Hornby OO R30555 LNER Class A4 Sir Nigel Gresley with figure LIMITED EDITION The Great Railway Engineers Collection

With a shiny new blue livery and NEM tension lock couplings, this steam locomotive is a wonderful collector's piece. Entering service with the LNER as 4498 in Garter blue with streamlined side-skirting and red wheels, this was the 100th Gresley ‘Pacific’ to be built when it emerged from Doncaster Works in October 1937. Allocated to King’s Cross ‘Top Shed’ and used on front-line express services such as the prestigious ‘Coronation’ between London and Edinburgh, ‘SNG’ was built with a single chimney and had stainless steel numbers and letters for the tender added at a general overhaul in January 1939. After a period in wartime black, when the side-skirts were permanently removed, the locomotive returned to lined Garter blue in March 1947. Painted into BR’s express passenger blue in September 1950, as 60007, it set a post-war steam record speed of 112mph on 23 May 1959. Withdrawn in February 1966, by now in BR green, it was saved for preservation by the A4 Locomotive Society.