I have been going to the Association’s national show for a number of years, including several at the old venue at Stoneleigh. I’ve always been impressed with the way it’s been organised, and the willingness of those involved to learn from their experiences and to improve for next time. As a veteran of numerous shows put on by my local club (Southport Model Railway Society) I know how much work is involved, and how hard it is to please everybody. What follows is I hope a positive account of my involvement as an exhibitor at the 2018 event at Peterborough.

 

Another layout, another show

I don’t know how it is with other layout builders, but somehow I get the feeling that no sooner has a track plan germinated in their mind than exhibition managers somehow get wind of it and start making enquiries, phone calendar app already open. Perhaps there is some secret messaging service, known only to the Exhibition Brotherhood, by which potential exhibitors are continuously monitored for signs of baseboard construction. An alarm, triggered perhaps by visits to DIY stores with tape measure and notebook, alerts a central control room of suspicious activity that might lead to a new layout, despite the best-planned shed security measures. And as to advertising current progress on social media, that’s just asking for trouble…

 

In my case it’s a little different, in that I pre-empt the above process by fearlessly making contact with exhibition managers to inform them of my intentions and tout for invitations. Not surprisingly, such irregular seed-sowing often falls on stony ground, with vague promises of ‘I’ll get back to you’ or ‘I’ll see if I can fit you in’. Just occasionally however I catch an organiser unprepared and extract a promise to admit my latest invention. And thus it was that I secured an entry visa to the East of England Showground.

 

The layout in question was Kingsdown Roads, one I had fabricated to provide some more interesting running than with previous roundy-roundy constructions. It uses three kit-built plywood baseboards and a pair of ditto turntables, linked together in a U-shape and covered in Mamod track. It features a dozen or so buildings from Pendle Valley Workshop, a good more than a dozen Motley Models figures, and an uncounted number of drums, crates and other impedimenta that might be scattered around a small country goods yard. It had a trial run out at the local Woodvale Transport Rally, and a more serious outing at the Corris Model Railway and Toy Exhibition, so its pedigree was well established. I thought so anyway.

 

Both trips were successful in providing not only proof of concept but also some essential route training for the selected layout slaves. I have five or six of these, kept at constant readiness to attend shows to which they are assigned, and there operate layouts in a carefully-choreographed and well-rehearsed manner. This normally works well, providing adequate arrangements are made for their transport, accommodation and feeding. This last usually involves securing access to significant quantities of Real Ale, which seems to more than compensate for the lack of any monetary reward. Just occasionally however there are rebellious mutterings, which have to be firmly quashed by threats to reveal to their better halves just how much they have spent on new locos in recent years.

 

Making it better

For Peterborough I wanted to show the layout at its best, whatever standard that might be, so I spent some time tweaking its appearance and adding more bits and pieces. Whilst I like adding scenic details, I am under no illusions as to my ability to create high-quality dioramas that might catch the eye of a ‘Best in Show’ judge. So it tends to be quantity rather than quality. One early addition was a Pendle café, complete with a fearsome female proprietor who clearly takes no nonsense from prevaricating railway workers, unsure if they want one egg or two with their al-fresco lunch.

 

Some people have mixed feelings about internet auction sites, regarding them perhaps as examples of rampant commercialism at its most extreme. However I acknowledge the seductive benefit of being able to buy virtually anything at a price that usually takes careful account of market value. And thus a number of items were sourced for the cafe, including plates of doll-house food, fairy lights (non-working) and an all-in-one flower border that fits neatly along the back wall. Somewhat surprisingly, a Lego coffee-maker does not look too out of place on the counter, and the associated mugs fit quite neatly into the hands of the model workpersons. And talking of plants, Lego do some quite-convincing-at-medium-range flowers. I added some of these to the cottage garden and the greenhouse. Paving slabs, garden walls and lawn edging were created with the aid of some old but serviceable Jigstones moulds and some superior-quality filler powder.

 

Another one of my modelling toys is a 3D printer, for no good reason other than it appeals to me, and my pension can afford it. What other reasons are required, is my view, particularly as the never-ending drain on my finances that is our set of five children has gradually reduced its flow to a more sustainable level. Given that the youngest is 23 or so (I have long since lost count of exact ages) it’s high time. So a lot of plastic clutter has sprung up in odd corners of the layout, particularly around the engine shed. Old radiators, worn-out wheels, rusty con-rods and even whole discarded engine blocks have appeared.

