2017 RMCQ Christmas Party

Well another club event has been run and boy was it a very nice day yesterday at the Club.

In the lead up to Saturday, I spent the last week down the coast with the family and was able to relax going to the beach each day and having fantastic weather.  I did not get up to much modelling activity but I did relax by doing a bit of reading and a bit of tennis with my son.  There was cricket on TV for the first 5 days and I could not get motivated until Thursday, when I decided to try and decal my FAM coach.  I knew that the decals I was going to use were old, and I had heard many stories about people using old decals, and thought that was not going to happen to me.  Well I was very wrong.  The decals just disintegrated in water after 3-4 seconds.  That was a bit of a shame.  I texted the boss who was out shopping asking her to pick up some clear nail polish (you can never have too much of that stuff).  Upon her return I coated the next lots of decals with the clear nail polish and allowed then to dry.  So on Friday I then tried re-decaling the FAM coach and low and behold, the decals did not disintegrate.  I did have trouble separating the decal film from the backing paper, but eventually with a little persuasion the decals came away and they were able to be positioned on the coach.  However, I then had the decal resting on something when I turned the coach over and that stuffed up the decal.  That is a newbie issue that I just slapped myself for.  So my coach went from being a pristine coach to a dilapidated coach with the decaling half coming off the wagon.  Oh well – I could model that.

My next task was to complete about a dozen 6’ x 4’ box trailers.  Basically all I had to do was fit the axle and the wheel hubs to each wagon.  So after an hour or so, that was complete.  However, my plan to paint the trailers a nice new silver colour down the coast, came to a thundering halt.  It was blowing a gale on Friday afternoon, I was going to do it over at the beach so that was not possible and I certainly was not going to do it in the unit we were staying in.  So on Saturday morning, after getting home from the coast, I went down to the shed and set up a base to paint on, and then I spray the collection of trailers.  I then let then dry and after about 40 minutes, I placed a selection of 20' x 10' sheets of concrete reo into my 40’ container flat and added 8 of my 6’ x 4’ trailers to the load.

It was then time to head over to the Christmas Party.  As I said earlier, it was a very nice day.  No traffic on the way to the Clubrooms.  Not too hot, and there was a nice breeze blowing.  There were about 8 tables set up in the Club meeting area, with table cloths and Christmas decorations on each table.  I added my donations to the various Christmas Hampers and purchased my non winning tickets for the various drawers to be undertaken later. 

We had a very nice sit down lunch of cold meats and various torts.  A fantastic feast to end a year.  Thanks must go to the organisers of the food and setup of the Clubrooms.

I had three of the Auscision Coil Wire Wagons to sell, and the first person I spoke to about buying some, said “Yep, I’ll take three”.  Well that was easy.  I unloaded my modelling competition entries onto a table and that became the modelling comp table.  Of course I had a cold drink in one hand while I was doing this job.  I then went around and started to advise members, that there was a model of PK on the modelling table.  I just wanted to get a few laughs.  Everyone did!

I must admit that our Club member Greg, certainly put in in preparing the Club Modelling competition for the Annual Christmas Party and I was totally disillusioned that only Greg and myself put in entries.  I thought it was really poor form by the other members.  I know people are busy, but the members must have worked on something during the year.  I know that there are some fantastic modellers in the Club, so my goal now is to try and convert a club full of plonkers into about 10 to 15 people each putting in an entry in next year’s modelling competition.

Well on that subject, this year with so few entries, everything rolled up into two categories.  These were Dioramas, and the People’s Choice.  Greg did a really good effort on his oil depot diorama and I thought that my model of PK’s shed might cause enough of a stir to get the popular vote by our members.  How wrong was I.  It turned out that I won both trophies with my Chicken Coop entry.  I was very happy, but I bit embarrassed that I had 5 out of the 6 entries on display.

So my attention now turns to planning for my Operating Sessions that are scheduled for the week after Christmas.  I will need to clean the track, ensure the timetable cards are ready, the trains are in the right spots for when we start the session and the food and drinks are ready.  I might also have to clear the desk used by North Coast Control and update the train magnets in case the controller wants to use them to track the trains on the day.

I have also been doing some more work on planning for my presentation at next year’s Modelling the Railways of Queensland Convention presentation.  I will create two identical base boards over the Christmas break to start things rolling.

My 40' Container Flat with a load of concrete reo mesh sheets and 8 of my 6' x 4' box trailers

My FAM coach with had windows added and while hard to see, had venetian blinds added to the insides of all windows 

A rail side view of my scratch built Old Cassino goods shed.

A view of the road side of the Old Cassino goods shed.

PK's Shed with his clothes line.  PK's neighbour's dog is hanging from the clothes line after grabbing onto an old skipping rope.  PK is the guy drinking with a huge white Santa type beard sitting on the ground.  The Other guy is his neighbour.

Greg's Oil Depot.  It had working gates.

A view of the whole diorama of the oil depot.

Greg's enhanced kit turned into a diorama.  It will eventually be installed on the Club Layout.

A shot from another side.

The oil depot on the layout.

Another view from the layout.

Yet another view from the layout.

And another.  There are also cracks in the bitumen base that the oil depot has laid.  Even some weeds growing behind the shed.

One More!

The Chicken Coop.  The hen house (obscured by the apple tree in this shot) has a ramp up to the pen house for the chickens to walk up, and the door on the pen door does actually pivot/swing back and forth.  The chicken are all over the place with some inside and some outside the pen.