DutyDruid

Or we could all start building our own? (ducks and runs for flame proof bunker)

Hang on, I know Roco is a Fleishmann brand but isn't there some tie-up between Roco and Hornby? (Hornby market Roco couplers under some sort of licence agreement) That could mean that they have easy access to the CAD drawings which makes it a lot easier to produce the model.

True Jason, I know a number of "finescale" (whatever that means) modellers who are prepared to die in a ditch over what runs on their exhibition layout, but their home layout? That's a completely story...

Guilty! I have my name down for a Mickey Mouse when they arrive early next year, simply because I like them, but as a modeller specialising in BR(S) South Western Division and SR (ex-LSWR) lines I really can't justify owning one...

Me!

i'm building a wartime layout for the exhibition circuit so that would get my vote

Yep, but I'd prefer green with yellow ends. Another one that has occurred since I put my original wish list up: A Bulleid Raworth Booster Loco, There is a resin kit available but it didn't strike me as a brilliant representation and needed a lot of work to get it looking halfway decent.

According to the Hornby Advent Calendar 1000 on 5/1/2021. A reasonable expectation that the website will crash so I would suggest looking on the afternoon of the 6th...

On the "oldie" front, how about a model of Trevithick's Pen-y-Darren loco? That would be nice although they didn't get to my area of interest very often so I would be more interested in a 4COR (which I have heard on the grapevine might have been scanned already) If the Clan get re-released that might get my vote but I would want one with the "fantasy" number of the BR(S) ones that were cancelled - like Hengist maybe?

You're not wrong there Ian, although most of the time it's knowing what the question is that you need to ask to get to what you are looking for. My starting point was "multi level shelf layout Hornby mag" because that was all I could remember of the original article. BTW: I just dipped briefly into your layout thread; nice shed! I will have to go back and have a proper read while the paint is drying on the house renovation I'm currently doing - which is why all my modelling gear and magazines are in a shipping container.

Thank you sir! That link has provided me with a vital piece of information; the project was called The Corkscrew Lines and a quick google has thrown up this blog: http://corkscrewlines.blogspot.com/ Knowing that I would want to research this at some point I have been keeping my historic copies of Hornby Mag safe, all I need to do now is work out how to extract them from the shipping container in which they currently reside and start searching... Elliott

Hi all I'm on a bit of a quest here... A while ago - ok, several years ago - I dipped briefly into a magazine article about a layout built in - I think - a garage. It was a novel concept, at the bottom a storage yard level, then two scenic levels followed a further storage level at the top. The levels were linked by helixes and there were "loopback" boards at the top and bottom ends, it was possible for a train to run the whole way up through all levels then round a loop back and all the way back down again. There was talk of peninsulas and other exciting design elements. The interest is that I am in the fantasy planning stage of what will probably be the "magnum opus" last layout and I'm contemplating looking to the basic concept of this layout for design innovation and inspiration - but I'm struggling to re-locate the details. A search of this forum has thrown up a couple of oblique references to it in forum posts questioning whether the magazine it was in was losing its way, but no direct references to the layout itself. I have managed to establish the following facts: It was in Hornby Mag An article referencing it appeared in an edition that was being talked about in July 2015 The author may have been one Chris Jones Does this ring any bells with anyone please? Any pointers such as possible magazine issues to look for gratefully received. Elliott

That does tend to give you an edge Geoff...

That's the name I know them by, but it was a good 7 or 8 years ago that I was involved with them.

That got a "friendly.supportive" from me but truthfully , I don't think cost is the problem anymore. The hassle is the paperwork and the governance that a financial institution will require from a club in order to make sure that money laundering isn't taking place; GDPR also has a large part to play. We (Fareham) are lucky, we are a CIO (i.e. a charity) because of having to rent a Clubroom from the council. That means we are a "body corporate" and are regulated by the Charity Commission (they inspect our accounts and so on). Unfortunately, my experience of working with other small "membership" organisations is that the old fashioned "Treasurer's Account" that we all used to thrive on is becoming increasingly subject to intense scrutiny and hoops are being put up that must be jumped through for even simple stuff, to the point that finding a volunteer to be treasurer is becoming increasingly hard (unless they have an accountancy background). Also, I do think it's only a matter of time before HMRC takes what we will all see as an "unhealthy interest" in the finances of an exhibition and if everything isn't just tiddly - as a couple of small traders have found out to their cost in recent years - there will be hell to pay. Oh, and then there's the tax position too; as a CIO we're ok because as long as the Charity Commission sees our accounts each year HMRC will - for the most part - leave us alone, but an unincorporated club could well find itself with a very unexpected tax bill and the cost of fighting the appeal or funding the defence of an investigation. And GDPR? One of the "hobbies" I have indulged in since retiring has been the introduction of card payments at the local sailing club bar that I ran for 7 years. There the mountain of crud we had to deal with in order to use wireless (WiFi) PDQ machines (card readers) got so complex that with so many "non-compliances" against our returns to one of the banks involved we simply sent them back and got wired ones. Granted, iZettle and the like have made things a lot easier because of the technology they use for comms but I still think there are a lot of poo-traps out there for the unwary to fall into. Elliott

For the avoidance of doubt: Orientation on Saturday is 0900 to 1000 - 1 hour Open time Saturday is 1000 to 1800 - 8 hours Orientation on Sunday is 0900 to 1000 - 1 hour Open time Sunday is 1000 to 1700 - 7 hours 1 + 8 +1 + 7 = 17 hours. This is what I put in the original post as the total time required. The mistake I made in the original post was that I accidentally (and stupidly because I should have rechecked before I hit "post") added the two orientation hours on to Sunday's hours. As I said, yesterday was a long day.