 

Finding a home

Soon after downsizing into the current house, I had a dream of converting the garage into an all-purpose workshop and layout storage facility. Now, nearly a decade on, it has developed into a nightmare of random collections of recently-used tools, plastic boxes and piles of things needing to be put in plastic boxes. So I have decamped Kingsdown Roads down the street to the garage of the house occupied by Sons Two and Four. A slight problem, apart from a roof that dribbles in the rain, is the detritus left behind by Son One, which together with various somewhat bulky items from the estate of his maternal grandfather, occupies rather too much of the free space. There is also the trailer used for transporting the layout, despite it being an inch or two short for the main boards. So the layout lives somewhat precariously on top of the trailer and on an old coffee table awoken from a long hibernation in the loft. I’ve already had two incidents, one wind-related and one caused by my coat catching on a baseboard teetering on its edge while I installed wiring on its underside. Fortunately the damage was minor in both cases, but security, as they say, requires constant vigilance, not to mention arms kept well in to the sides.

 

Illuminations - eventually

Now what is he doing with wires on a live-steam layout, I hear you ask. The answer is lighting, in the form of a dozen decades-old Roundhouse street lamps, stored carefully for just such an opportunity. After some experiments I decided on 6v grain-of-wheat bulbs run off a 12v transformer. LEDs would have been more efficient, but installing them in the slender lamp-posts would have been a fiddle, not to mention the need to solder resistors somewhere in the circuit. Some head-scratching was required to work out how to run the bulbs in pairs with minimum use of wiring and of inter-board connectors. A rather fraught wiring session then followed, trying to work on, around and under each board in a rather confined space. On testing the setup, and for reasons that were not immediately obvious, some lamps failed to light and others burned at double the rated candlepower.

 

Faced with yet more grovelling about to try to fix the problem was not an attractive proposition, so I came up with Plan B. In amongst the random debris under the workbench was a twin-output 12v controller, which by careful adjustment could be made to deliver a nominal 6v, in stereo. This simplified the wiring to the point that it actually worked first time, and was sufficiently pleasing to the eye to justify the effort. It also showed the sense of an earlier decision not to flood the layout with artificial light from 1:1 scale overhead lamps. The buildings are also lit internally, using battery-powered LEDs secured with velcro. I am less convinced by the outcome, but they will do for now.

 

Despite a cold end to the winter, I took the opportunity of some weak late-March sunshine to get the boards out, one at a time, on trestles in the open air, to give them a hard staring-at to convince myself that nothing important was amiss. This was largely successful, and I wondered whether to forgo putting the whole thing together for a complete systems test. After all, it had been out to shows twice before, what could possibly go wrong at a third? But this is The National Show, where only the best will nearly do, so I did the right thing and put it all up on the driveway. I would have preferred the back garden, out of sight of curious passers-by, but the logistics dictated otherwise. And would you believe, there was (almost) nothing wrong with it.

 

Travelling hopefully

As in many fields of mankind’s endeavour, it’s not just the material stuff that causes problems, it’s also the human factor. On the eve of the show, my hand-picked staff were scattered to the four winds. One was way down in the Soft South, where he obstinately insisted on still living, another was en route to his country seat in Rutland and a third was packing his bags for an imminent departure to Sicily. Apparently the Mafia had been on the red telephone, requiring his specialist skills for some murky revenge operation. The cover story of a family birthday celebration was entirely unconvincing. Fortunately I had two spares on stand-by who could be allocated to the initial transport duties, with the remainder clocking in as and when they were spared.

 

By mid-morning on the Friday two cars and a trailer were loaded to the satisfaction of a carefully-crafted packing list. Dr Jim, the navigator in Vehicle Bravo, was invited to take careful note of how much volume remained empty behind the front seats. This was his Personal Swag Limit. Any excess baggage acquired at the show would travel home on the roof. The journey was uneventful, if a tad slow on the M6, and marked only by a lunch stop at McDonald’s on the A50, the adjacent Little Chef having succumbed to market forces, or more accurately lack of customers. It being the fag-end of the Easter holidays, the car park was crowded with vehicles, leaving little room for a car with trailer attached. So we unattached it, and parked it on some convenient yellow lines.

 

We arrived at the showground to find all sorts of busy-ness going on. I was again reminded of the work required to get these events on the road, and not for the first time was grateful to be a mere exhibitor. The first task was to convince the reception staff of our identities and of our peaceful intentions, and collect the all-important lanyards. Another memory was activated, this time of an earlier visit when I dutifully returned a lanyard I had omitted to hand in the year before, and then at the end of proceedings forgot to surrender the newly-issued one…

 

Having cleared immigration control, we were allowed to drive cautiously into the main hall, preceded by a steward in the highest of hi-vis clearing a path through the considerable activity on all sides. A wise precaution this, as even a walking-pace collision with a pedestrian would not have been a good start to our, or their, exhibition experience. And as for catching the edge of a newly-commissioned layout and pulling the whole thing slowly but unstoppably to the floor, it doesn’t bear thinking about.

