Introduction

I will shamelessly plagiarise my own review of a set of 1/35 scale railway tracks made by MiniArt, since the introduction is very relevant for the 1/72 Hunor offering as well.

When I started to think about the context I could use these sets I did not come up with many options at first; after all most rail-related models (railway guns, armored trains, locomotives) already come with their rails. However, railroads are not just bases for railway models. They are everywhere in Europe. Railway embankments can be used to depict soldiers (partisans) placing charges, or just walking alongside. (As can be used with marching POWs or fleeing civilians.) They can form a central piece by depicting a railroad crossing where military police is stopping civilians or military personnel. The “dead end” set could be used in a diorama with simply some personal items, toys scattered around to convey a message about the civilian costs of war. It could be a focus of a fighting, as railway stations were always important strategic targets.

All in all, there is actually a lot you can do with a pair of rails.

Review

The set comes in the usual sturdy little Hunor box with some packing peanuts thrown in. (I would honestly have liked it better if they stuffed the box to the rim with peanuts, but there was no damage on the parts.) We get three sections of tracks about 20cm long each.

The molding is very crisp and the detail is very nice. The metal tracks are thin and in-scale, the wooden grain on the ties is good (although a bit out-of-scale -any grain is out of scale in 1/72nd, it will help painting a realistic looking set of ties). There is nothing to assemble; the ballast and the tracks are molded as one section. The ballast itself is very interesting; the pebbles aren’t just little protrusions resembling pebbles, but you can actually see that they are quite three dimensional on the top.

The tracks are standard gauge - they can be used with the Hunor line of railway carriages and armored trains (along with all 1/72 railway-related models that are of this gauge). They are best suited for Western and Central European settings, obviously.