You used to be able to get a pendolino train set for about £175 now it's £275 just for the train pack and all that has changed is the livery. Ridiculous the way prices are going in this hobby

Nice model and a great video keep them coming lads.

Thanks for the review, this one beautiful looking limited edition train set.

Still not sure why Hornby numbered it as an 11car unit but only sell 9. ;) On the subject of price...To be fair, 2 HST Powercars are easily 250+... then a rake of Mk3 Coaches too, at least 25+ each!

Soon it will only be Manchester City and Chelsea that will be able to afford Model Railways! That is a nice model though, and the close coupling really enhances it.

Bought my Virgin Trains Pendolino back in 2009, for £90 brand new. The prices are just getting silly now.

Just taken delivery of the Pride one. And it's amazing can't wait for the coaches- hopefully we see a video of yours??

I have both the pride & awc pendolinos, arguably two of the best emus in my fleet!

This seems like a strange decision by Hornby. Re-releasing an old set, with outdated traction tyres/motor/pick-up combination, wrongly numbered and without interior lighting, while whacking the extra 10% onto the already heavy price tag, seems like they're begging for criticism. Reading the comments, there's plenty of it.

It looks good. However, Hornby has chosen a 390/1 to represent, yet is only making it available as a 9-car set instead of a 11-car set. The lack of cab detail is annoying, especially how this model seems to have a lot of light bleed from the top marker light so it acts as a cab light. The lack of interior detailing is also annoying, but the window tint means you can't see in without interior lights anyway. The pantograph being plastic and unsprung is irritating, because it never stays up when you position it upwards. IMO, for the spec of this model, a 4-car set isn't worth over £200. Mine is the original release 7-pin DCC fitted 390012 Virgin Star, which I have extended to 11-car with the correct 5 extra coaches for 012 plus the 2 correct vehicle types to make it into 112. However, I haven't yet renumbered the unit to 112, or the 2 extra middle coaches to their new identities, or removed the pantograph from one of those 2 extra coaches. However, I have added bullfrog snot and quite a bit of weight into the motor end to give it enough traction to cope on a flat layout.

I was so excited when my avanti pendolino arrived at my house

Price is always the first consideration nowadays. I have 9 full Hst sets so I am going to compare this to one of them. This 5 car set is less than the 2 HST power cars. I think that makes it good value and the HST set overpriced. It looks great and I really do not care about the motor. It looks good, runs well and can run with the full 9 or 11 cars.

It’s an incredibly smart model, highly tempting. Fortunately I’ve started to limit my range of modelling or I might just go bankrupt! Enjoy this style of video though!

Love the new avanti livery on what is already an iconic train I have the virgin alstom 4 car set I replaced the axle with traction tyres for the modified one and added 2 more pendolino weights to compensate for not having the traction tyres and what a transformation it flies now thanks for another great video Richard and Mike best wishes Kev Beighton Parkway Sheffield

Looks a good product

Silly prices, think I'll keep my original 9-car Pendolino.

£275 for a set that was tooled 17 years ago, and £45 per coach? What are hornby smoking to charge that much when people’s wages haven’t risen no where near that much

Looks smart. But with the APT release around the corner. I’ll keep my wallet in my pocket til that drops. Especially as Hornby has upped the price of that from £434 for the 7 car set up to £533 and additional coaches from £89 up to £98.99. I’m almost having second thoughts as wanted the full 14 car set. Just not sure how ‘worth it’ it’s really gonna be. Sincerely hope you guys get a good look at one on your layout.

You have to produce a version of the traindear that was in operation over the christmas one year

What a magnificent set! Slightly alarming that they couldn't have put a 5-pole in it given that they're often available in the same form factor so the tooling would still work. Still, it's cheap compared to a Bachmann EMU for example.

