Mike Bellamy

Thanks for another memory - after the Assembly Rooms got too expensive, we moved to Moorways sports centre where the only power was a couple of 13a sockets on the wall near the door and a single three phase 415v socket. Our two electrical wizards had to build a lockable distribution cabinet which was placed in the middle of the hall with three outputs to the three islands of layouts in the centre. Different coloured cables were used and the 4-way sockets were painted matching colours to ensure that there was no possibility of mixing phases. By coincidence our two electricians were also training apprentices at a local power station. .

Thanks for the mention. I agree with almost everything you say but I'm sure that the lighting in Hall 5 did get an upgrade as I remember when it was the sort of orange light given out by sodium (?) street lights but now they are a more natural yellow/white colour and whilst not daylight, they are better than before. When we first started exhibiting at the Assembly Rooms in Derby 40 years ago, all of the layouts & traders down each side of the Great Hall were under the balcony with very few lights as it was designed as a performance venue not an exhibition hall. We had several mass production sessions building lighting stands - two 3ft or 4ft pieces of metal conduit, a square foot piece, joining piece and clamp to hold onto the layout or traders table, a long cable and two large spotlights on a T-piece at the top - all carried in two large boxes which were bl**dy heavy - but then I was 40 years younger and I certainly wouldn't be able to lift them now. .

Thanks - after reading the Wikipedia entry, I'll look out for them when next in Yorkshire, and make sure I'm not in the caravan parking area just in case they turn up again. Interesting to see that they are a properly constituted Limited Company. Their entry on the Companies House Register says the nature of their business is "Other amusement and recreation activities not elsewhere classified " https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satans_Slaves_Motorcycle_Club https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/company/05045235 .

Very few shorts and t-shirts on display when we met a group of mature gentlemen with large American machines at the Skelton Lake service area on the M1 near Leeds a couple of years ago. We were on our way to the Harrogate Christmas Market (so not the warmest of weather) and pulled in for a break - to start with we were the only vehicle in the empty caravan parking area. Half hour later after coffee and cake, we returned to find this sight awaiting us !! The Clint Eastwood film comes to mind - push one bike over and they all go over . . . .

I suppose the question to ask is why do visitors go to exhibitions - is it layouts, trade or both ? Take out the layouts and you cut out a lot of expense - hall hire, advertising, insurance, etc need to be covered but if you charged traders a lot less would more go to your event. The Guildford O Gauge Group have a 'Trade Show' next week - 60 stands - 1000 free parking spaces and only £7.50 admission. In fact after looking at their website, it does mention that they will have layouts there which may possibly be a first. Even at Guild events there are often only a few layouts - except at the main September Guildex at Stafford. .

I was given a hamper when I retired - but it was made up by the people I worked with so it contained 6 bars of chocolate and six bottles of beer - plus a Slaters 7mm wagon kit. In my few words of thanks I said' Oh great, another one to add to the pile which probably won't get built' but Neil, my good friend and fellow modeller told me to open the box. Not only had he built the kit, but he had also painted it, and added transfers in the name of Bellamy Brewers - the wagon was numbered 20 on one side and 65 on the other as I had been there 20 years and retired at 65. .

Agreed. Following the recent passing of a close friend, I now have 12 boxes of assorted railway books which have been given to our local narrow gauge group - at least I know when they will be going out of the loft as we intend selling those not wanted by group members at our annual modelling day / exhibition in January. When I went to the local hospital A&E about six years ago with chest pains, there was large waiting room and a sign that gave the minimum waiting time of four hours. However I was told to go straight though the door that said 'No Admittance' and was seen immediately. Within five minutes I was on a bed wired up to ECG etc. Kept in overnight to have a 'stress test' the next morning - this was on a treadmill which got both faster and steeper to make me really work hard. When resting there were several technicians and doctors looking at the screen as I was still all wired up. I asked if there was a problem and they said I wasn't recovering as quickly as they expected - hardly surprising as the last exercise I did was at school almost fifty years ago ! Came away with a couple of prescriptions for asprin and statin and told to exercise a bit more - no problems since then. NHS at its best and before all the issues with the pandemic and doctors strikes etc. .

I get an email like that every month but the paper copy still arrives a few days later so suggest you wait a while and see what happens.. .

. . . .but you're not John Denver and you aren't leaving on a jet plane . . . . that's Dave's job All my bags are packed I'm ready to go I'm standin' here outside your door I hate to wake you up to say goodbye But the dawn is breakin' It's early morn The taxi's waitin' He's blowin' his horn Already I'm so lonesome I could die .

