On the 9th May the NMRC attended the exhibition hosted by the South Herts Model Railway Club with the original section of the O-16.5mm layout 'Exdale'. The exhibition itself was held in Queens School Bushey. Like the NMRCs own exhibition the venue was split over several halls to accommodate the 25 layouts gathered together from around the 'south east'. In addition there was society and trade stands in attendance ensuring that a wide range of interests were catered for both enthusiast and general public alike. Being on such a large scale the exhibition spilled over into several classrooms in addition to the three main halls. At times it seemed that going 'back to school' seemed just about right as some basic geography skills were required to negotiate the maze of classrooms, corridors and halls.
The day itself did not get off to the best of starts with one club member suffering car problems en-route. This led to a cosy van ride (with the layout in the back) for the remaining members of the club who headed off east. Thankfully, by heading off early in the morning there was time to set up the layout before the show opened to the public. Setting up the layout was one thing, running it was quite another. Now, here is a piece of advice to all those would-be-exhibitors at future shows, when you pack up your car/van with the layout for the show it would generally be considered a good idea to pack the control panel for the layout! Er, guess what was forgotten on this occasion.
The club had a training night specifically devoted to setting up the layout a few weeks previous so that come an exhibition, the members of the club less familiar with the operational side of Exdale would be competent with its operation come an exhibition. So, yes the club was prepared but as it transpired something had to put a spanner in the works. Luckily, a planned staggering of the operators meant that following some frantic phone calls and tracking down of club keys, a 'late comer' was able to save the day and pick up the control panel before coming to the show.
Once all was sorted the layout which by this time had had a good clean of the tracks worked almost faultlessly and provided much entertainment to people watching the trains coming and going along with the occasional shunting demonstrations in the yard. The training session held earlier in the year was useful and it ensured that the operators had a good grasp of what was required to 'make the trains go'. Much fun was had in watching the goings on in Exdale and in making the 'goings on' go on by the public and operators alike.
Written by Alan Robertson