Sunday, January 28, 2018

London Model Engineering Exhibition 2018



My annual practise run, driving to Alexandra Palace. I'm going to have to do it in a couple of months and on a Friday, so it's good to have a go in the somewhat lighter traffic found on Sunday morning nice and early. So early that we got in the car park by 9 - right on top of the hill.

Inside the show, it was the usual eclectic mix of disciplines from plastic kits and Lego to great big lumps of metal. Quite how you summon up the courage to start work on a 7 1/4 "Big Boy" that will be 17 feet long is a mystery, but I'm sure it's going to look great when it's done, at least judging from the parts on show anyway.

Little Lister loco

I think my favourite loco was this little Lister. I could just imagine pottering around a miniature line on it. And there is a Lister D awaiting restoration under the workbench in the garage. But no...

Barrett steam models J65

Obviously, I spent quite a lot of time ogling the G, G1 and 16mm layouts. They are always very popular - that combination of movement and live steam always draws a crowd.


Double Deck Tramcar

With my Dad in tow, we also spotted one of his "maturing" projects, an Ochre tram kit. You don't see many of these built up, but this one looked lovely and has inspired him to take another look at the Portuguese tram kit he was building before moving on to the LCC car.

SAC Burrell

Following their appearance in EiM, it was great to catch up with the Steam Apprentice Club and take a look at their fantastic Burrell as seen on the front cover of the magazine. Lovely friendly group - if you are under 21 and fancy getting involved, they will welcome you with open arms.

This wasn't an expensive show though. I picked up some steam oil and an gas tank filler from Polly Model Engineering but apart from lunch (£10ish a head inc. drinks), my wallet survived the trip largely unscathed. That might have been me remembering that I haven't even started the "quick to build" kit I came back with last year though...





3 comments:

James Finister said...

You know that as well as "Scamp" Colin Edmondson does a semi kit of parts to build the Lister D powered Stumpy?

I've wondered about building the Lisbon tram in Beamish 196 guise

Phil Parker said...

I didn't and I think I'll pretend you didn't tell me. That Lister D has been on the "pending" pile for a decade and I REALLY don't need any more projects!

Huw Griffiths said...

Please could you remind me what modellers mean by a "quick build" project?

I'm wondering if this might, by any chance, mean one of those legendary "one day" builds - you know - the ones that will, almost certainly, get built ... one day.

I think most of us have got those sorts of projects in the pipeline (a very long pipeline, by the seems of it).

You might have seen me shopping for one of those projects at last year's "Ally Pally" BRM show (followed by further shopping fot it at last year's "Warley" - and I mustn't forget last weekend's local show in Pontcanna, Cardiff, where I finally managed to get the last piece of this particular "jigsaw puzzle"). Now, it only remains to actually BUILD this stuff (this year - next year - sometime - ... no, let's not go there!).

Joking aside, I reckon there's a very good reason why magazines and internet forum sites run challenges - to encourage people to build things - possibly even to complete them.

In my case, all I need is another "motive power build" challenge - either that, or a decent block of free time.