Ashland was a challenge to build a working and fully scenic model railway layout in just two days at the Hornby Magazive LIVE! Exhibition back in July 2011. As regular readers of this blog will know I was part of the challenge building team along with Hornby Magazine editor Mike Wild and fellow modeller Richard Proudman. We started the build as the doors to the show opened at 9.30am on the Saturday and by 3pm on the Sunday the layout was complete and operating for the visiting public to watch.
Ashland running in 1946-9 guise with my stock in this case 21C102 ‘Salisbury’ with original style cab
T9 class number 721 trundles through Ashland with the morning milk train.
Being based somewhere in North Cornwall on the Southern Withered Arm we will once again be running my own 1946 to 1949 era stock on the Saturday and Mike’s BR(s) stock on the Sunday.
The Spalding exhibition will also showcase, in a dedicated hall, a number of layouts that have appeared within the pages of Hornby Magazine over the last few years.
Just a quick reminder that WYCRAIL celebrates its 40th birthday by relocating to a new, bigger and brighter venue with more exhibits and an improved visitor experience tomorrow 3rd November.
WYCRAIL celebrates its 40th birthday by relocating to a new, bigger and brighter venue with more exhibits and an improved visitor experience on Saturday 3rd November.
This is a modern, bright and much larger venue increasing the space available for the show from just over 7000sq feet to an impressive 17,600 sq feet. The new venue will allow for increased space to aid circulation, much wider aisles and larger rest and catering areas. The entire show will also be held under one roof for the first time in a number of years without visitors having to walk outside between halls.
Included in the layout line up is Ashland built by Hornby Magazine Editor Mike Wild, fellow modeller Richard Proudman and myself in a weekend at the Hartlepool Hornby Magazine Live exhibition in 2011, Mike and Richard also occasionally myself will be operating the layout at the show.
Full trade support will be present ranging from tools, kits, electronic components to R-T-R models and books. Hornby Hobbies will once again be a welcome presence at the show along with, for the very first time at Wycrail Bachmann Europe also in attendance.
The new venue is still very conveniently close to the M40 Junction 4 and the free vintage bus service will once again be operated between Wycombe Railway Station (Chiltern Line) and Wycombe Town Centre to the Cressex Community School. In addition, this year it will also operate between the venue and the nearby free Park and Ride situated close to the Handy Cross roundabout, M40 junction 4.
I am now able to confirm that I have accepted an invitation to exhibit Fisherton Sarum at next year’s Hornby Magazine Live show in Hartlepool on 13th / 14th July. This year the show moved to an in town venue at the new Hartlepool College of Further Education, and has gone from strength to strength quickly building a reputation for being a high quality show.
It will not be the first time some of stock has been seen there as the layout Ashland that Mike Wild (editor of Hornby Magazine), Richard Proudman and myself built actually during the 2011 show was exhibited at this years show and on the Saturday ran in Southern 1946 to 1949 guise using my stock.
Fisherton Sarum’s final outing this year will be at ‘TadRail’ the annual exhibition of the Tring and District Model Railway Club on Saturday 13th October 2012. It will be a new venue for TadRail as it is being held at the the Cottesloe School, Aylesbury Road, Wing , between Aylesbury and Leighton Buzzard, LU7 0NY.
Due to many other commitments I do not exhibit Fisherton Sarum more than 3 or 4 times a year, so catch it while you can…
Last year at the Hornby Magazine Live exhibition the Hornby Magazine editor Mike Wild, fellow modeller Richard Proudman and myself undertook the challenge to build a layout in a weekend and having successfully finished with an hour to spare Ashland was born. Based on Southern practice in North Cornwall we used Ashbury and Dunsland Cross as the inspiration, hence the name. Ashland will be returning to Hornby Magazine Live at Hartlepool on 7th and 8th July to enable those visitors who attended last years show and saw only a part built layout to view the completed challenge.
Ashland in 1946 -1949 guise with my Bulleid Light Pacific 21C102 ‘Salisbury’ awaiting departure from the station.
Making only its second appearance since completion, we shall be operating Ashland in Post war 1946 to 1949 guise on the Saturday using my own rolling stock and moving forward in time to the BR Southern Region era of 1955 to 1965 on the Sunday using Mike and Richard’s stock. If you are planning on visiting the show please make sure you come and say hello!
