Our theme of the day was bogie wagons and vans and after the circuit was set up the action began and first out of the blocks was Fred who ran among other things a GWR siphon G van, a Southern bogie luggage van and a nicely weathered bogie well wagon carrying a diesel engine. Martin […]

Taking advantage of the temporary lull in heat waves we assembled at Badlesmere where our focus of the day was on Private Owner Vans and Tank wagons. Once the circuit was up Paul W ran an LNER F Class with some salt wagons and Fred ran a Class 121/122 railcar. David Ho ran a train

The circuit was worked pretty hard today with a lot of members running stock mainly in line with our focus on Welsh, Scottish and European. The Welsh contingent was well represented as Paul W ran a Brecon & Merthyr Keir Stuart 0-6-0T pulling some north Wales private owner wagons, Bill ran his GWR 43XX No

Today our focus was on maroon and red locomotives and stock. Once the circuit was set up Tim ran a GWR pannier that he had just picked up on e-bay for £100 and which will reappear in due course in London Transport red. In keeping with today’s focus the pannier was pulling an ex-GWR bogie

David L gave a very interesting and informative talk on the history of the London Brighton and South Coast Railway starting with the early days of the London & Croydon Railway and the London & Greenwich Railway and their eventual merging with the London & Brighton Railway in 1836 to form the LB&SCR. Brighton station

Our focus on the circuit today was again on Private Owner Wagons but this time on those from outside of Kent. John D was first out of the blocks with his GWR 14xx pulling a Pickfords container on a GWR container wagon, a Westbury Iron Works 10-ton wagon and an Edward Eastwood 10 ton wagon.

This was another of the extra meetings for members to work on their own projects. Dave B continued working on the EMU that he had picked up for a song (almost literally) at a recent show. The model is coming along really well and is almost ready for Dave to apply transfers. They are likely

Today’s focus on the circuit today was Kentish Private Owner Wagons and the lie was quickly given to the suggestion that we didn’t have many as over thirty of Kent’s finest appeared on the circuit and the modelling table! Having set up my train of private owner wagons with my SECR H Class, an annoying

After making teas etc, I spent 45mins setting up the diorama, only to find an old controller that I had bought with me had decided to pack up. A quick rewire with one of the Roundy’s controllers and hey presto all back in action. I then demonstrated how the layout worked using the new EKOGG

No commentary on today’s proceedings which focused on anything Great Western but these are a few pictures of that day.

In the first of our sessions dedicated to working on layouts or our own projects eight of us assembled at Badlesmere and got on with it. Roger was working on one of Geoff’s bargain basement wagons on which he had carried out a cut and shut operation and was now adding strapping and other detail

Our focus for today was on diesel shunters. On the circuit while Fred was running his 08 with a short train including a shunter’s truck, an engine from a Class 47 diesel on a well wagon and a brake van. Rob got out the big stuff from across the pond. This consisted of a big

Today we had short presentations with photographs from three members on their own layouts and first up was me talking about my layout based on Margate Sands station and set in 1911. This was the first station in Margate and for seventy years the terminus of the short branch off of the SER line to

First thing on Friday morning Tim picked up a big white van and then picked up Bill, David L and yours truly before heading on over to Badlesmere. There we loaded the layout up into the van before going on to Gravesend to pick up Roger. With our setting up team now complete we set

Today on the circuit we were looking at horse boxes and specialist stock. Today’s runners and riders were John P with his GWR 14xx 0-4-2 with a Conflat wagon, John B his Hudswell Clark 0-6-0 pulling a mustard van and Rob with his 0-6-0ST “Elizabeth” with an assortment of wagons. Roger ran his D8 diesel

Today’s theme was 0-6-0 tender engines; well, that was the theory anyway. However, Martin kicked off proceedings by running a Class 117 3 Car DMU and then a Class 121 single car DMU. John P then ran a BR Class 45xx 2-6-2 Prairie and explained that this was really a 0-6-0 tender engine but with

David G gave us an illustrated talk today on the origins and effectiveness of BR Standard Class engines. David told us that when British Railways came into being on 1 January 1948 it employed 648,000 men and women and had around 20,150 locomotives spread across 476 different classes. Many of these locomotives were not in

Today’s focus was on industrial and shunting 0-4-0T engines. Once the circuit had been set up several 0-4-0Ts were soon buzzing round the track. John B had his B4 pulling a couple of coaches and Rob had his ex-L&Y 0-4-0ST Pug No. 11247 pulling two private owner wagons. Roger ran a Rushton & Hornsby 48DS

Having recovered sufficiently from the recent festivities we assembled at Badlesmere to parade and consider our recent presents and purchases and with the circuit set up Fred’s pannier was soon running round with an auto-coach and Bill ran his Prairie and brake van.The Prairie was bought by Bill at the recent Guildford show and apparently

Today was the long-awaited Christmas Lunch; this time at a new venue for us, the Gunpowder Mill in Faversham, the change of venue being occasioned by some dissatisfaction last year with our usual Christmas Lunch hostelry the Red Lion in Badlesmere. Accordingly, sixteen assorted gourmands and trenchermen assembled for a 12.30 kick off. Unfortunately, despite