 

Getting it all together

In my experience, erection of a layout is the most stressful part of an exhibition, as there is little opportunity to remedy problems before the public are allowed in to see what has gone wrong. I have yet to forget to bring any crucial item, or to suffer any critical mechanical or electrical failure, but there’s always a first time. Fortunately April 2018 was not that first time, and it all went together with only minor difficulties, mainly caused I suspect by the effect of speed bumps and/or potholes on the trailer’s suspension, big wodge of foam plastic notwithstanding. The distance from the power supply to the layout was a potential problem, but fortunately Malcolm the Soft Southerner had an extension lead in his van, for no other reason than it might come in handy some time. Its time had clearly arrived, and the lights lit up on cue, which was gratifying.

 

We were fortunate in that one of our number, Richard, had graciously made his rural residence available for us to doss down in, and even threw in a self-catered evening meal. The ‘self’ in the description was actually his spouse, with her other half merely entrusted with various reheating tasks, but the combined effect was well received. A couple of others supplied additional liquid calories, but somehow the cigars and cabaret entertainment were delivered to the wrong address, so we had to do without. Afterwards two of us, all too aware of the need for a peaceful night’s pre-show sleep, committed snorism (Dr Jim again) and opted for the B&B across the road.

 

Next morning it was a tough decision whether to opt for a quick breakfast and an early arrival at the showground, or a more leisurely and well-fed start to the day. You may not be surprised that the latter proved more popular. Still, two of us made it 20 miles eastwards to the showground by a little after 9am, which was a promising start. Once satisfied that all was still in order, I left the layout in the charge of a trusty and went exploring. As always the quality of the other layouts was impressive, and not for the first time I wished I were a better modeller. Memo to self – must get round to building one of Gareth’s modular sections, once I have acquired another garage of course. On the commercial side, the range of modelling products available for acquisition, much of it produced by one-man-and-a-laser-cutter enterprises, seems to get bigger every year. A sure sign of a healthy hobby.

 

After a few minutes I remembered what I should be doing, and gathered up my Class B for some minor tinkering by Timpdon’s electronics guru. I had (falsely as it turned out) suspected one of their receivers to be faulty and handed it over for testing at Narrow Gauge North. A phone call shortly afterwards revealed, with more patience and good humour than I deserved, that the circuitry was in A1 condition but the settings were all to pot. Just who might have potted the settings was politely not mentioned. Even more politely, an offer was made to refit the unit back in its loco and set it up properly, should I care to bring said loco to Peterborough. This was duly done, adding more evidence to the belief that our suppliers take customer service seriously, and attending shows has more benefits than just having a good time and buying stuff.

 

The event – at last

At 10am precisely the main door opened and a wave of humanity poured into the hall. My optimistic self fully expected that they would be hungry for the sight of high quality, well-engineered layouts, and would descend avidly on the first one in line, namely ours. In reality of course the tide swept past in an urgent quest for the bargains on the trade stands, as if the event was an upmarket jumble sale. In due course a backwash made its presence felt and we got some visitors, a state of affairs that continued to a greater or lesser extent all day. Three more unrostered helpers turned up, and were gratefully assigned running duties. Some complimentary remarks were heard occasionally, which was pleasing. And nothing fell off, nothing of consequence got broken, and the locos generally behaved themselves. A couple of hours in, I realised I had forgotten to switch on the internal building lights, but it seemed too much bother to do it all at that stage, particularly as there was a risk of disturbing carefully-arranged scenery.

 

From past experience I knew that running a layout means little time for an in-depth survey of the exhibition, so review of other displays was somewhat reduced and my wants list was kept short. Just as well, as Dr Jim did all the shopping for us, and a large pile of treasure trove rapidly accumulated behind the layout. The day seemed to progress rapidly, always a sign that someone at least is enjoying themselves, and all too soon the prospect of having to take down the layout began to loom up. This is my second most stressful part of exhibitioning, as the amount of material that needs to be carefully packed up and secured for transport always seems to be dauntingly large, This time I decided to get all the empty boxes out and arranged in some sort of order, to minimise the amount of searching and sorting required come 5pm. In the event it was all done in an hour, thanks to some hard work by the underlings and efficient management by the organisers.

 

By 7pm we were back in Braunston and having a well-earned beer in readiness for a meal at the Blue Boar. The overall view was of a very successful and enjoyable day, marred only by our unaccountable failure to win anything in the raffle. A Memo t’Committee was contemplated, but after another beer and a bottle of wine, the rest of the whisky and some liqueur chocolates, the idea somehow slipped off the radar. We will just have to go again next year.

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