Beginnings
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Our group was started by Yvonne and Michael Shillabeer. He called a meeting of local N Gauge Society members at Pelhams in 1993. Michael missed the first meeting, as he was in hospital, so it was Yvonne that started us off. Around 20 members attended, a committee was formed, and it was decided to form a proper Area Group, affiliated to the N Gauge Society.
At first we just brought along stock, and chatted, but then the possibility of building a group layout was discussed. This was soon ruled out due to lack of storage space. Some of us still wanted to create something, so a modular system where each person could build a small part of a layout was devised. Eventually the number of modules were 10 straights and 4 corners, this was cumbersome to assemble and dismantle at a club evening, to this end two end return loops were built to give more flexible options. In 2005 we decided to hold our own (our first) exhibition at Pelhams in October 2007, this gave us the incentive to re-lay the fiddle yard track and change the electrical connections to all modules.
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October 2007
We have around 19 members who regularly attend, and make newcomers most welcome.
Exhibitions
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We were invited to attend a model railway exhibition at the Allendale Centre, Wimborne in 1999. At that stage we had no fiddle yard, and decided that we needed the impetus of a dead-line to speed us up a bit, so we agreed. We just managed to get the end two fiddle yard boards ready in time, although it hadn't been tested with the rest of the layout. It took a fair bit of fiddling about on the Friday evening, but we eventually got it going. We then added more modules, attended more exhibitions. It was eventually retired and modules returned to various members, parts that were never completed were broken up for re-use.
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The modular layout was exhibited in various forms as can be seen from the list below.
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