Cheshire Railway Modellers

Page 1 (1-10) 1. Good exhibitions.   2. Layout information.   3. Standards.   4. Talking to the public.   5. Wagon loads.   6. Exhibition performance.   7. What is black?   8. What sort of show visitor are you?   9. What happens when we're gone?   10. How much does it cost?  

Page 2 (11-20) 11.Visiting the colonel.   12. Are you a secret modeller?   13. Getting trained.   14. train simulation.   15. The quality of shows   16. Extending the layout   17. Involving the public   18. Are you consistent?   19. Trains for children   20. When modelling is done

The other weekend Fred had again been a demonstrator at the Farthing Gate show.  He recounted a conversation he’d overheard at the next table between a boy of about nine and a chap building a bridge from metal sections.  It went something like this …

“Whayer doin?” asked the lad, in a half-bored tone.

“I’m soldering,” the demonstrator replied.

“Whazat?”

“Sticking two pieces of metal together using solder.”

“Howd zitwurk?”

“Do you make models from card at school?”

“Yez.”

“Did you stick the bits together with glue?”  The lad had.

“Well, solder is like a glue.  But to become sticky, it has to be so hot that it melts.  When it cools and goes back to being solid, it holds the metal together very strongly.”  He then showed the lad and invited him to pull apart the bits he’d just soldered.  He couldn’t.  The lad was most impressed.

The demonstrator went on to explain how the metal was thoroughly cleaned to provide a good bonding surface and flux applied to prevent the metal from reacting with the air when it got hot.  The young fellow started to ask quite pertinent questions.

He quickly appreciated that different materials have different melting points and so molten solder can run between pieces of metal without them melting.  Later he realised that by using solder of different melting points fresh components could be added without other bits becoming unstuck.  He even grasped the use of a block of metal as a heat sink.  However, nobody could explain why solder actually sticks metals together.  After a while, he was allowed to solder some parts to the bridge.

Later in the day, he returned, this time with his father in tow.  “Thazbits ayedid,” he announced with pride, pointing to several cross-members of the bridge.

“Don’t be silly,” was the curt reply.

“Ayedidem, dinaye?” he appealed to the demonstrator, who confirmed the youngster’s achievement.  Father was most surprised.  The lad then went on to explain how it was done.  The parent was dumfounded at his son’s newly acquired knowledge and skill.  He admitted that he thought soldering was a black art completely beyond him.

“Kid’s can pick up things so quickly,” Felicity observed.  “They haven’t yet learnt that some skills are supposed to be difficult.”

“Do adults just need to give them the opportunity and encouragement?” the chairman mused.   “We should never underestimate what youngsters can accomplish.  It would have been so easy to ignore that boy.  No doubt that incident raised his self-esteem.  Perhaps as a result, he’ll become one of the leading railway modellers of the future.”  And none of us could find a reason to disagree with that.

Some local clubs raised their eyebrows when they heard that the Nether Hamblins show had secured a grant from the Regional Board for Promoting the Arts.  It seems they had bid for funds under the ‘Inclusion’ heading for a summer holiday project involving teenagers and a local artist.  The resulting ’work of art’ would be a model railway to be displayed at their next show.

“Bully for them,” cheered Jane.  “It’s about time modelling railways was recognised as an art-form.”

“Why should they get cash and not a proper model railway club?” Peter asked.

“May be it’s because the Hamblins show team is more imaginative than the modelling clubs that traditionally put on events,” Jane suggested.

“Less imaginative?” Paul sneered.  “They don’t build anything, they just put on shows.”  We all smiled to ourselves.  Paul first started saying he was building a layout about fifteen years ago.  In all that time we’ve seen nothing of it, or even bits for it.

“Anyway, what’s ART got to do with model railways?” he demanded dismissively.

“Whether they realise it or not, builders of models railways follow the same rules as other artists,” Felicity explained.  “They select the key features, re-combine and re-position them, as well as compress time and space to make a meaningful representation.

“They create a stage-set, so it’s theatre,” she went on.  “They include cameos that record little incidents – the scenes of a play.  And the train movements provide the principle story-lines that bind everything else together, so that makes it a drama.  And if the moves are well-choreographed, then that’s equivalent to ballet.”

