Submitting Forms and Planning Next Moves

This week I did a small amount of work on my diorama entry in the December Club modelling competition.  I applied my layer of grout to the base.  Apart from that, I visited a hobby shop and purchased a loco shell.  I also visited Arthur, our local AP representative and he took some photos of my models to go with the paperwork I also put together for my 7^th AP for Master Builder - Cars.  So that will be submitted by Arthur at his leisure.  Who knows what the result of this is and when it will be ratified.  Maybe January next year I might get the next AP certificate.

I will need to continue work on my model for the Club Modelling Comp and then also start to draw up a To Do List of activities to get the layout back operational after a couple of months of inactivity before we have another Ops Session in December.  I’m sure I will have about 20-30 things on the To Do list before I’m finished.  There are a few lights not working on the layout and I will also start a list of major projects to complete, like the Kyogle Station building that I have been working on for a couple of years.

Next Sunday is our Buy and Sell at the Club, so I need to get a few things out during the week ready to take along to sell.  The next major activity is the Club Exhibition a few weeks later.  I will be working on the NMRA stand so I need to plan my model building activities.

I also have a list of 'To Be Purchased' list of items that as soon as some of these items are released, I will have to order the items. 

So I have lots of things to do, but not much motivation at the moment.  I will try and find some.

Relatively Free Weekend

This weekend while the NMRA Divisional Meeting was way up in the Hervey Bay region, I did not have much to do.  I bus trip was organised for those down south to head up north for the monthly meeting.  I did not plan on attending after spending all my shackles in Sydney on the NMRA convention.  Luckily there was a Buy and Sell on at the AMRA Clubrooms in Zillmere on Saturday morning - which I attended, and there was also some sport in varying forms on TV to watch.  At the Buy and Sell, I ran into a few Club Members there selling, as well as a few buying.  The layouts inside the Clubrooms were running and there was a BB18¼ running around hauling a 6 car set of 3D printed SX cars.

Over the weekend I sat at the kitchen table and did some work on my Club Christmas Modelling Competition entry.  So the 6" x 6" baseboard for my diorama has been started and painted.  I still need to apply a layer of grout on this model and then that part of my entry will be completed.

There is another Buy and Sell next weekend (Sunday) at the Logan District Model Railway Club and then I think the next event after that is our Club's Buy and Sell on Sunday 5th November.

Club 12mm Update

This week I had to go back to work after 2 weeks touring through NSW and attending the NMRA convention.  What a let down!  Anyway, I was able to take Friday off, as I needed to get my daughter to the airport at about 4:40am for a flight to Cairns and then Townsville.  She comes back on Monday night after talking to some people up there.

So used the time later on Friday to get my tax done.  Looks like I’m in for about a $600 refund.  I see none of that, it just goes into the back account.

Saturday was Club Meeting day and I made my way over there early.  What I noticed was that the extension to the front of the Shed was complete.  There is however further work about water proofing that and the rear extensions and putting insulation into the walls.  It is looking pretty good.

After the meeting, I went down to the rear HO shed and had a look around.  Holy 12mm batman!  There was truck loads of it on the layout.  Most of the goods wagons were weathered, and weathered very well.  I think there were a few BB18¼ steamers running around on the layout.  There was at least three sets of SX cars.  There was also two complete sets of lander cars.  It seems that we might have become the centre of the QR 12mm universe over the last couple of months.  We have quite a few new QR modellers joining the Club.

There was also people running on the outdoor live steam as well.

Back Home

After last week’s blog post we jumped in the cars and went to Marcus’s place for dinner and an Ops Session.  It was great to catch up with Marcus.  Most people ran a train at Marcus’s and had a great time.  While there, Marcus also replaced the RJ12 connection in my Powercab.  It now works like a treat.  I also purchased some new battery terminals as the old ones were tarnished by a previous battery leak or two.  These were replaced when I got home.  Nothing like a throttle that works as good as new.

Some of the crew at Marcu's Place for dinner

Next morning we started our way north, and went to four layouts on our Layout Tour Day.  We went to Rob Peterson’s, Alistair Gilmore’s (Some of us had been there before), back to Marcus’s, and then David Howarth’s.  We were running late and could not get to Ken Scales place.  We stayed that night at East Maitland.  We had a BBQ dinner after a run to the shops for some snags and other items.

At Rob Peterson's N scale layout

John Z working as one of the station masters

Trains running

Control's Desk

More trains running

BBQ Dinner on Monday evening

Next day (Tuesday) we started hitting the stations up the main line to Werris Creek.  We seemed to catch quite a few trains on this section of the trip.  We left Werris Creek for Armidale just after the Explorer left and we saw it at a couple of locations on route north.  We had dinner in the Bowls Club and stayed in our usual motel.  On Wednesday we were planning to visit Rohan’s layout, but he had a plumbing emergency that he had to deal with so we did not catch up with him.  We still had a few stops at Glen Innes, Tenterfield, Warwick and Aratula before we split up and made our separate ways home.  My car got back to my place, and then Pk took over driving Glen and Clinton home.

Muswellbrook dock with a captive coal wagon

A Hunter Set about to head back to Newcastle at Muswellbrook

Tenterfield Station

Tenterfield Station

Tenterfield Station again

Tenterfield rest break eating a sausage roll

Willow Tree waiting for a number of trains to roll through for Tuesday lunch

Werris Creek Station from the overbridge

Armidale Bowl Club

We did over 2,100 kms, saw many trains and railway locations, went to a convention, dropped in on lots of layouts, and maybe some of us actually learnt a thing or two.  I know I did.

Not being content with all this railway activity, on Friday Night Darren and myself along with Brendan went over to Geoff’s place for a night of pizza, drinks and modelling.  I started to work on my entry for the RMCQ Christmas Modelling competition.  This model will be something very different and will cause some in the competition to scratch their heads.

That's a Wrap!

A fun filled week has almost been completed.  We have an Operations session scheduled for later tonight at Marcus’s place.  This week we travelled down frpm, Brisbane to Sydney, via Border Loop, Casino, Grafton, Coffs Harbour, Port Macquarie, and Newcastle.  We had a few cars in tow at various times.  This was all to attend the NMRA Australasian Convention at Rosehill.  We had some layout tours on Friday, before seeing lots of the inside of one of Sydney’s tunnels when road traffic ground to a halt.  The convention proper started on Friday night with model comp entries being submitted, Canapes, and a few drinks.  Convention Sessions started yesterday and today they continued.  One and a half sessions today were by me.  The half was with PK.

Last night at the Convention Dinner, I also was surprised with a third place prize for passenger cars, second place for freight cars, and first place for non-revenue cars (must have been the only entry).

We have more layout tours tomorrow.  Then we still need to get home.  We have had a ball.