Winchester Railway Modellers

WINCHESTER RAILWAY MODELLERS

CHAIRMANS CHATTER, our quarterly newsletter

Firstly, Merry Christmas and a Happy and productive New Year to all.
Welcome to the first Chairman's Chatter of 2026 complete with a new editor! Hopefully we can continue to provide you with the information you need and keep you up to date with what the club is doing.

Chairman's Chatter
October 2025

General chatter

Well done to Bruce, Jerry and Bev for flying the flag with "Lockton Lane" at Southampton Central on 16th of December in support of the Rail 200 Inspiration Train. There have been some great comments and it has certainly helped raise the club profile.

Keep the evening of Saturday 21st of February clear in your diaries. It’s the President's dinner aboard the Steamship Shieldhall. Partners are as always invited. Further info will be forthcoming in the new year.

Dave R

Redbridge Wharf (Clive "Watty" Watson)

October saw Redbridge winning yet another Best in Show trophy at Fareham with its last outing of 2025 (although we only held it for 30 seconds!) back in the club room now and ready for a winter of remedial work and TLC. The layout is available for OO stock/loco testing (playing trains), pending any work being carried out. Roll on 2026.

Abbotstone (President Shaw)

During the last 3 months, running has been achieved and some visiting stock seen. We tested the old MPD add-on and found it worked as intended. Plans for the next 3 months include adding the turntable (now working) to a new add-on board. This will have 2 or 3 roads for stock storage. It will be erected on planned running nights and additional as required.

NG7 (President Shaw)

The main 7mm event was the erection of the Lynton to Barnstaple boards. Thank you for allowing this as with all new layouts it is important to de-snag during construction.

President's Ponderings

Our new Chairman has kindly agreed that I may contribute a paragraph or two to the club's newsletter. This publication serves as a key communication channel reaching all members, and importantly, it includes the calendar of upcoming events and exhibitions.

A happy New Year to you all.

The Importance of Exhibiting

Over the years, exhibiting either a club or private layout at exhibitions, particularly local ones, has proved to be the most consistent and reliable way to attract new members to our club. These events provide us with the opportunity to showcase our craftsmanship and highlight the friendliness and camaraderie that exists among us. Long may this tradition continue.
However, it is important to note that we rely on receiving invitations to participate in these exhibitions, and such invitations are often the result of our ongoing publicity efforts and regular appearances at shows. It is something of a chicken and egg situation. The question I would like to pose to everyone is: how do we get things moving with a brand new layout?

Support for 2026 Shows

I encourage everyone to support the shows scheduled for 2026. Please make sure to mark the dates in your new family diary now.

Project "Eastleigh" (Mr. Chairman)

Discussions have been ongoing for the last few weeks, and although we have little concrete to show for it, we are making progress. There are a myriad of things to sort before we can usefully get into full-on build mode so your patience is appreciated.

We do have a concept level track plan (below) which shows we can build something worthwhile in a reasonable space. This is not going to be another generic N gauge layout but something "meaty" and to a high standard to continue the club's record of top notch layouts.

We hope to have baseboards under construction early in January and some track building tasks will get underway in parallel with that.

A key item to resolve promptly will be the traffic flows we wish to model and how the scenic yard area will operate. This in turn will influence how we lay out the fiddle yard area and how we operate the layout overall.

Once we get that far it will allow the "wire stranglers" to plan the electrics and we can think about building the scenic items. Some of the major buildings can begin construction fairly soon alongside all this.

We will need a project lead (or two) to take on the co-ordination and planning work for the project as the Chairman is only holding the fort at present. If you think you could help with this, don't be shy, speak to Dave R.

Phew!

Back Issues of Chairmans Chatter

Previous years Chairman's Chatter are available in the archive

Jan 24	Apr 24	Jul 24	Oct_24
Jan 25	Apr 25	Jul 25	Oct_25

All images hosted on Flickr