Wintonian

After a false start with a second-hand/recycled baseboard and waiting for Lenz to bring out long announced items, I am now under some pressure from colleagues at the Liphook club to get on with it.! It really will be a new start and the target date is the club's 2014 open day in October. Soltendieck is a real place in Northern Germany within commuting distance of Hanover and Hamburg. It is near to Lunberg Heath where the German Forces in this region surrendered to General Montgomery at the end of WW2 It had a station on a line that ran from Berlin to Hamburg which was used extensively to move emmigrants from Berlin to Hamburg for transport to the United States in the late 19th and early 20th century. With the division of Germany into East and West Germany in 1949 the line was cut actually a few kilometres east of Soltendieck and as a result all services on the West German side ceased. This was not always the case where lines were cut and some lines continued in use on each side of the border often without track alterations. In this instance the station building is just within West Germany and with some judicious shunting can operate as a passenger terminus as well as serving a long established grocery wholesalers warehouse. The East Germans have removed a section of the railway embankment at the border and a third of the warehouse has been lost. It will be set in Epoch 3 which covers the height of the Cold War. The first work is to layout out the proposed track layout on the 3300 x 600 footprint; then if all OK to build three baseboard sections approx 1100 x 600 each Track layout to follow.

Update to Liphook & District Model Railway Club details The club is a small friendly club based in Milland, West Sussex, approx 3 miles from the centre of Liphook, Hampshire and was established in 1964. Amongst the membership there is a wide range of interests- ,N, 00, 0; British,American, Continental and Japanese outline; Modern and Steam outline and trams; standard and narrow gauge-00-9, 0n30/0m; We have regularly supported local exhibitions since our inception, particularly the Midhurst Modellers Show, but in recent years we have widened our aspirations with members or club layouts exhibited at Aldershot, Alton, Portsmouth, Woking, Fareham, Horsham and High wycombe shows. Club/ members layouts include 00, Southern Railway;HO (German and American); N (German and Japanese). In co-operation with the Liphook U3A we have arranged Building a Model Railway courses in 2010 and 2012. A new version of the course is due to start in September 2013 We meet every Friday evening between 7-30 and 10-30 at the Committee Room of the Milland Valley Memorial Village Hall, Iping Road, Milland, LIPHOOK GU30 7NA The venue has toilets and Kitchen area to which the club has access during meetings. We have our own storage area adjacent to our meeting room. The committee currently comprises Chairman: Ben Russ Secretary:: Matt Wildsmith Treasurer: Tony Bettger Full details of the club including contact information can be found at www.millandvalleyrailway.co.uk Membership, which is by invitation, is open to ladies and gentlemen 18 and over. Membership is £110 per year paid in 10 equal payments of £11 by standing order. There is no additional meeting charge. Membership includes annual portable appliance testing (PAT) of members mains electrical items used with exhibition layouts and tools used at club meetings. Items not tested/listed on the club register are not permitted to be used at club meetings or with layouts exhibited under the club aegis..

The space available turns out to be quite a bit more than the original plan so we have 2600 x 500 which should allow for some modelling of the "Iron Curtain". A 3 section baseboard has been constructed and the necessary 3 left hand points purchased, not Lenz, but Peco.

I've always admired the Lenz 0 gauge system since I saw some pictures on their web site. Last year at the Winchester 0 gauge American/ Continental meet I made an "unplanned" purchase of two small carriages and followed that with an "impulse buy" of their "good value" start up set at the German Railway Society show at Sutton Coldfield this year. The set contained a Lok shunting loco, some wagons, track, one point and a Lenz DCC controller. The loco and rolling stock is DCC fitted for lighting and uncoupling, with the loco also sound fitted. I regularly visit Carl Arendt's Micro/small layout site and recently noticed a proposed small shunting layout set on a line cut by the internal border between East and West Germany in the 1950's. it allegedly fits into a space 1650 x 350 (See small layout scrapbook No 89 for Sept 2009 on www.carendt.us/scrapbook/page89/index.html) I hope to have slightly more space than Carl's correspondent allowed but haven't decided exactly how much. This blog will follow the planning and construction of the layout which is a German translation of a local place name. I hope my colleagues at the Liphook and District club will join in!

CLUB CELEBRATES 50th BIRTHDAY IN 2014 In the early days the club was known as the “Petersfield, Liphook, Liss and District Model Railway Club” and we have a group photograph from 1965 which was printed in a local newspaper, possibly the Petersfield Post, with an article about the club. In those days they met in members’ homes and the picture was taken at 83 The Close, Gunn’s Farm which was (is)in Liphook. Amongst the members in the photographs are Ron M, Steve E, David L, David G, Chris B, Don D, Adrian M and Ron G(?). At the AGM for that year held in the home of Mr and Mrs R G in January 1966 members agreed to an annual subscription of 12 shillings (60p) and voted £10 towards a club layout which is to be shown at local shows and fetes. Reference is made to a very successful model railway exhibition at Haslemere Educational Museum presumably in 1965. Mr S.T E was made club secretary with Mr G as treasurer. By 1966 the club name has been shortened to the current title- as we have a poster for an event on May 7th, called “May Fair” held in the Liphook Village Hall in aid of the Hall improvement fund, which lists “exhibition by Liphook & District Model Railway Club”. This event was opened by Geoffrey Adams who played the part of Detective Constable Lauderdale in Dixon of Dock Green. We have a photograph of him looking at part of a model railway layout with members Malcolm L and Adrian M looking on. This appears to be the club’s first exhibition. We do not know the date of the first meeting, but we believe it was held in a members house in Petersfield. After a period of meeting at members houses, The Pavillion in the garden of The Anchor in Liphook was used followed by a converted poultry house in Bramshott, a building that was part of the Longmoor Military Railway, another farm building this time a milking parlour in Milland, a members double garage also in Milland followed by our current abode. If any of you recall earlier days of the club- we had early members of the Gauge 0 Guild at one time, or attended our early exhibitions please contact us with any snippets of information Contact details on our website www.millandvalleyrailway.co.uk Many Thanks