Doncaster Show
 

I've mentioned this exhibition earlier in another post but thought I'd post a reminder in the Forum's Railway Modelling section.

What is called "The Festival of British Railway Modelling" is being held at the Doncaster Exhibition Centre over the weekend of 13/14 February.

I'm assisting as an operator on "Alloa" which is a truly excellent OO guage layout (early 60's) and intended to be as accurate as reasonably possible, created by the Scottish Region Study Group. It needs 4 or 5 operators and there'll be 8 of us sharing the load.

If you're there, do come and see it and if you feel so inclined, say hello.

Mike

Would like like to make it and will certainly come and see you if I do.

Best wishes.

John H-T.

John,

If you can make it - delighted to see you and to make your acquaintance.

A bit more about Alloa - it has had only one previous outing - at Model Rail Scotland in Glasgow in February 2008 where it won several awards, including the one for best layout voted for by fellow exhibitors. The 31ft x 12ft layout was featured in BRM in the April 2009 issue. Alloa will return to Glasgow this year at the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre over Fri,Sat,Sun 26,27,28 Feb. The four guys in the SRSG have also committed to exhibiting at Perth in July and I think also Wigan in December. I cannot claim any involvement in its creation but have been roped in very willingly to assist in operating it at exhibitions. I've committed to being at Doncaster, Glasgow and Perth and will do Wigan subject to other commitments at that time.

I'll be pleased to introduce you to the experts behind the project including my good friend Steve Turnbull.

Kind regards

Mike

OO Live Steam Supporters Club launched at Doncaster with a Live Steam layout and it was a fantastic success.

Despite being stuck in the corner of the 'annexe' we were often mobbed and most of the people we got chance to talk to were very impressed by what they saw.

Our key finding was that half the people who have bought into Hornby Live Steam never got past first base declaring it is "too difficult to drive" yet we had 8 year olds driving well after just a few minutes.

If YOU have OO Live Steam gathering dust please get in touch with us on this forum or through mail at OOLiveSteam dot com.

Adrian

Sadly I didn't manage to get to Doncaster this weekend I am sure I missed a great show.

Best wishes,

John H-T.

John,

Sorry you didn't make it. The show was extremely busy on Saturday but less frenetic on Sunday. I didn't get the opportunity to spend much time looking around but there seemed to be some good stuff there although I did feel it was a little dominated by trade stands. Although hard to define, it did come across more like a commercial exhibition (which it is) than the sort of "cosier" atmosphere of a club sponsored exhibition but that is not a criticism.

"Alloa" seemed to be well received and we had an almost permanent crowd several deep other than late Sunday afternoon when things generally tailed off quite considerably. As operators we were very busy keeping trains moving - it's a real dilemma as to prototypical movements and timings versus keeping the crowd happy with always something moving. Not too busy however to spot and converse intermittently with a few expected and unexpected old faces. All in all, very good and good fun.

Mike

excellent show some great layouts well worth seeing nice to see it back at doncaster again