009 AGM - we should be so lucky

Blimey that was a day out! I set out at 6am for sunny Liverpool and dropped off M'lady Stoner near Lime Street and half an hour later I was in sunny Rainford. Set up the layout and the F&WHR stand and got myself sorted out in time to hand over a box of stock to Brian on the society sales stand which will pay for a few of life's niceties.

Flanked by David Gander and Stan Williams, the exhibition was opened by Pete Waterman; no one mentioned Rick Astley.

Underhill behaved itself pretty well and some people said nice things. There were several visitors to The Island, the first of which was a very splendid radio controlled and battery powered loco. The loco itself was just a PECO GVT tram with a KATO chassis but the extraordinary thing about it was the superb controllability  Without relying on the track for power there was no stalling and the chip in the loco had excellent speed control. I'm dreadful at names but on the NGRN online forum the makers name is Fallen and there is an interesting thread all about the birth of this loco.

The controller is sitting on the shed with the loco in the foreground. I feel that this could be the way forward.

Next visitor was the latest not quite ready version of the new PECO L&B coach; looked brilliant to me but will apparently be even better by the time we are allowed to have them. can't wait.

SR first and then L&B will be available.

The next visitor was a bit of a shocker...

Its health and safety gone mad!

Mr T of RT Models was doing the rounds frightening people with his total H&S Peckett. Despite the stripes it was a lovely build from one of his kits and ran very well. Later on it had a train of dirty big skips which it looked more at home with.

I also had a visit from Rod Alcock and one of his splendid locos and some ROCO/Parkside cross breed skips which looked very good. We spent most of the time talking about guitars of which Rod seems to own many very nice ones.

In general I had a cracking day so many thanks to Stan and the boys but mostly to the ladies of the bacon butty and tea brigade.