Alexandra Palace - January 17th to 19th.
The year kicked off for South West Meccano Club as a guest exhibitor on the West London Meccano Society stand. Steve Briancourt's USS Missouri was on display for all three days and attracted a lot of attention. Despite the arduous journey from Bristol to North London all the model's functions worked flawlessly for all three days of continuous running. The West London Meccano Society displayed a differential analyser, a Rubik's Cube solver, a folding bridge, two clocks, and a selection of 'hands on' small models, which went down very well, especially with the younger visitors. A short video of the Meccano stands can be seen on YouTube. A longer video, giving a proper flavour of the whole exhibition can also be see here (which is also a link to YouTube). Both videos courtesy of Rob Briancourt and the St Albans & District Model Engineering Society. An interview with Dubious Engineering may be seen on YouTube at Dub Eng: USS Missouri
Opposite the stand, George Illingworth displayed his superb array of Meccano fire engines throughout the ages. Scroll down the page for photos of these engines.
Many of the visitors said they had actually been on the USS Missouri in Pearl Harbour and one had spent operational time in turret number 2. The model conjured up happy memories for many of the visitors who had Meccano as children, and they were delighted to see that Meccano was still alive and well.
One of the most frequent questions asked was 'will it float'? The answer of course is 'yes it will, once the hull is wrapped in plastic sheeting'. Steve has done the preliminary calculations regarding displacement and balance and hopes to demonstrate it on water sometime in the future. No additional buoyancy or internal changes should be needed.
All of the exhibition stands were given the opportunity to vote for their favourite display and the West London Meccano Society display won 2nd place for the second year in a row.
Many thanks to Matt Goodman and John Sharp for providing such a prominent location and lights to enhance the ship and for excellent organisation and company.
George Illingworth was an independent exhibitor, and the pictures below show some of the 30 1/12th scale fire engines over the years. You can click on any of the photos to enlarge them.
