Gwyn Humphreys Award for Innovation

[Les1952]

Greetings.

 

I've posted this here because this year RMWeb (or use of it) is involved in the citation. The award is given annually at Warley Show in memory of the late Gwyn Humphreys of Farndon, Notts. Gwyn was the founder of the Newark N-Gauge Group (which is a semi-dormant Area Group of the N-Gauge Society these days). He was an early convert to DCC and very experimental in his approach in many ways.

 

The award was set up using the monies collected at Gwyn's funeral, and offered as a trophy to Warley Club, who decided that Innovation would be an appropriate criterion. In many rerspects this is a poisoned chalice as some years the decision is hard (lean years) and we have had to ignore worthy ideas (3D printing comes to mind) as it is unclear exactly who was responsible for the innovation.

 

Previous winners have included Bachmann for Dynamis, Hirotsugu Hirai for T gauge, Hornby for Elite, and Brant Hickman for the lateral thinking that enabled Rorgyle as a layout that could be transported to exhibitions on public transport (contained in a shopper's trolley).

 

This year the Citation reads as follows (excuse strange spacing casued by copying and pasting from Word the document given to Warley) -

 

Gwyn Humphreys Award for Innovation

 

In 2012 the group has decided that this award should be given to

 

Dave Jones of Dapol Ltd (aka Dapol Dave)

 

 

For

 

i. Working signals in N and OO

 

ii. Use of Internet forum in development of Class 52 diesel in OO

Reasons

 

i. Gwyn would certainly have enjoyed the signals and would have spent many happy hours designing his own simple way of making them automatically operated by the trains.

 

ii. Were he still alive Gwyn would certainly be amongst those using the Internet to interact with Dapol over alterations to their products while at the CAD stage.

 

Trevor Webster, Les Richardson, Geoff Warren, Alf Hodkin

 

The Newark N-gauge group

 

Note that in the second case it is for the PROCESS, not the product.

All the very best

Les

[Andy Y]

I'd like to be the first to applaud this one on a couple of accounts:

 

1. To recognise that the club recognises innovation and development

2. To endorse the club's award to a manufacturer engaging with potential buyers through a design process with the intent of making a good product better. The evidence of this co-operative approach to a small part of the process was evident in the final samples on show around Warley.

[Metr0Land]

Richly deserved IMHO

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

An award partly given for process. Never thought I would read that such a thing has happened in the UK. Reflects as well on those making the award as it does on the deserving recipient.

[DJM Dave]

Hi chaps,

 

I am truly humbled by this award. Never did i think that i would be the only one to see a forum such as this a rich 'hunting ground' for ideas, and advice.

Many thanks to you all who have helped me over the last few years, as without the 2 way interaction i would firstly never have won this award and secondly the models would ever have been so good.

 

cheers

Dave

[Tricky-CRS]

Well done Dave and the staff at Dapol.

[Les1952]

It was actually quite difficult to get across the concept of the innovation being in the process. There are four of us who meet to choose the recipient, and getting a measure of agreement isn't always easy.

 

In the second year of the award we gave it to Brant Hickman. This was for the lateral thinking involved in making his layout "Rorgyle" stow away small enough to be carried around on public transport. Most people thought we gave it for the layout itself- it is easier to understand awarding a trophy for something physical. Inj the succeeding years up to the present one there has always been something physical.

 

Gwyn Humphreys was a strong minded individual, who put a lot of thought into what he did and who was not afraid to give others the benefit of that thought- especially if he was of the impression that the other(s) in question weren't thinking! He would certainly have been using RMWeb had he still been alive today, and no doubt many here would have had advice, encouragement, and in some cases criticism from him. Gwyn had no problem with recognising process, and I hope he would feel that all those who have received the award so far have been worthy winners.

 

Hope this all helps.

Les

[Les1952]

Just a note to say that this year the awarding team have gone for low-tech innovation and awarded the trophy to Romiley Methodist Railway Modellers for Gillan and Brown.

 

This includes-

scheduling system based on wagon loads rather than wagons

always having someone out front to engage with the punters and point out and explain aspects of the layout

the low-tech solution to a semi-automatic working wagon tippler.

 

While the touches may not have originated on Gillan & brown the combination adds up to an innovative layout.

 

All the very best

Les

[Les1952]

Hello again.

 

I forgot to post the results of the 2014 award.  This went to MERG for their pocket money kits.

 

The award this year (2015) went to Locomotion Models for being forward thinking enough to do an Ivatt Atlantic as an r-t-r model, and to then follow that up by announcing a Stirling 8 foot single.

 

The citation does suggest that Hackworth's Sanspariel, which fits the criteria by being domiciled at Shildon, might be a suitable progression.....  It wasn't entirely a joke.

 

Les Richardson

on behalf of Trevor Webster, Alf Hodkin, Geoff Warren, Jim Ross and Mr Simon.