2004 Meetings

October 2004

Sam Medworth brought along his Steam Shovel in its second incarnation, this time powered by electric motors. Sam has made up a d.c. Power supply and control unit from a large flash light unit, which will be invaluable for powering future models. He also showed a new Meccano model of a Skidoo.

Ron came with a 'Motion Series' model collection of a Helicopter, Road Sweeper,Motor Cycle, Breakdown Truck and an excellent radio controlled Jeep based on a Niko chassis. All these models are available on the market at present.

Dave Miller brought along a clockwork motor from the Meccano Action Packs from 1979 and a set of Hornby railway points using Meccano to operate them.

Tony Lavender had recently visited an old mill in Eskdale that was built in 1540. Tony has recreated this building with working sack hoist and two 3" pulleys with tyres for the millstones.

John Day drove all the way from Devon to be with us. He has just built a fairground Ferris wheel from a 1957 Meccano model plan, which was demonstrated to us. He also showed us a Mamod steam engine beautifully restored. He showed us the same engine some time ago prior to restoration in an awful state.

Peter Evans has got the build bug again and has just completed a Super Model Traction engine in medium green and red Meccano. This is one of four models he has presently on the go.

Neil Bedford is working on a Scamell Explorer tractor unit used to transport main battle tanks on the road. He now has a very impressive rolling chassis with six-wheel drive.

Richard Smith produced this impressive half-track.

David Northcott brought this nice single decker bus in blue and gold.

January 2004


Roger Baker came with an unusual American Meccano set of the 30s that was like a large scale X series set of parts that were held together by pop-rivets rather than nuts and bolts.

Sam Medworth had come right up to date with a 2003 Meccano ‘Design 3’ outfit that made a three-wheeler motorbike. Some of the parts were made from a form of spring steel with a ‘memory’, which meant they would spring back to their pre-formed shapes if you tried to bend them. Surely Frank Hornby himself would have been intrigued by such technology.

Tony Lavender demonstrated a device he had made for his grandson to show that the acceleration due to gravity is the same for all objects regardless of weight. We did not have the leaning tower of Pisa handy to operate it from so we had to make do with a dining room table, but it worked fine!

David Northcott had become smitten by a model tugboat he had seen accompanying a much larger model at Skegness last year. He reproduced it and brought his version along to entertain us.

Ron Garside, having made over twenty supermodels that are still up and running has clearly run out of nickel parts and so his latest, No. 10 a sawmill, is made from 70s bits, but ran as smoothly as all the others.

Richard Smith had decided to restart his Corsair fighter plane and build it in a more robust form that will cope more reliably with the skin he intends clothing it in. He has been working on the retracting undercarriage.

Malcolm brought a Primus car chassis outfit with the car made up (left on the picture). He had put this together for a future Constructor’s Quarterly article. He also had a Meccano Car Constructor model for comparison (on the right in the picture).