NMRA Winter Meet - Northampton

This weekend was the delayed NMRA winter meet, moved from it's usual Benson location to a hall in Northampton.

The meet was mostly focussed on traders and bring-and-buy with only a handful of layouts.

There seemed to be a really good turnout and the hall was very busy, it certainly seemed like more of a crowd than Benson usually attracts.

There were plenty of bargains to be had at the sale tables and as usual I picked up a few goodies.

Several trailers, containers and three kits - a pair of old Milepost 501 Furehaf Z-Vans and a partially built and slightly damaged Lonestar Trailmobile 40ft flatbed.

I also picked up a couple of blue box locos, a basket-case GP50 and a nicely painted GP60, both of which will become donor locomotives for my planned SD60 kitbash which I hope to have ready for this years convention.

The GP50 was clearly destined to be a super-detailing project before it was abandoned, presumeably when a more detailed rtr GP50 was announced.  The frame has been very nicely milled and filled to allow space for piping and frame sides.

I'm mostly interested in the shell parts, but the trucks, motor and frame may see use in another project, either it's all good fodder for the parts collection along with some GP38-2 parts that were also in the box.

Benson Winter Meet 2014

A rather belated updated on this years NMRA winter meet at Benson in Oxfordshire back at the beginning of January.  It's the first meeting of the year and the small hall is always packed with layouts and traders.

This years layouts included the excellent Red Hook Bay, the Gosport modular club, a Japanese layout and a New South Wales based outback line among others.

The show is always worth a visit and the second hand area upstairs is one of the highlights, this year I picked up some Heljan building kits.

If you haven't been to an NMRA meet yet then I highly recommend checking out the Spring Meet at Weston on Trent on 26th April.
 

NMRA Winter Meet - Benson

This years exhibition schedule got off to a good start with the NMRA winter meet at Benson in Oxfordshire.  

 I drove up to the small village early on Saturday morning and spent an enjoyable couple of hours browsing the secondhand stalls and watching trains on the many excellent layouts.  I also took a turn at the throttle on Dan Spalding's 'Galatia, Kansas' layout.

I'm on the lookout for suitable rolling stock for Godinez, but there wasn't much Rock Island to be had, other than some old Athearn blue box kits which aren't detailed enough for the layout, I don't want to take on a lot of super detailing projects so I'm looking to pick up some more modern models for the layout.  

I did pick up a couple of old Details West boxcar kits for a quid each, they should be suitable for repainting into Rock Island versions.

The top floor of the hall was filled with bring and buy tables and I picked up a selection of Morning Sun reference books on Rock Island for a very keen price, and much cheaper than importing from the US.

Here are a few pictures of the various layouts that were in attendance. I forgot to take a note of the names as I took the photographs, so apologies to any modelers that are mis-credited!


‘Mill Falls’ HO - Mike Carter

‘Windsor, Colorado.’  HO - Peter Everitt

The Worcester N gauge modules

'Simply Narrow Gauge’ On30  Keith Willows

'Sankei City' Japanese Layout Z - Keith Willows

‘Roestock’ - Ian Turner

‘Saw Pit Creek’ HO - Bearwood Group

‘Galatia, KS’  HO - Dan Spalding

Benson bits and pieces - bargains for the parts bin.

One of my favourite areas of any model railroad show is the secondhand sales tables, I'm always keen to pick up a bargain or a bag of bits for the parts bin and this weekends Benson NMRA meet was no exception.

The bring-and-buy tables were packed with all kinds of kits and bits, including a huge collection of 'O' gauge and a massive selection of Walther Amtrak coaches, along with the usual Athearn blue box and other assorted HO stock.

I picked up a number of cheap items that caught my eye, although all of them are very definitely going to be filed in the parts bin or added to the 'to do' list.

This Railpower SD60M (bizzarely painted in Warbonnet scheme) was a great deal at only £6, worth it for the trucks, plow and cables alone, I will probably strip the shell and rebuild it as a different roadname at some point.

This Dummy GP60 was only £3 and will make a good parts loco, or I may add a motor and sell it on.

A dash 9 shell minus one of it's fuel tank sides for 50p

Four DPM/Rix buildings for £9, these will clean up nicely to fill out my next freemo module.

A vintage Heljan/Con-Cor kit for a Ford C Auto Transporter.  All the parts seem to be there, including the transfers and instructions.  This was £3 but I'm already thinking that it might be too rare to build and perhaps would be best sold on to a collector instead.

There were several more items that caught my eye, including a number of Athearn blue box Railbox cars at £2 each, but I opted to save those for another day (i've got several on the to-do list already) and having reviewed the sheer number of projects waiting in boxes here in the house, I reckon I might need to do a bit of a spring clean and sell on some of the less likely projects before my next purchasing trip.

NMRA Winter Meet - Benson

This weekend I drove up to Benson in Oxfordshire to attend the NMRA winter meet, a great way to start the years model railroading exploits.

The event is held in the Benson village hall, a compact location but one that turned out to be surprisingly spacious on the inside.

The main hall was set up with layouts and traders, with Brians Trains, LSWR Penguin, Kent Garden Railways and others.

A great selection of books and new and used brass and plastic stock, mostly in HO, and several really great bargains.

The upper floor had the bring-and-buy section where members were selling unwanted parts of their collections.  Including a fantastic selection of Walthers Amtrak coaches and a collection of built and painted structure kits.

The layouts were varied and of universally high quality, and not so many logging lines as at some recent shows (I'm looking at you NEC Birmingham).


Prospect Valley - HO Gauge

Switching Yard - HO - Mike Hughes and Peter Bouchard operate another fiendish switching puzzle.

Littleton & Humphrey Railroad - HO Gauge

Union Pacific & Santa Fe - HO Gauge

Snake Bend - N Gauge

Prospect Valley - HO Gauge

Hamilton - N Gauge

Norton & Northern - S Scale

French Module - 2mm Narrow Gauge



Water Street Yard - N Gauge