Just buy R40015 and R40019 if you want the correct 11 carriage formation ;)

I believe its called inflation to some degree, 10p in 1984 isnt worth what 10p is worth now ... Anyway... more importantly... how can we talk about the enjoyment of the Pendelino, a train, for the masses, if the fundamental fuel of the pendo ... the knitting is, for the most part lacking .. you would expect if you are paying £500 for the train set to at least be able to buy the knitting to keep the pantograph and ultimately the train fully juiced. The knitting being the Overhead Line Equipment ... being ready to use ... not having to scratch build ... you dont scratch build a semaphore signal or a KFA intermodal wagon, you get stunning replication which is ready to use. Yes there's talk of different things in the background to offer a ready made solution to this, PECO were planning something a while back. It should be like a Mars bar. You peel open the wrapper and its ready to eat ... the OLE gantry may need its cantilevers to be clipped on or maybe there will be some simple ones set to hornby track seperation requirements. The industry is going full tilt in offering the modern day model railway enthusiast their digital era highly detailed models that operate under the 25kv settings and here and now, we are seeing big progress with the newly tooled heljan class 86, hornby class 87, Bachmann's very popular class 90, Accurascales forthcoming class 92 and all the other Electric Multiple Unit sets including the Hornby Pendelino, APT and Javelin, Bachmann's 350 desiros and the train of the moment, the Hitachi Class 800 series, soon every network in the country will have its own example - surely we should have the knitting to compliment these stunning models.

Wait for the sale. I can't see hornby shifting an old tooling with a poor mechanism for that price !

I'm only a beginner with the hobby (the floor train runner!) but am desperate for the model! Forget the prices (If I can afford it) and the criticism, all I want is some model of an EMU from the early 2000s (in a 2021 livery!)

Single power bogie for a 9 coach train. Is this adequate?

Still love your stuff, even though I don't model in OO, but 24 'as well''s in 11 1/2 minutes ?

How much is the chips from then

I got a special livery virgin trains one not just the normal virgin trains one

Where to buy this? I have always wanted a model train but they cost WAY To much

It is very disappointing that this model does not have interior lights particularly when these have been featured on the new 4 wheel coaches.

Expensive compared to the old Virgin one

Never understand why Hornby don't research numbers before producing sets. This could've been numbered for a 9 car, but I guess that's too easy. You may want to check the formation on your set though. The 2nd and 3rd coach from the front need to be swapped round 😉 pantograph coach always 3rd from the end.

I bought one of these and they are definitely very nice looking models, my biggest issue with them is for the price you get what appears to be the exact same motor/mechanism set up as in their Eurostar sets. Which for the price has left a bit of a sour taste in the mouth. Exposed gears for the driving axles? Such a poor choice and it'll get clogged easily.

You should keep the virgin pendolino on store so you don’t need to buy it second hand from ebay

£500, say it fast! Say it any way, it is still a lot of money!

Value ? 4 wheel pick up, Dont think so!

Pity it still has traction tires.

Five hundred quid? I could buy a "Z" gauge train for that money-and "Z" is a "true" scale as well. And wasn't "Avanti" C&A's own brand?!

You out the first 2 non driving coaches the wrong way round lol

Why can no one get the coaches right lol.

Certainly looks the part but traction tires bare bones pick ups and basic motor are a major let down for the money. Not what I call value

Not at that price thanks, especially for traction tires!

Who is Hornby trying to fool? Pretending 9 car is 11

Hmmm, only a 3 pole motor and traction tyres?! Have to give this one a pass, Im afraid.

Traction tires are a put off think I’ll stick with Bachmann locos

An old model with a fresh paint job? No thanks

Their is nothing brand new about a 17 year old model with a different paint job and to charge an extra £100 for a paint job Hornby know how to fleece their customers.

£500 set. I’m out the hobby!

I bought one of these. Absolute rubbish, wheel sets fell off, coach ends fell off, wouldn't run over points. Sent back.

Sorry but seriously over priced. From a business perspective wouldn’t it be better to sell products at sensible price so customers would come back to purchase more etc. Talking about the colour isn’t really selling it to me. This isn’t to be negative because I think it’s a great model. Just for me and probably a lot of others it’s a lot of money 💰

Robbing 🤬🤬🤬🤬