A Drummond T9 runs through Ashland with a parcels train.
This year’s show, being held in the centre of town in a new venue at the Hartlepool College of Further Education, Stockton Street, Hartlepool, TS24 7LB will feature over 20 quality layouts in scales from ‘N’ to ‘O’, many having been previously featured in Hornby Magazine, plus full trade support and catering. Proceeds from the event go to Hartlepool Families First and RNLI Hartlepool.
Other Southern related layouts include: Rowland castle – 00 wartime Southern, Hedges Hill – N 1980’s BR Southern Region and Meopham East Junction – 00 1960’s BR Southern Region.
Although not Southern based another one of Mike wild’s Hornby Magazine layouts, that I can often be found assisting with, Bolsover and Seven Pit Lane will also be in attendance and operated as usual by Hornby’s Railmaster system and is well worth a watch. Further details about the show can be found here on the Hornby Magazine website.
With a nod to David Frost et al for the title… although I am not really that old… honest… As regular readers of my blog will know last weekend was the last of three exhibitions in three weekends, and was the third year in a row that I have exhibited with a layout at the Warley National Model Railway Show. This time it was turn of the Layout Ashland which was built by myself, Richard Proudman and Hornby Magazine Editor Mike Wild as a challenge, which we duly completed, to build a layout in a weekend at the Hornby Magazine Live show in Hartlepool last July.
21C102 'Salisbury' arrives at Ashland. Note her short deflectors and original style cab.
Ashland formed part of the Ian Allen / Hornby Magazine stand at the show and is based on the North Cornwall Line, the track plan being a mix of Ashwater and Dunsland Cross. We ran my own Southern 1946 to 1948 era stock on the Saturday and moved forward 10 years or so on the Sunday with Mike’s own BR Southern Region stock being used. Along with a couple of Bulleid light pacific’s, M7’s; an O2, N, N1 and a T9, my recently re-liveried Beattie Well Tank also put in a sterling performance hauling a mix of suitable stock.
Beattie Well Tank 30586 in early British Railways livery trundles into Ashland with a pick up goodsT9 721 on the morning parcels turn
Warley is a bit of a marmite show you either love it or hate it, however a number of changes made to the show this year including widened aisle widths and increased seating available for visitors to rest weary legs (due to the extremely hard concrete floor) which seemed to improve circulation around the show. There will always be discussion on the cost to visitors attending taking into account the entry fee (still half the price of the next door motorcycle show) and parking, but even all in, its still cheap when you consider the cost per layout ratio or the cost per hour of entertainment as most visitors appear to spend all day there (which is needed to see all or nearly all the 75 layouts and nearly 150 traders!)
Many of the suppliers and manufacturers now appear to time announcements and new releases for Warley, with respect to the latter also Christmas is possibly a factor, however this must put strain on the traders stocking policy and cash flow having to suddenly stock so many new items.
Bachmann released a number of new items and had on display a number of pre production tooling’s in both 2 and 4mm with the most noticeable being the 6 car Midland Blue Pullman. The N Gauge Society’s commissioned, from Graham Farish, fine model of an SR Queen Mary brake van was also available.
Hornby had their livery sample Brighton Belle unit on display, and very nice it looks too, and their non corridor Gresley suburban coaches now released certainly look excellent despite not being Southern.
Dapol have just recently got there 4mm Class 22 into the shops. Kernow Models had the excellent looking livery samples of their commissioned weathered versions on display. Dapol also announced their intention to enter the 7mm market with a 6, 7 and 8 plank private owner wagons to start with. Hattons although not having a stand had a presence with Dapol showing off their stunning looking LMS Twin diesels 10000 / 10001 (both of which ended up onAshlandtowards the end of Sunday!).
Heljan announced their intention to add to their range of transition ear diesels with the Class 16 The prototype, not the most reliable of engines, “worked” mainly out of Stratford so am not sure if they ever reached Southern Region metals via transfer freights.
Gary at 247 Developments showed me his new etch of Southern engine head signal discs (often incorrectly called route discs or headcode discs) that are complete with half etched handle.
