My certificated Euro star

[Daniel-378271]

Hello everyone,

I am wondering if there is someone out there thay could shed some light into a Euro star i purchased back in 1995. It came with a numbered certificate as it was in partner ship with Jouef? I have been trying to understand the value you of mine compared to say a normal euro star train set you could buy?

[ModelerXYZ]

The certificates aren't really worth the paper they are printed on. A certified loco is rarely of much more value than an uncertified, non limited edition one. My certified Dominion of Canada loco wouldn't be worth any more than one without a certificate. Model trains are to play with, they don't increase in value. Enjoy running your Eurostar.

XYZ

[P-Henny]

The only way to realistically increase value, is to buy something that is still fully sealed in the original factory shrink wrap plastic and never open it. Assuming, of course, that it is factory shrink wrapped in the first place.

[What About The Bee]

Hello Daniel

Welcome Aboard!

Absolutely every model produced by Hornby is limited in production. Even good old Smokey Joe does not have infinite numbers. When it comes to special locomotives, the numbers become even more constricted.

Hornby are well aware of the "collector" nature of production. In limiting some models to X, they hope to encourage you to think that this is because Hornby wants to drive value. An alternative consideration is that this is how many they expect to sell, X, as that is what the market will bear.

So Hornby issue the model, and include a piece of paper. With printing on it. Which declares number x of X.

Instead of making X quantity of models, without the piece of paper and declaration of X.

Bee

[Yelrow]

In other words, value is Not increased by certificate. Just enjoy using it,as has been said.

[LTSR_NSE]

@Daniel - a certificated model could have more value than the standard one (to both collectors & interested modellers) if it had a unique livery/feature/addition, that was unavailable on another product.

If there is anything more than a piece of paper that makes your version unique, that might increase its value - but unfortunately a certificate alone doesn’t have much value.

[ellocoloco]

Hi Danial and welcome to the forum.

The guys are right. A limited edition certificate may or may not make the slightest difference to the resale value of a model. Your Eurostar is one of 2500 sold as R543 by Hornby. Not a huge amount, but exactly the same model was sold by Jouef as 745100 without the certificate so plenty around. What is perhaps more important is the condition and demand for the model.

But your Eurostar is slightly different and depending on your position it is either the Holy Grail of Hornby models being the most fundamentally accurate British outline model that Hornby have ever sold (prior to the launch of TT120) or the ginger stepchild of the OO model world! The Jouef Eurostar was made in several version and the model sold by Hornby was actually made by Mehano and was a budget version - see the British HO society Eurostar page. There were no intermediate coaches available for it so a full train was impossible. Pantographs are plastic and only one bogie is powered. Jouef did offer a higher spec model in HO but this was never sold by Hornby. In 1997 Hornby released a OO scale model of the Eurostar with their own tooling.

On Ebay this morning I could order either the OO or HO four car sets from about £50. Yours would probably get more as it looks in good condition but I doubt there is much demand for it and certainly in the UK a non certificated OO model in similar condition would demand a higher price.

Time to get it out the box and see how fast it goes......................sunglasses

[Daniel-378271]

Thank you to everyone who has replied and it took me awhile to figure out where my forum post had gone! This information is very useful and an insight to what I have.