For similar reasons, a few years ago our club chairman, secretary and exhibition manager all resigned from the committee leaving me as treasurer as the one remaining 'senior' officer - although there were times when I felt like joining them . . . . . thankfully everything settled down soon after as one individual had his membership suspended and then an application to re-join was refused. .

We use a local church hall 3 times each year for swapmeets and every time the ladies in the kitchen say they left it much cleaner than it was when they arrived. That's the problem when so many different user groups have meetings and events there. We did get a 'Thank You' from the hall secretary for taking home tea towels and returning them washed and pressed unlike many who just leave a pile of dirty and wet towels. At our Community Centre exhibition last month we had 520 visitors over two days at £5 each - but only paid £450 for the hall - perhaps it helps being the Chairman of the Community Centre - and the tearooms were very busy resulting in a decent profit for the centre as their volunteers run the tearooms. .

You need some serious experience to undertake this task as Paul Martin at EDM Models has found. Everything you need to know about O14 can be found on his Blog in the link below. Make sure you look at the later updates further down the page as it seems that the wheels need to be reprofiled as well as gauge altered. If you do go ahead, Paul can also supply the track. https://ngtrains.com/blog/lionheart-lb-models-o14/ .

What a coincidence - we will be in Harrogate tomorrow and have Afternoon Tea booked at Betty's and went to Harlow Carr on a previous visit to the area.. .

Perhaps this is the type of shirt John was looking for - seen in Marks and Spencer. Apologies for any offence but in my mind, if you need a 3XL shirt, you are not 'Slim Fit'

Thanks Phil - I haven't been that far south-east into Essex although we did get south of the river to Margate last year (and I didn't visit Hornby!). A few years ago, my brother was a frequent flyer from Stanstead to Dublin every week for about a year - and he's been in Southend this weekend to see the Stylistics in concert. Last night he was following Tony's route to get back home to Grantham. .

Having been to the Warley show a number of times, I would say that in parts the "Creative Craft Show" and the "Cake International Show" at the NEC on Saturday were even busier than Warley but as one might expect the gender balance was the opposite - and instead of being bashed by rucksacks, our ankles were being attacked from all directions by shopping trollies on wheels. Very busy and as someone who doesn't do crafts or cakes (except for eating) it was very interesting. I was there as the chauffeur and the official bag-carrier for Mrs B but after six hours even she had had enough. Came away with a 6" steel rule for a pound and an A5 cutting mat, also one pound. I have no idea how much she spent but the bags were heavy. The level of detail in some of the cake / sugar-paste / icing creations were much better than seen on many layouts. Brief BBC report below but unfortunately this shows some of the more bizarre creations rather than the very intricate flower displays that were incredibly realistic.. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-24891683 .

I expect some of that was because of weekend closure as we drove north of Doncaster on Monday where the bridge works were down to a single lane in each direction. If you don't need to go to Grantham then you can avoid almost all of the A1 by coming home on the M1 around Leeds and then coming off south of Leicester on the A14 to Cambridge and then M11 towards home. I left Grantham in 1978 but until very recently we went to visit family every couple of weeks, until it was time to start arranging funerals . . . . . . . . Hope you enjoy the rest of your holiday - did you know there's a museum and model shop in York . . . . . . . . 😀 .

We 'inherited' our first "Solo" unit from another club who had last used it in January, but after charging it up and re-registering the machine to our account, it worked perfectly in October so that was a gap of 9 months out of use. I have since bought a second machine so that we can use one for second hand sales and the other on the door. We run three swapmeets and one exhibition each year and as it obviously boosted sales it has been a worthwhile investment. You do have the facility to type in what it has been used for and that will be shown on your summary sent as a PDF by email a couple of days later when the cash goes in the bank - however the amount into the bank will be the total transactions for that day so you need to keep your PDF sheets as evidence of what the card was used for. However even though we have this facility, we haven't actually used it as all transactions at the show last month were on the club sales stand (and the same at the swapmeets). In addition to the daily payout sheet, you also get a monthly summary and an invoice to show the total charges that have already been deducted (1.69%). One thing I didn't mention is the ability to send a payment link to people. We had a lot of members who wanted to support the club by remaining as members but didn't come to the meetings or take any other active part in our activities. I was able to email them a renewal membership form and a link to the SumUp website where they entered their card number onto a secure site and that was their membership paid for. At no time do we see the card number or customer's name so if sending out these payment links you need to use their initials so that you know who has paid - such as Membership MB. Hope that helps . . . . . . Mike

