

Yeah, with costs like that pretty soon nobody'll be making anything.............


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