picture 1 picture 2 picture 3 picture 4 picture 5 picture 6 picture 7 picture 8 picture 9 picture 10

Monthly Club News

December 2012: We started the month finishing the legs for our new Smallwood layout so it is now standing on its own legs. Much work is being done on the scenery for our Oakenshaw layout with a concentration of activity around the two corner boards.

November 2012: We had a successful day exhibiting Buckshee at the Burton Model Railway Exhibition on 4th November. We have now completed all four of the baseboards for Smallwood. The track work is progressing for the Smallwood layout with all of the points having been scratch built and a start has been made on the plain track. So that we are ready to lay the track shortly the baseboards have been given a coat of dark grey paint as a base colour and much of the cork underlay has been cut ready to be stuck to the baseboards. A start has been made on the legs to support the layout. We ended the month with the Warley National Model Railway Exhibition at the NEC where we had the usual club display stand.

October 2012: We started October by the virtual competition of the third of four baseboards for our new modern image layout called Smallwood. We had a successful day exhibiting Buckshee at the Didcot Model Railway Exhibition on 20th October. Work is continuing on the buildings for Oakenshaw with many now having additional weathering added to them following the competition of the weathering of the largest structure the viaduct over the town

September 2012: We have spent much of this month preparing for the Club exhibition. Work continues on our Oakenshaw layout and we have now made 2 out of the 4 baseboards for our other new layout currently provisionally know as Smallwood. The Club staged its 45th Anniversary Model Railway Exhibition over the weekend of the 15th & 16th September. Despite the many external economic pressures many people are facing the exhibition actually had a very small increase in overall attendance when compared with the 2011 event. 

August 2012: We have spent much of the early part of this month preparing our Arrowmouth layout for the Club exhibition in September. As well as the usual cleaning and repairing any damage we have now fully weathered all of the track which has improved the appearance considerably. Work continues on Oakenshaw and we have now started drawing out the track plan to scale on the baseboard tops of our next layout to be called Smallwood an end to end layout based in the 1970's. This 4mm scale layout will feature scratch built track. To allow the baseboards for Smallwood to be assembled we have built a jig to ensure we get them square.

July 2012: The Club website is 13 years old this month. On Sunday 1st July 2012 a group of Club members had a great day out on the Shakespeare Express from Birmingham Snow Hill to Stratford upon Avon. As it was the first weekend for the Summer Sunday operation of this service and because the Olympic Torch Relay was in Stratford that day former LMS 4-6-2 6201 Princess Elizabeth was used in place of the normal Great Western Hall or Castle class locomotive. We had an enjoyable weekend at the Chasewater Railway over the 7th and 8th July and over the weekend of the 21st and 22nd July at the Kidderminster Railway Museum exhibiting our Buckshee layout.

June 2012: Friday 1st June 2012 marks the 45th Anniversary to the day when the Redditch Model Railway Club was formed at the White Hart Public House in Headless Cross in Redditch. Club nights have once concentrated on the continued construction of our Oakenshaw layout. The Club's Annual General Meeting on Tuesday 12th June once again provided few surprises and the Committee where re-elected without change for a further twelve months.

May 2012: Like all recent months much of the work on club nights concentrates on the construction of our new Oakenshaw layout. The big progress on Oakenshaw is that the viaduct is complete apart from painting and the adding of a couple of down pipes. We however going to have to start on a refresh of Arrowmouth ready for our September Model Railway Exhibition - It has got to look it's best to celebrate 20 years on the exhibition circuit.

April 2012: We start the month with much ongoing work on our new Oakenshaw layout which has included a very significant progress on the construction of the largest structure on the layout the large viaduct that takes the railway over part of the town. The structure is now largely covered in the plastikard to represent the stone construction. There is still much to do on it as there is stone detailing to add plus the small job of painting and weathering it. On the subject of weathering we have been experimenting with the stone colour and we now believe we have got it right on a number of the smaller station buildings. These will be used as colour references so we can get the rest of the building the right colour. The numbers of buildings for Oakenshaw layout yet to be started is now in single figures.

March 2012: Work is continuing on Oakenshaw. On Friday 9th March an eight page article in the April 2012 edition of Hornby Railways Magazine was published. Work has continued on our Oakenshaw layout

February 2012: We started February by taking Dagnell End to the Stafford show over the weekend of the 4th and 5th February. Unfortunately it snowed during Saturday and this provided for an interesting weekend though on the downside it did not help with encouraging people to visit the show. Mike Wild the editor of Hornby Magazine visited the Club on Thursday 16th February to photograph our Buckshee layout for a forthcoming feature in Hornby Magazine. However the photo shoot was cut short because of a problem with the camera. He return to finish taking the pictures on Tuesday 21st February. The pictures together with the article on Buckshee will be in the April 2012 edition of Hornby Magazine

January 2012: 2012 marks a special year for Redditch Model Railway Club as it is our 45th Anniversary and the 20th anniversary of the first time our Arrowmouth layout was exhibited. We intend to celebrate both milestones at our September Redditch Model Railway Exhibition. Work is continuing on our Oakenshaw layout which has included a start on the construction of the largest structure on the layout the large viaduct that takes the railway over part of the town. As part of this work we have also finalized the position of a number building that surround the viaduct. In preparation for the Stafford show we have been finishing the installation of the lighting of the underground station and a number of buildings on our Dagnell End layout