This post is not intended to be a full review of the show but just a snapshot from my perspective / interests. Operating a layout at Warley does not really allow the time to fully view all on show and therefore the above are just some of those things that came to my attention. I am sure that there will be a fuller roundup in the various next magazine issues or on some of the web forums.
I am now two thirds of the way through my three exhibitions in three, back to back, weekends marathon. The second of the three shows last weekend was the Spalding show assisting Mike Wild and the Hornby Magazine team operate his layout Bolsover and Seven Pit Lane.
Bolsover and Seven Pit Lane on the right at the head of the Hornby Magazine showcase aisle.
The Spalding show is a large provincial show and is certainly one of the best in the East of England. This year in particular saw an extremely high standard of layouts on show including the likes of Stoke Summit, Hassell Harbour Bridge, Penhallick and the extremely impressive Gresley Beat. This line up is good on its own before you add the entire Aisle of layouts that formed the Hornby Magazine showcase of layouts that have featured in the magazine including Treneglos, Romley Midland and New Haden Colliery. With another of Mike’s layouts Hettle having to be a last minute stand in it meant out team of operators were a little stretched. Bolsover and Seven Pit Lane is DCC controlled using the Hornby Railmaster system which I believe is a first for an exhibition layout, and included the beta testing of a hand held device version of the software.
A closer view of Bolsover and Seven Pit Lane
Mike has also amassed an impressive line of sound fitted locomotives that proved very popular with the visitors. The technology, and to a certainly extent physical parts of the layout too, seemed to work against us a little on the Saturday (the expression a bag of bolts springs to mind) although frustrating for us as operators we kept an intensive service of trains running and the viewing public would have been none the wiser. Things certainly settled down on the Sunday and therefore was a much more rewarding day all round.
Ashland Station somewhere on the North Cornwall Railway
This coming weekend of course sees the final part of the trilogy; operating at the Warley National Model Railway Exhibition, Ashland. This is a layout built by in a weekend at the Hornby Magazine Live Hartlepool show last July by Mike Wild, Richard Proudman and myself. This will be forming part of the largest Hornby Magazine stand to date at the show. I am certainly looking forward to running my own Southern 1946 to1949 era stock on the layout on the Saturday whilst tome will move to the mid to late 1950’s on the Sunday with Mike’s own Southern Region stock. With over 16,000sq feet of space, 75 layouts and a zillion traders the Warley show can be quite an experience; this being the third year in a row that I have exhibited at the show, I was there two years ago with my own Fisherton Sarum layout, and last year with Hinton Parva from the High Wycombe and District MRS. I personally feel that it can be more fun to exhibit than to attend as a visitor and is seen as a ‘Marmite’ love or hate show by many. If you are thinking of coming alone and want to avoid the usual scrum area around some of the traders by all means come and say hello to us on Ashland.
Bolsover and Seven Lane Pit made its exhibition debut at Model Rail Scotland in February 2011 and meant I had to get to grips with not only DCC control (I am still very much in the DC camp with my own fleet) but also Hornby’s Railmaster control programme. As when we last exhibited at the Southwold show last August we will be using the yet to be released wireless hand held control with Railmaster utilising Palm devices. Although as hinted I am a DCC Luddite I have been impressed with the Railmaster system and the added dimension it brings to the operation of such a layout.
I know Mike has been spending some time prior to the Spalding show giving the scenic’s a bit of a refresh and also paying attention to the loco fleet with weathering and also newly sound fitted locos. At the show there will be a whole aisle showcasing layouts that have featured in the Hornby Magazine over the last few years.
Ashland was a challenge to build a working and fully scenic model railway in just two days at the Hornby Magazive LIVE! Exhibition in Hartlepool last July. I was part of the challenge building team along with Hornby Magazine editor Mike Wild and fellow modeller Richard Proudman. We started the build as the doors to the show opened at 9.30am on the Saturday and by 3pm on the Sunday the layout was complete and operating for the visiting public to watch.
Being based somewhere in North Cornwall on the Southern Withered Arm we will be running my own 1946 to 1949 era stock on the Saturday and Mike’s BR(s) stock on the Sunday. It will be nice to be exhibiting a Southern based layout again with Mike,.
So if you are planning to visit either show come and find us as part of the Hornby Magazine stand / showcase area and say hello.
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The model railway world and mainly Southern Railway meanderings of Graham 'Muz' Muspratt
