2002 Easter Exhibition

Mervyn had a brilliant 'Biggles' display. The centrepiece of this was a large tower with a rotating four-armed section on top from which four aircraft were suspended. Two of these had operating propellers, which powered the rotation of the top section. The aircraft modelled were all from WW1 and some had been flown by W.E Johns the creator of Biggles. Mervyn also had static aircraft models and a really novel exhibit of the carnage once created by Johns himself when he let a plane he was about to fly run amuck and wipe out several other planes and buildings. The later attraction was accompanied by a tape recording of Mervyn reading an account of the mayhem from a book by Johns!

David Northcott had a model of a Morgan and the scrap 2-10-0 he had brought to our last meeting.

Gordon Snow had a selection of small but intriguing models he had put together for a public exhibition in mid-Wales.

Roger Baker displayed his collection of Meccano Mogul models from the early 70's most of which were unused and boxed. Moguls were one of many attempts by Meccano to diversify, but just as Cliki could not compete with Lego so the Moguls were no match for Tonka toys and soon disappeared from the scene.

Sam entertained us with an 'identify this Meccano part' competition and a model of a microscope in which a drop of water acted as a very effective lens.

Bill Jary drove up from Devon with a Meccano/Jones sewing machine and Meccano counter top dealer's cabinet from the nickel period.

Ron Garside's contribution was a collection of nickel models including a revolving crane, bagatelle game and planing machine.

Grahame's 70's Meccano models consisted of a crane lorry and a ship coaler.

Malcolm has been lazy on the model-building front of late and only brought a No. 6 set model of a Bedford type lorry made from French blue/gold Meccano of the 50's. However, in an attempt to add to the interest he brought along all his pre 1970 French Meccano collection with items dating back to the 20's.

David Hobson had made a magnificent car chassis.

Richard Smith did bring his crane this time which continues to progress. The drive to the tracks is now operative but because of a fault on one side on the day the model would only go around in circles!

There were 8 competitors for the scrap-heap challenge of building a 'tug of war' machine powered by a clockwork motor. We ran it in a 'knockout' fashion. As one of only two competitors who owned a 'trinity' motor of the type made for Meccano by Marklin in the teens Malcolm was at something of an advantage and after he had loaded his device with over 100 24.5" and 18.5" girders to aid traction it proved unbeatable! Not very pretty, but very effective! Next year we must think of something where the mad collector does not have such a head start! Sam's entry (runner-up) had some novel features including drive from the winder of the motor, and the weight transmitted to the wheels via rollers onto the tyres, not via the axles to reduce friction.