Just to pick up on the idea of advanced ticketing that got mentioned yesterday, I've spoken to my lad who works for an organisation called www.damgoodmedia.com. They do all sorts of Gucci stuff for the live music industry including providing feeds to search engines through something called gigseekr and to organisations like Ticketmaster. He tells me that typically the "fee" for doing advanced ticketing is 10%, he thinks plus banking charges, so a £10 ticket will probably only deliver about £8.50 to the organisers. I had a look last evening and I found an organisation called eventbright.co.uk that could be useful and unlike some of the bigger players they seem to support ticketing for "free" events and have a higher level of community engagement. Depending on how this all pans out, if we do find ourselves having to adapt the way we do business I think this could be something the medium sized shows will have to seriously think about.

No, I missed something from the explanation. Sat opening is from 10 to 6 and Sun opening from 10 to 5. What I hadn't stated is the necessary hour or so for briefing and orientation of the hired help each day, including the evacuation process and the actions to be taken in the event of a medical emergency, that's where the extra hour each day crept it - it was noted in the spreadsheet I used to construct the list but I didn't transcribe the explanation when I wrote the post. In my defence it's been a long day. And yes, earlier this year I was at an exhibition as an exhibitor where - as a medic - I was called on to assist in a cardiac recus and then do the evacuation when the ambulance crew turned up because the organising club stewards hadn't take charge of the crowd control aspects of the situation. Stewarding isn't as straightforward as it is made out. That hour of orientation and briefing is very necessary if you want things to work when the wheels fall off!

Point taken Andy, at the request of the venue (who actually sell our Tyvek wristbands for us) we did investigate advanced ticketing last year but had to give up because administering it got too difficult, plus everyone else wanted their cut. One of the things put us off was the problem of people rocking up and saying that their wristband hadn't arrived in the post and demanding a replacement when in fact they had already given their wristband to someone else (had that happen at another show I'm involved with). That said, it might be time for the Club to investigate an e-commerce solution to sell a voucher that could be exchanged for a wristband at a separate desk at the entrance, scan a barcode (from the punter's phone if necessary) to check that the ticket(s) haven't already been issued, and make sure that the timing is right if you are using "differential pricing", and away you go. Hmm...

Sadly, I'm afraid I can't agree. Fareham Railex (10,000 sq ft, approx 30 layouts): Sat hours 10 to 6 = 8 hours Sunday hours 10 to 5 = 9 hours Total 17 hours open to the public. My festival and exhibition experience suggests that in order to give breaks and down time I'm going to need 10 paid stewards which equates to 170 man hours Rule of thumb based on dealing with Security at Festivals: they will cost me something close to £20 per hour to buy in (assuming that they earn close to "Living Wage") so cost to me is going to be a minimum of £3400. Gate of 1500 paying + 1000 "free children" (which if what I see here is true I can expect to fall dramatically, but we'll stick with it for the example) £3400 spread over 1500 paying tickets in round terms is around £2.25 extra per ticket Current ticket price should be £7.50 (but we were actually planning to hold the price at £7 this year), that means I'm going to be charging a tenner, that's approaching a 33% hike in admission.

Bang goes my "Financially Viable" model!

You can't deny that there are a lot more tests being done now, which in turn will mean that a lot more cases will be detected in that group of people that are basically destined to be asymptomatic. I see this as a good thing in that it will slow the spread, but it will push the reported case numbers up too. The other thing: I don't know what advice someone who tests positive is given, but I do know that in the last month or so that a lot has been published medically about simple things which if done early enough can greatly reduce the impact of the disease on the body, in turn reducing the number of recorded (or required) hospitalisations. Not a lot is being made of this in the mainstream press for what I would call "political (lowercase p) reasons".

https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1329512/London-news-anti-maskers-London-tube-boris-johnson-face-masks-mandatory

Very true, and truthfully I'm not entirely sure I would want to get thrust back into the exhibiting - and more specifically in my case demonstrating - until things have subsided to a much lower level than they are at the moment. Was it a month or so ago we were talking about sweaty bodies and rucksacks here? Well, during the summer I work as one of the medical team coordinators at medium sized (~4500 attendee) hippy festivals and if we think we have to deal with the "great unwashed" at exhibitions you should see what I sometimes have to deal with after a week on a festival field. In both cases, much as I miss "the scene" I am in absolutely no hurry to get back to either of them, simply because making people who are "caught up in their moment" realise the potential impact their lack of infection control precautions is going to have on my wellbeing is frankly like trying to kick dead whales up a beach.

My problem with this is: as someone with an often misunderstood long term health problem (Lyme Disease) as someone with a foot in the complimentary medicine world due to mainstream medicine being unable to acknowledge that they can't treat Lyme Disease without stepping outside the box as someone with a foot in the orthodox medical camp - qualified as a "community first responder" (as opposed to a first aider) and therefore recognised by ambulance crews as a fellow professional rather than an amateur I'm reading stuff on medical websites which suggest that the big pharmaceutical companies are riding roughshod over common sense precautions and best practice in their rush to be the first to gain the licence to put a vaccine on the market. Forget the tinfoil hat brigade, a fair number of mainstream medics I know are saying that they won't take the vaccine if they can get away with it.