Blog- Kernowland - I bloody told you so... and a review!

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Not too long ago I recall having a conversation with some folks about "what's next for the model railway industry<sup class='bbc'>tm"</sup>. As always, my angle was the westcountry and clay branches, an area of increasing interest in the model railway hobby community and industry. My predictions were the class 22, the various air braked clay wagons (tiger, polybulk, imerys nacco JIA, silver bullets, cargowaggon etc), and then lastly, the Rolls Royce Sentinel shunting locomotive. My predictions caused some controversy and were met with a great deal of skepticism. My logic was, the class 22 covered a wide area in a popular era for modelling and was a "missing link" locomotive, the air braked clay wagons were already proven to sell well with the sale of CDA wagons over the last 2 decades, and the Sentinel was already a popular model in the Knightwing and Judith Edge kit forms, and that the industry needed such a ubiquitous private-owner shunter given the large quantities of private-owner wagons that were already on the market.<br /><br />As per usual, the "I know what's best" brigade poo-pooed my notions, insisting that there was no market for these models because they're "odd/rare prototypes". This statement was more a matter of perception than reality, but they were pretty adamant about how wrong I was. Their predictions instead revolved around ad-nauseum facsimiles of various types of mainline steam locomotives, various types of vac braked coach, and various types of vac braked wagon - in short, things that are already massively over-catered for. The hobby, IMHO, was far too mid-20th-century-centric already. With some 30+ different types of steam locomotive in Bachmann's range alone, and not counting DMUs/EMUs about 20 different types of diesel locomotives, it's easy to see which time period is better catered for.<br /><br />Of course, it wasn't long before Kernow Model Centre came up with the silver bullets, the JIA, the tiger, the class 22, and the Beattie well tank. The manufacturers produced the cargowaggon and sentinel of their own volition. My little list of predictions had now become some of the most heavily reviewed, praised, and warmly welcomed new models in the industry for years. Not since the introduction of the Bachmann class 66 and class 47 was such a universal "hoorah!" heard reverberating through the forums. Now we even have a ruinous Cornish engine house as a lineside structure.<br /> <br />So, to those people who thought you knew better, it gives me great pleasure to say; I bloody told you so!<br /><br />I'd held off purchasing any of these products until the end of this year, when I picked up Hornby's Sentinel. A purchase I now regret not making earlier. Unlike other reviewers, I was not particularly struck by the small size of the locomotive, as I was already well aware of how much smaller than British loading gauge they are. It was more a pleasant reminder - these handsome engines were wonderfully well proportioned, but are also delightfully small.<br /><br />Initial impressions out of the box are very good. The molding is very nice, the etched radiator grille is superb, and the brake gear is quite impressive. The wheels have a finescale appearance, separate positionable metal etched windscreen wipers, and there are a lot of nice surface details, such as chequer tread plate on the walkways. The first thing I did after getting it out of the box was order Shawplan Model Products "Extreme Etchings" glazing kit at a cost of £7 on ebay, because it was immediately apparent that this was the main thing letting the model down. I should point out that this was not a particularly easy locomotive for Hornby to manufacture; they made a few compromises that resulted in some body panel join lines, particularly between the valance and the die-cast chassis, and between the handrail panel and cab. I'm quite happy with the way they've approached these compromises, as they aren't unsightly for the casual modeller, and easily rectified for the more serious hobbyist.<br /><br />There is also a cutaway in the bufferbeam to accomodate the nem coupler - a blank is provided to fit the nem pocket, but falls short of actually lining up with the hole by about 2mm, which does nothing to improve the appearance. The blanks themselves are a perfect fit, so they would be useful for those who wish to convert the model to finescale chain link couplers, requiring only minimal filler after gluing in place. If you are happy to keep the hook and hoop coupler, adding a small square of styrene sheet to fill the void below would improve the appearance enormously, however this would also be a permanent modification.<br /><br />On my 18" length of test track, the model ran surprisingly well out of the box. The running speed has been geared extremely low for shunting, and the whole thing seems to run very smoothly indeed. After running in I'd imagine that it'd be a very good runner indeed.<br /><br />That's all for now folks, stay tuned for more.

 

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