Having been to the Warley show a number of times, I would say that in parts the "Creative Craft Show" and the "Cake International Show" at the NEC yesterday were even busier than Warley but as one might expect the gender balance was the opposite - and instead of being bashed by rucksacks, our ankles were being attacked from all directions by shopping trollies on wheels. Very busy and as someone who doesn't do crafts or cakes (except for eating) it was very interesting. I was there as the chauffeur and the official bag-carrier for Mrs B but after six hours even she had had enough. Came away with a 6" steel rule for a pound and an A5 cutting mat, also one pound. I have no idea how much she spent but the bags were heavy. Brief BBC report below. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-67301315 .

I was going to recommend SumUp but I see Barry beat me to it. I started with the cheapest which if I recall was on offer at the time for £25 (£50). This is operated through your phone by BlueTooth and doesn't incur any additional costs apart from the 1.69% charge. There are two issues with this - you need to be there as it's linked to your phone and you need a decent phone signal. We have since upgraded to a SumUp Solo machine £95 which is independent of any phone as it has a simcard built in - only recently got this and so I don't know which network it uses and may be the sort of thing that will go through whichever network has the strongest signal. At our recent exhibition, the Solo machine was used on the club sales table 18 times for a total of £1,157 at a cost of £19.54 and so well worth the effort as the club got £115 commission so the net "profit" was £95. The machine paid for itself on the first day of use - and the cash was in the bank two days later. Also if you buy from Rymans they often have offers on and even better, as a club treasurer, I was able to register with them as a business user and now get 10% off every purchase. https://www.ryman.co.uk/sumup .

Son had a 1979 Mini that was restored by an expert - admittedly the bodywork was good but there were three very serious issues with the mechanicals - everything was taken off the bodyshell for replacement of many panels and a full respray. When I went to collect the car, it had a new MOT but something didn't feel right. Other son took it for a run and was soon back saying that the steering was all over the place - never having driven a Mini, I wondered if they were all like that. Investigation showed that near side front wheel was loose as there was no split=pin in the castle nut holding the hub. Every now and again there were weird electrical faults when starting - or cutting out. I suggested an earth fault and asked son to check the earthing strap between the engine block and the bodywork - one hadn't been fitted. Quick job and no problems after that. Third fault was the adjustable "Hi-Lo" suspension units as the car was sitting too high - he tried to adjust the ride height but found there was insufficient thread to go more than half a turn. Obviously they couldn't get it set up properly and had butchered the units by cutting the ends off with an angle grinder. Once everything was put right, he used the car every day for about four years without any more trouble. Perhaps we should have done all the mechanical bits ourselves . . . . . . . .

As well as being at DEFine, Dave Roome's Underhill Yard is featured in the latest (299) issue of Model Railway Journal. .

There was a long discussion back in 2010 about Cleminson where it was agreed that the Brassmasters version wasn't a true Cleminson design but for many modellers was good enough. What is missing is the way in which the separate axles are linked together, best illustrated in the model sold by Phil Traxson (Port Wynnstay Models) in the link below. https://ngtrains.com/shop/product/pw131-cleminson-6-wheel-1st-2nd-class-saloon-coach/ Link to archived RMweb discussion https://www.rmweb.co.uk/topic/6484-cleminson-chassis-drawing/ Hope that helps

If you like the idea of drilling and gluing (see above), then have a look at EDM Models at the link below - 1:48 instead of 1:43 but as they are so small I don't suppose the scale difference will matter much !! https://ngtrains.com/shop/brand/titchy-trains-group/ .

Model Railway Club Committee meeting Monday at 7pm - I arrive about 10 minutes early to find everyone else there and much laughter. I had completely forgotten that for the first time, the meeting had started at 6pm as the secretary had another meeting to go to later that evening so I was only there for about 20 minutes. When I worked at the University, I was usually the minute taker for a number of committee meetings and so I was always there in plenty of time. Sounds just like those here in UK - at the one near us, the Lindt shop is directly opposite to the Cadbury outlet so two chocolate shops to tempt us. As The Q says, The Works is one of the very few shops I go to. When working and needing "smart" shoes, they all came from the Clarks shop. They have now opened the UK's largest Nike store so that's another one to avoid. And me - financial year end at the end of October and AGM at end of November so not much time to "cook the books" . . . . . .