Our exhibition is next weekend 23rd and 24th October at Langley Park Boys School, South Eden Park Road, Beckenham, Kent.
The club layout is Horton; now extended to 32' x 10', the main line control panel is fully computerised and the guys aim to get two trains circulating in each direction. Seeing is believing. Me, I'm allowed (occasionally) to operate the branch line if I'm very good and drive the van for them.
... and if you come tomorrow as a special never to be repeated offer you'll get me showing you where to park. :-)
In message , Chris Wilson writes
That must be worth paying the entrance money to see.
Two stints on the car park ... it rained, it blowed and it rained and blew some more. :-(
On the up side there are some *very good* exhibits.
In message , Chris Wilson writes
Where were you? You weren't anywhere to be seen when I arrived, nor when I left. :-) At least I saw Roy Manning: he was on the door when I got there.
True. The ones I enjoyed particularly were Thornbury Hill and Coombe Mellin, and I didn't spend enough time looking at Horton, coz it's "very modern" and out of my time period, but what I saw of it was nice.
Car park between 1230 and 1400 and again 1700 through to 1800. Other than that I could have been anywhere ... might have been at the KGR stand where the bugger talked me into buying not 1 but 2 diesels (and I thought he was a friend)! A class 08 and a class 20, son wanted the 08 and after I bought the
20 I couldn't really say no. First impressions (based on not yet taking the lid of) the class 20 (Backmann) is the dogs do-dahs, all green, indicator disks, so smooth .... very good slow speed control. Got home, wife saw the recipt, screemed became violent, told her that these things normally run in pairs and pretty please can I get another ... and she got more violent ... I'm still limping!:-) You might have seen my son, he spent most of his time either on the drive it yourself N guage or behind the Pullman association stand playing on a gameboy with the son of one the exhibitors there.
Coombe Mellin certainly gets my vote but to be frank there were so many (and still are for tomorrow - although I head 'up north' tomorrow) it's hard for me to choose who gets second place. Plenty of variety to.
Yeah ... don't want to sound disloyal but it's not my favourite, far to modern. Stephen's signalling though is out of this world, tremendous and by the time it gets it's next outing the station side should be complete and that really should be a treat for the modern fans.
There's plans afoot though for another 00 gauge layout, post nationalisation, transition - steam to diesels set somewhere 'up north' where trains were 'ard and carried coal ... none of this 3rd rail glorified tram stuff we see 'daan sowff'. Still at the pre-planning stage but I'm hoping to get involved with that.
Thanks for the comments Chris. Yes, we will complete the scenics for the Crawley Show in April. We might also get the Up line running tommorrow, now we've found that the newer Point Modules Relay PinOuts are different, and we have rebuilt a power supply.
Given that there were multiple track ciruict failures, wrongly wired relays and most of the day we had half the layouts control system without power, I thought we ran a reasonable service. At least 2 trains moving at all times, mostly in the scenic area.
I'm also stunned that an S&T maintenance engineer, a Signalling Designer and a NR qualified signaller (all operators!) all failed to notice a wrong side failure Green vice Red on HN11 signal from the start of the show until 1700!
regards HN28 aka SJP.
You're welcome, though if I'd known you were lurking I would have been more honest :-)
...
^^^^
That's your problem there ... it's all subcontracted, like I keep telling you, stick with Gods Wonderful Railway with a fully functional electro-mechanical, fully automatic, interlocked and idiot proof TPS and you wouldn't have drivers passing signals at danger. :-)
In message , Chris Wilson writes
At least that won't be a duplicate of my garden railway, then, which is OO gauge, post nationalisation, transition - steam to diesels set somewhere 'in the south Wales valleys' where trains were 'ard and carried coal ...
Trouble is, I've got over 100 P.O. wagons, and they had disappeared by transition time.
One exhibition manager has just got home, very tired, having broken down one very successful show. Horton *consented* to behave itself today although loading / unloading it into the van in a torrential thunderstorm was an interesting experience. Just the barriers to deliver to Crawley tomorrow and the van to return, and the exhibition is over for another year.
Meanwhile Horton appears at Gravesend in a fortnight. I'm just the van driver, although if I'm very good, they might just let me operate the branch line.
In article , Chris Wilson writes
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