Evertonian

Hi John, very pleasing to see some of your teams efforts in your photos, and as a member of the BW operating mob, may I say we are really looking forward to meeting up and seeing your Bmouth Central soon. We exhibited West for the final time last weekend at Wimborne and are now keen to crack on with this new project, with a high standard to emulate looking at your pics. I love that shot of 34044 adjacent to the shed ! All the best. Chris Knight

A last minute reminder that B. West will be making its final appearance under the present group's ownership at the Wimborne Model Railway exhibition this weekend 15/16th April at the new venue for the show, the Allendale Centre conveniently located in the town centre. The new owners will also be present to learn, assist and remove to their clubrooms after the show concludes. We look forward to seeing fans old and new over the weekend, and look forward to showing the early developments on our new layout, whilst of course wishing the new owners well when exhibiting BW in the future. Chris Knight on behalf of SWMDG.

Wishing yourself and Mo the happiest of Christmas's Tony. I well remember seeing Stoke Summit at Wells many years ago and it was truly a revelation. Why hadn't anyone built a layout like this before reflecting my own thoughts on what constituted exciting viewing for the exhibition spectator? Of course as Tony says all these opinions are personal, but to me the procession of long expresses traversing an authentic setting was thrilling and new. I had a brief conversation with Tony at Wells and mentioned that I was building my layout based on Sonning Cutting along the similar 'watching the trains go by' concept. I must admit I was together thrilled and horrified when he suggested he came down to Bournemouth in order to photograph my humble effort with a view to an article appearing in BRM ! Well Tony I must say you were a real gent when you made the long trip down, the most lasting memories being of the advice and recommendations you offered to a modeller lacking your talents in the friendliest and supporting of ways. The improvements and ideas you suggested have, I hope, stayed with me and one day I would be delighted to visit LB with your permission and play with a fantastic railway. Seasons greetings to all WW readers and contributors. Chris Knight

Frank was very well known as a regular visitor to the home base of the B'm'th West layout at the Model Railways Solutions shop, and sadly his worsening health problems were mentioned when the modelling group met last week. Very sad news indeed to hear of Frank's passing and I am sure Roger will be acknowledging the diligent work that 'Ceptic' contributed to the project. Condolences to all family and friends. Chris Knight

Like David (Landscapes) has remarked I never tire of watching Tony's big locos speeding long. expresses tbrough LB, I just wish that Tony in his short trousers days had been attracted to the de!ights of Swindon and copper capped engines however !! Chris Knight

Good afternoon Tony, just to say how much I enjoy catching up with "Wright Writes" every couple of days, there always seems to be something of interest to see or digest - long may it continue ! An added bonus of course helping your recovery, well done Andy Y all those years ago. best wishes to yourself and Mo, Chris K

Pleasing to see a good selection of GWR and WR locos featured recently, we all have our little niggles however - mine is so often seeing the Castles shown with the wrong type of steam pipes - as evidenced on "Banbury Castle", sorry Barry Ten ! Chris Knight

A bit late in the day perhaps but this event next weekend features the massive Heaton Lodge Junction ( the uk's largest layout ?) with good support from the award winning Bournemouth West and Evercreech New amongst others and trade support. Should be well worth a visit to the Bath & West Showground. Chris Knight

Modellers in the locality to the shop may be interested to learn that the proprietors have organised a coach to visit the forthcoming exhibition at the Bath & West Showground on Sunday April 10th when the UK's largest model railway, Heaton Lodge Junction, together with Bournemouth West, Evercreech New,Wimborne and a few other layouts will attend. There will be trade support from Peco,Bachmann Heljan and others including MRS of course. Advance price show and coach tickets are available from the shop, 01202 798068. Please note the show runs from 8th to 10th April, but the bus only runs on the Sunday.

Just to clarify, I would like to point out there is absolutely no connection between the (now closed) shop mentioned in Bournemouth and Model Railway Solutions, currently the only model rail shop in the area, and where pricing is in place throughout on new and the extensive second hand items. Chris Knight

As an oldie of the same 1946 vintage as Tony this disposal of a lifetimes modelling should be a problem,however the issue is solved should No.1 son own a model railway shop, and also share exactly the same modelling preferences and an exhibition layout to boot. Lucky me! I can plead guilty to most of Manxcat's list, except 8 and 12, to my enduring shame have never built a working chassis - don't think I could pass with Kitmaster from my childhood regrettably.

Without wishing to sound too sycophantic Tony it was your photo of an A1 rounding a curve with an assortment of coaching stock and taken at low level which appeared in the 1983 RM which first struck me how realistic a model railway could look. The usual style of magazine photography at this time being the over used helicopter shots. It did help that excepting anything originating from Swindon A1's were my favourite locos. All the best to yourself and Mo. Chris Knight

Such a shame (as others have remarked) if we have seen the last of Leicester South GC on the circuit, surely one of the finest layouts around in the last few years. I and others in our group will be "leaning" on Roger Sunderland and Dave Bayman to think again about retiring B'm'th West from exhibitions, although I fully understand their reasoning behind this decision. Other members,including myself, have decided to take a layout to the Hornby mag. GETS show in Milton Keynes in October, taking the view that we believe the organisation will be top drawer and the enjoyment and social elements involved in exhibiting again worth any risk involved.

Thanks Tony, at least I remembered it was a 'Castle' and the layout Wellington, where I got Stephen Williams from is a mystery! 7 1/4 gauge, that's a lot of cardboard. Any shots of the layout, I saw it once, at one of the Wolverhampton Club's exhibitions ? Probably not judging by my level of recall lately. An excellent piece of modelling is not in doubt though.

The recent talk here of card modelling reminded me of a terrific '0' gauge Castle loco featured many years ago in the Railway Modeller. If memory serves correctly I seem to recall it was built by Stephen Williams (?) Of 'Wellington' fame, a super layout - hoping Tony may have some photos to remind us of its beauty. Chris Knight