Work on the new main layout at the club is progressing nicely with the main yard 90% complete and operational. Unlike the previous HO layout, the main yard will eventually have full scenery applied (including backdrops) for added realism.
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This photo is over 10 years old now (!) and shows the construction of the club’s new N Scale layout beginning to take shape. It was about time we updated the web site to reflect the changes so the Layouts page has undergone quite a revamp!
Read more about the club’s current N Scale layout on the N Scale Layout page.
Unfortunately I couldn’t make it to the club on Wednesday so I missed the running of the first train on the new N‑Scale layout, but Rowan was good enough to capture it on his phone and send it to me!
The Secretary (Ross) will be away with work on the 16th March, so rather than press-ganging someone else into taking the minutes, the committee intends to delay the next regular general meeting by a week to Wednesday 23rd March (still at 8pm in the clubrooms). Formal notice of the meeting will go out this coming Wednesday (2nd March) as normal.
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We received a nice note from our travelling President a few days ago. Sounds like his trip is going well:
Hi, Yes we are still alive! Mind you we just about got fried alive going across the Nullarbor; 43°C for about 5 days in a row. Philip island was nice and cool. In Portland, Victoria at the moment with some bad weather on its way tonight; 30 to 40mm rain forecast. At this stage we will be home on the 7th March, a week before my rostered day on. Say hi to the other members for me.
Thanks Mark & Beryl
Half their luck — after 14 nights of minimums greater than 20°C, I could do with a bit of ‘bad weather’ about now…
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Finally, the N‑Scale boys finally got cracking last Wednesday night and knocked up four wooden frames in a little over an hour (see picture above) — each one measuring 2.4 x 1 metre. And that was in spite of all the *ahem* ‘helpful advice and encouragement’ *cough* from the rest of the assembled peanut gallery club members. 🙂
We had a good turn out at the club on Wednesday night. Nobody came down the week before because of Australia Day so I think everyone was keen to come back. Even Peter Tullis turned up — back from his travels around the world over the past couple of months, although it might take him a few days to recover fully! Its good to see some activity down the club again following the traditionally slow Christmas period.
The N‑Scale crew finally finished dismantling the old ‘Redwintul Park West’ layout — and Weepee Junction — and stacked the old modules neatly in a corner so that construction of the new N‑Scale layout can commence in earnest; the HO boys appear to have finally got the wiring for the new DCC boosters sorted out so you don’t get intermittent shorts when driving from section to section on the HO layout; and the daylighters are in the process of cleaning out the outdoor pond following the discovery that the refilling mechanism had failed.
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The February 2011 AMRA Branchline is available here: 
AMRA Branchline Feb 2011
Image: Quarry/mine on the old N‑Scale layout as it looked at the last RailFest.