They’re here!
The Revolution Class 390 Pendolino models manufactured by Rapido Trains of Canada have arrived.
After three years of development – and the occasional hiccup along the way – Britain’s first fully crowdfunded complete model train is a reality.
The first job was simply to take the cartons off the pallet and group them into sets. There are four different 9-car versions – in both DC and DCC Sound, seven different 11-car versions (including the bonus City of Birmingham sets) plus lightbars, 5-car sets and add-on coach twin sets.
The image below shows the first pallet being unloaded. The other still-sealed pallets can be seen in the background!
After several hours work the all the pallets were unwrapped and the cartons sorted into some kind of order.
Later this week when time allows we will being a short programme of testing a selection of the models plucked at random from the consignment.
We are expecting to begin sending models out this weekend, or very soon after, but given the sheer number it will take us at least 2-3 weekends to get every last model shipped. We will try to do it in order of purchase, so those who stepped up at the start receive their models first. After all, they have waited the longest!
We have had several emails from this wishing to collect their models at York – please let us know if you would like to do this too.
We would also like to take this opportunity to pay tribute and say thanks to Jason, Gareth, Bill, Dan, Tomas, Janet and everyone at Rapido who actually did the heavy lifting with this project (let’s not forget – it IS a Rapido model!) and have been with us all every step of the way negotiating issues and solving problems with ingenuity, skill and great good humour.
And, of course, once again, a huge thank-you to everyone who stepped forward and helped us make this incredible project a reality. Is this a game-changer? You bet!