Evening All,

Well after about 4 weeks working away in Yorkshire, Herefordshire, Shropshire and Northern Island, I have finally managed to get a Thursday night to pop down and do a bit with the guys at Ramsbottom Model Railway Club. I can’t complain about working away as you get to see some really beautiful places and meet some very nice people.

A nice warm welcome to our new member Philip, he is a South African. He has interests in South African railways, modeling scenes and also hopes to model Summerseat Station sometime in the near future. Unfortunately I have not had the pleasure of meeting him yet but I’m sure the time will come as he was at Bolton this week. Welcome to the club mate.

Also a nice warm welcome to Matt Milburn who has joined the ranks of the club.

Below are serveral updates from previous weeks. But this Thursday just gone was our AGM so not much has been done tonight.

Well here is the update thanks to Keith and Alan.

• The Bacup Shed building has finally had its roof added and glued down. This has also included the wooden air vents that run the length of the shed and give it some character. The original plan was to have the shed roof to come off so people can see inside but this wasn’t to be as it would have been a bit difficult with the delicate vents.
• Dark grey fine ballast has been laid inside the shed roads to represent concrete walkways. Some of this has even been put in the pits to show concrete pits. We may well weather this to be a bit dirtier as we know that sheds were never clean.
• 12x peco point motors have been wired up. This is done by using a green wire with a loop over to a tab on the same side, this is then the common. Then a blue wire on one of the other tabs and a white on the other. These are to be used for the Bacup layout.
• 2x peco point motors have now been fitted to an insulfrog point. This has also had a supply for dcc by soldering two wires to the underside of the point.
• 2x gas lamps have also been fitted on Bolton Road North in Stubbins opposite the station. These have been cut out, glued together, wired up using a grain of rice 12v dc lamps and then painted green. These are then fitted into location and wired up underneath the layout.
• Keith has been beavering away on the Bacup layout installing more cork strips for the laying of track in the next coming weeks.
• We have found in recent weeks that the turntable we have which is a peco model seems to bounce a bit. We hopefully have solved this by gluing some lead weights in place.
• Alan has made a few water cranes out of a silicone lid, a pen and what looks like some wire.
• Alan this week decided to take a break from modeling and run a few trains. The chairman has had a day off and has new teeth!

We also sold some unwanted and unusable books, wagons, carriages, trains, controllers, old bits and bats. This managed to raised a total of £70 which will go towards Bacup as we need more points.

Evening All,

Firstly sorry for the lack of updates but work has been sending me away to such far out places as Herefordshire, Shropshire and London. Unfortunately this means that I have not been able to get down to Ramsbottom and seen the lads including the new lads Phillip and Matt.

Well today has been hot and sunny with trip up the fylde coast to Thornton Cleveleys then down to Summerseat which is really beautiful on a day like today. This has also meant that I was able to attend and catch up with the lads.

Only three tonight this being Me, Alan and Keith….

• Well today started with a quick phone call to Alan to let him know that I was coming down tonight. He informed me that all the milk has gone off and that the biscuit jar was running low. Recently it seems that the lads only function if there are biscuits haha, So off to Aldi we go for long life milk and biscuits. The reason we use long life milk is because we don’t have a fridge…..could do with a travel type fridge….mmmmm.
• Arrived down at the club house around 6.00pm with chippy tea, milk, biscuits and tools in hand. Connected up the water, emptied the bins, washed the mugs outs and finally eat my tea.
• A surprise phone call from Roger Wilsons widow Olive to Alan to ask if he wanted some track that she had found. The track was a few boxes of triang curved and straight. But the biggest surprise was the full box of flexi track that I am informed made Keith beam with a smile!
• Matt has made some repairs to Bolton Road North in Stubbins where new street lights have been installed in the past.
• Been informed by Keith that the AGM is due…..oops
• Me and Alan have been having a running night, not quite to the program but just a nice evening of running trains including the worlds longest Pullman train complete with Alex’s Deltic with 10 coaches.
• Keith has been working on felting the turntable, the worm gear on it has seized up so he has eased it off and tried to reset the mechanics of it. Previously peter had fitted the motor to the underside of it.