Newsletter – AUGUST 2019 Contents 1. Chairman’s Monthly Report..…………………………………..……………………………………….……..1 2. Other Club News ………………………………………………………………………………………….…..………...…….2 3. My Operations Adventures ……………………..…………………..…………………………………………………....5 4. Silent Once More…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………5 5. The EMD SD Tunnel Locomotives, Train Masters, and Commutes…………………………...............5 6. Annual Claremont Model Railway Exhibition, 2019 Perth.……………………………………………...…11 7. Model Engineering Fair - A Forthcoming Attraction………………………………………………………..…20 8. The Water Tower Challenge - Waterval Boven.…………………………….……………………………….....21 9. Upcoming Duty Roster………………………………………….…………………………………………………..…..….32 10. Club Diary……………………………………………………………….…………………………………………………………33 11. Club Committee……………………………………………………….……………………………………………………….34 12. Banking Details………………………………………………………….………………………………………………………34 2019 Chairman’s Report – August 2019 By Glynn Chamberlain Hello again fellow EMRIGers I hope this newsletter finds you all well. As in life, a change is always considered a good thing. And I think this stands true for the move we recently undertook. I was at a committee meeting last night (07-08-2019), and yes, it is I who have been delaying the newsletter, but damn, the club house is just looking great. The various modules are just looking stunning and cleaner (for want of a better word). For instance, less clutter! Again, we have landed with our bum in the butter. Now, this change has also impacted us with regards our lease and finances... The lease is in its final stages of being organised and is almost an identical copy of the one Colin TT originally had with the mall under his own name. This time it will be in the name of the Club (and the club will now need to pay the deposit, so that Colin can get his back!). An amount of R100 to R150 per month for the rent has been bandied around, yet to be finalised, but almost certainly, we will additionally be paying for lights and water. So please, no more running your passenger trains with all the lights on . Page 1 of 35 One item which does need discussion and resolution fairly soon: the committee, knowing there would be issues getting everything into the new club house decided, as a “stop-gap” measure, to rent storage space at a storage facility for stuff we could not get into the new layout or room. Thus, a container was rented and believe it or not, is FULL. The exhibition layout takes up about one third of the container, but the remaining items are questionable. The issue here is that the cost is R630 per month and something like R1800 has already been expended on 2 month’s rent and a R500 deposit. If you do the maths for one year, it is quite substantial, and so is definitely not a long-term solution! To this end, the committee has given itself till the end of September to “make a plan”. My advice is that we need to be ruthless. E.g. there is the steel desk there that was next to Jean Dulez’s layout. Do we really need it? NO! It must go! The same with most of the other stuff there. However, we need to find a suitable place for the HO exhibition layouts as well as all the barrier-pole buckets. So, we are asking the members – any ideas? Do you have space, or know of space where we can store them without incurring costs? Lastly, on the 31st of this month, we are having our next Swap Meet. Again, the earnest request is that members attend on the day to assist with set up and take down. Please! This one will be a bit of work in that the two trolleys we use for moving the tables around are now in the container with the exhibition layouts mounted on top. So, if you have trolleys, please bring them along to help. So, till next time, Happy railroading. Glynn Chamberlain Other Club News By Brian Dawson Our New Club Premises… It always takes a while to move completely into a new home, and to fine-tune all the facilities until they feel just like “home”… And that’s what’s been happening in our new club premises over the course of the past month. A number of the members have been hard at work turning what was an empty old office suite into a model railway clubroom! After the basic erection and connecting up of the layout, there has been an on- going process of sorting things out to make life lekker for everyone: getting track levels sorted out (so that trains with Kaydee couplers don’t uncouple as they pass over the “speed-bumps”); re-affixing items (like tall trees) that became dislodged or were removed for safe-keeping during the process of the move; carry- ing out repairs to items that became damaged due possibly to rough handling or tight corners that modules or boards had to be moved through; putting up clubroom signage; replacing door locks; issuing keys; rein- stating the library; getting rid of old magazines for which we no longer have storage space… so many tasks Page 2 of 35 (some small, others not so small!) that have all helped to give our new premises a real “we like being here!” feel to them!! It is always risky to single out people for special mention (the risk is of inadvertently leaving someone out of the list), but during the limited time that I have been able to spend at the club during the past month I have seen or heard about the following members all hard at work making improvements: AshP, ColinA, ColinTT, JimmyM, Kallie vB, KevinB, MarkP, NielW… to all of you guys, and any others that have been involved but who I have not mentioned, THANK YOU for your efforts in helping to get things sorted and optimalised. There is still some work that needs to be done… fire extinguishers and CCTV cameras and the appropriate signage still need to be affixed to the walls, there is still work to be done on the shunting layout (so that it can be used as either DC or DCC, and some attention is required to the wiring of the “Dulez” layout, but we are rapidly getting to the point where everything is fully functional. We have a Swap Meet coming up at the end of the month, and no doubt we will have many visitors on the day, coming to see where we now reside as a club… so it would be great if everything was ship-shape by then! To that end, we will be having another “workshop” afternoon on Saturday 24th August, when Glynn is again on Key duty. The programme for the day will be finalised in due course, but it will primarily be about ensur- ing that all aspects of all of our layouts are 100% functional. The new lease agreement with Mall management will soon be in place… we WILL now pay a (very nominal) rental per month, as well as paying for our electricity and water usage (please don’t run the aircons or the hot water in the kitchen sink unnecessarily!!), so the use of the premises is no longer a “freebie” as we used to enjoy. But the arrangement is still a very favourable one for our club, and likely still one of the best deals around. Enjoy the new premises, everyone!! N Gauge Action…?? Since the removal of Ron Poole’s lovely wall mounted layout from Shop 23 when he moved off to France, the N Gauge guys have been a bit limited in that they have only had the Exhibition Layout on which to run. William vdB has taken back the table-top layout that he loaned to the club, in order to do some additional work on it, and hopefully that will return and be available for club-running once again. But meanwhile the N Gauge section of the club has a nice big room (unfortunately not quite long enough for the longer HO Exhibition layout!!) in which to do their thing, but not a lot of “things” for them to do…. MarkP has sug- gested that it would be really good if some of the guys who run (or own but can’t run) N gauge equipment could set up a work-group and look at putting something additional together for them to run on… Are there any takers to drive this project and make this dream a reality???? Next Swap Meet At Northmead Yes - we have a Swap Meet coming up SOON!! On Saturday 31st August!!!! This one will of necessity be a little different to previous ones we have hosted, due to our move and the current construction activities at the Entrance 2 end of the Mall (where we were), and the fact that the clubroom will now be a bit more re- mote from all the action. For those who have not recently been to the Mall, there is now a construction site where the old Entrance 2 was located… and that end of the Mall and the entrance have been boarded up. The ground floor carpark Page 3 of 35 at that end is no longer available due to the construction work, rubble removal, and site offices set up there. The Entrance 1 ground floor carpark is quite small, but would still be the best option for the traders who can get to the Mall early for setting up, bringing their wares all the way through the Mall on trolleys (just a slightly longer haul). The table deliveries will also need to be made through Entrance 1. Once that carpark is full, however, the other option will be to park in the upstairs covered parking, accessed up the ramp just to the north of the Entrance 2 carpark (closer to the Engen Garage), and then make use of either of the two lifts (the larger one at the Glasfit end, or the other [smaller, but generally more reliable] which is accessed through Entrance 4 [past the club premises] and exits near the Sausage Saloon).