Visit by Richard Davies of Hattons Model Railways in the UK

President John Kinson with Richard Davies of Hattons Models.

Saturday 16/04/2022 saw a surprise visitor to the club, Richard Davies Managing Director of Hattons Model Railways in the UK dropped in to see the club. He was in Perth visiting relatives.

He was very interested in our decision to demolish the HO layout and rebuild, as well as its affects on membership applications. He was also very interested in the full size steam locos on display in the Railway Museum, photographing the makers plates of several (all manufactured in the UK).

2022 Mini Model Railway Exhibition

Sadly the annual WA Model Railway Exhibition at Claremont Showgrounds over the June long weekend has been cancelled for the third year running (due to uncertainty surrounding public health restrictions), so Rail Heritage WA in conjunction with the WAMRC are taking the opportunity to hold a ‘Mini Model Railway Expo’ on Sunday 5th June.

This event was a big success last year and is sure to be even better this year!

You can now book tickets through: https://www.trybooking.com/BYQDI

Mini Model Railway Expo

With the sad cancellation of the annual Perth Model Railway Exhibition for the second year running due to COVID-19, Rail Heritage WA in conjunction with the WAMRC and several other model railway club will be holding a “Mini Model Railway Expo” at the Rail Transport Museum in Bassendean on Sunday 6th June 2021.

For more details, please see the poster below.

EMRA 2021 Calendar

Our sister club, the Edmonton Model Railroad Association (https://www.emra.club/) has once again sent us one of their excellent calendars for 2021. They produce this calendar every year using photos taken by their own members.

In a letter from their President (Tim Walker) accompanying the calendar, it sounds like their past year has been considerable more difficult than ours. We are so very lucky to have been as minimally affected by COVID-19 as we have!

This year has been unlike any other preceding it. With the COVID pandemic, we made the decision to suspend operations back in March. We had some relief from August to November when we able to access the building and work in small groups on projects. Unfortunately, at this time we have had to suspend operations until the new year. I’m sure this is like what you have been experiencing. Our model railroad community is small, and we have been trying to keep communication open between our members by hosting various online video events. Hopefully with the vaccine rolling out in Canada, we are nearing the end of these strange times.

Tim Walker, President — Edmonton Model Railroad Association

Thank you very much for the calendar EMRA and we wish you a speedy return to normal operations!

Layout Room Flooring Upgrade

The layout room is beginning to look much better after the laying of the first set of floor tiles yesterday. It has taken months to complete removal of the layers of old, tired carpet in the room — painstakingly moving shelves, cupboards and progressively lifting the legs of the layouts to get the carpet out. Then weeks of back-breaking work to remove the old glue from the floor!

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Containers for Change

The WA State Government is encouraging recycling through the Containers for Change program. Eligible containers (most aluminium cans and PET plastic bottles) are able to be collected and recycled with a reward of 10c per container. The WAMRC has registered for the scheme and our scheme ID is C10321786:

Anyone can donate their recycling reward directly to the club by quoting the Scheme ID above. We have already made about $30 through the scheme by recycling containers we collected during RailFest and from within the club!