This analysis of railway modelling came as a shock to Peter and Paul.  Their jaws slowly dropped when they realised that they might actually be accused of being … ARTISTS.

“Why haven’t real clubs thought of this and put in their own applications?” Bill enquired.

“Lack of imagination,” Jane repeated.  “They don’t think about modelling as anything other than a craft.  They’re so engrossed with locomotives, scale standards, DCC and ballasting that they haven’t realised there’s a broader picture around what they do, or seen what’s going on the wider world and the opportunities that can be exploited with a bit of lateral thinking.”

“Are you saying we’re narrow-minded?” Paul demanded indignantly.

“Oh yes,” Jane replied, much to his surprise.  “Many model clubs just complain about how the world gives them a raw deal and a bad image.  But then it’s always been easier to moan than to get up, go out and search for new ways to promote the hobby and earn a good press.  It might even require doing something new.”

“That means going outside their comfort zone,” Felicity chimed in.  “Some folk are so set in their ways that they find it greatly disturbing to do anything new or unusual.  Good fortune is more often the result of hard work and imagination than any intervention by Lady Luck.”

“It strikes me,” the chairman mused aloud, “that there are sources of external support that we modellers really ought to consider.  Perhaps we should keep our eyes and ears open.  But above all, perhaps we should keep our minds open, so that we can identify potential in any opportunities that present themselves.”  And we all agreed with that.

A few weeks back, Graham brought his new layout along and taught Jim and Bill how to put it up in readiness for their trip to the Charr Hill show.  First he told them.  Then he showed them.  Finally he made them do it all for themselves, both the assembly, and equally important, the dismantling and stowage

When it wasn’t going to cause damage, Graham even allowed them to find out they’d made mistakes.  As he explained, through adopting this procedure they would remember things better, recognise the symptoms of problems and be able to resolve them when they arose.  It was a laborious process, but the layout went up and down several times that evening.

“It’s a good thing it’s a two-day show,” Paul muttered.  “At this rate you’ll just about get it running before the show closes on the Sunday.”

“You can’t even be bothered to learn,” was Ken’s swift put-down.  “At least Jim and Bill are willing pupils.  After a few sessions they’ll be really useful engines.”

“Who wants to be a really useful engine?” was Paul’s riposte, not recognising the reference to Rev Awdry’s stories.  “You become proficient and he’ll always be asking you to help him at shows,” he warned them.  “You’ll just get put upon.  I make sure I don’t know how to do these things.  That way I’m never asked to help.  Means I can get on with my own projects.”

The following week, Graham’s layout was up and running in no time at all.  The training had paid off.  Now the emphasis was on fluent operation.  They started with the basic moves until they were fully conversant with the control panel, and then they progressed to the more complicated moves where knowledge of siding capacity, clearance points and isolating sections became important.  After a while there were up to three locos simultaneously going about their business.  Again, Paul ridiculed the whole training process.

“There’s a great difference between operating one’s own simple layout at home and performing at an exhibition on a complex shunting layout,” Fred commented.  “At home, the solo operator makes one move, and then another, perhaps with the same loco or maybe a different one.  There is no pressure to complete a shunt in time for the departure of someone else’s train and mistakes don’t matter.  Moves that would, in reality, be made by two locos simultaneously are made in sequence.  And if an incorrect move is made, then it doesn’t really matter.

“By contrast,” Fred continued, “under exhibition conditions, there may be two or more engines moving round the yard at the same time.  Their movements have to be co-ordinated.  Control of a loco may be passed from one operator to another according to who has the best view of the relevant sidings.  Breaks to work out the best shunting procedure or to take a leisurely cup of tea are just not allowed.  The pressure is one.  Mistakes cannot be made.”

“The more layouts, locos or rolling stock you build, or the greater the number of layouts that you learn to operate, the more confident you will become,” he went on.  “This allows you to tackle new projects with less apprehension.  If you restrict yourself to what you’ve done before, then you’ll never develop and your modelling is moribund.  If applied to life, this philosophy would severely limit your activities.  Indeed, you might not have taken your first breath.  And then you would be dead.”

“I was brought up to believe that the more things a person can do,” the chairman observed, “the more use he can be to his family, his friends and the community in general.  Putting your time, skills and talents at the service of others is what differentiates humans from other animals.  And doing it as well as you can marks out a human being as a true friend.”