A pleasant summer day with a hint of rain was the perfect weather for yet another excellent show organised by Bryan Pentland and members of the Train Collectors Society. Despite the lure of the Ladies final at Wimbledon, the attendances were up this year and in particular the number of local families. Visitors were given a feast of wonderful layouts, from TT to gauge 2.
This is a summary of the full report to follow in the next edition of The Train Collector.
Malcolm Pugh, aided by Paul Chapman, ran the club bring and buy stall. During the day French H0 sold well. Amongst the British items, a lovely 3-car set of maroon 00 scale Exley coaches sold for £77.
Eric Large's Tri-ang TT
Tri-ang TT was represented by Eric Large with his superb two level layout.
Alongside were Dave and Elspeth Coddington with a fantastic display of Tri-ang OO trains from Australia and New Zealand. Full of rare items, this was a popular display.
David Ramsey's Carette Display
The highlight of the show was a display of Carette trains by David and Amalia Ramsey. Mainly dating from between 1909-1914, this was an almost complete collection of everything made for the British market.
Peter Berry was running Graham Farish 00 gauge from the 1950s. He had an excellent loco yard full of locomotives, as well as some of the 4mm scale buildings.
Pat Hammond was displaying trains that had a connection with India. Of particular interest was Crown Railways who had bought Tri-ang redundant tooling from Lines Bros. in the 1960s.
Rachel and Bill Vyse had a mixed stock 0 gauge layout with the theme ‘Holiday and Excursions’.
Neil Smith and his brother had a wonderful loose-lay Tri-ang Transcontinental two level layout on ‘standard’ track. It had four running tracks including three with live catenary.
Steve Smith and Joshua Thompson were running Tri-ang Big Big with a triple loop layout that enabled plenty of variety in running.
David and Peter Peasant displayed a scenic 0 gauge layout. This included Tri-ang Minic with a collection of taxis awaiting the arrival of the next train, and Britains’ Soldiers.
David Knighton and friends with a pre- and post-WW1 gauge 1 layout. This used Marklin track and stock from Bassett-Lowke, Bing and Carette. There were also some gauge 2 locomotives on display.
John and Pauline Forman had a two-level Lego layout. In the centre was a Monorail Airport Shuttle and there were three running tracks around the outside.
Roger and Barbara Burnish had scenic Dublo 3-rail layout popular with the children. It included a repainted 0-6-2T in ‘Thomas’ colours and a 3-rail Hornby Toby the Tram Engine pulling a train.
Bryan Pentland, TCS Chairman and organiser of the show, along with Paul Williams, TCS Treasurer, had a Tinplate Trains Wonders of the World layout and display.
Michael Foster was selling the last few copies of part 1 of his series of books titled ’British Toy Trains’.
Steve Knight and members of the Kitmaster club had a small display including a rare Lord of the Isles (loco only) produced by French Nescafe and a nice conversion from a Sterling Single to a Crampton.
Amongst the Traders were Elaine Harvey (trading as Elaine’s Trains) and Dave Angell who both sponsor the show.
