Floating Shelf Budget Model Railway Challenge - Part 2 - A trip to Sompting Model Railway Exhibition

This weekend saw my Dad and I visiting the Sompting and District Model Railway Exhibition.

This was a fantatic little day out for the pair of us and it is about 35 years since I have last been to a model show of any kind.  

If I remember rightly it was the Model Engineers show at Olympia where I got to see the anamatronic ABC Warrior and the Landrover Mega City 1 Taxi which were going to feature in the upcoming Judge Dredd movie with Sylvester Stallone.  The team from Robot Wars were also there recruiting robot builders for their new TV Show which was still in the pre-production phase.  Yes, it was that long ago.

Sompting Exhibition Layouts

Many thanks to all the members who brought their exhibition layouts and for taking the time to chat with us.  Everyone was extremely welcoming and we both had a great time chatting and looking at the wonderful layouts.  Big shout out to Mike Potter from Budget Model Railways for publicising the event on his YouTube channel and bringing his Japanese shunting layout which was quite stunning.

Barraton - 00 Scale Layout

A charming scratchbuilt Era 1 locomotive

Thomas The Tank Engine celebrating his 80th Birthday

a 360 degree shunting layout

I could not leave without making a few purchases some of which may find their way onto my own floating shelp layout including:

Arnold 6354 / Rapido (0634) - BAUSTAZ Coaling Station - £6

When I watch my favourite YouTube channels they invariably feature industrial buildings.  Sadly I do not have many of these so I grabbed this visually interesting multi-level multi track building when I spotted it on the club stand.  Largely intact, with the exception of the coal conveyor,  this will be a great addition to my layout.  It is an impressive 22cm x 4.5cm and is intended to be flanked on each side by a track, so lots of opportunity for shunting.

Gaugemaster SS-2 Electronic Station Stop Module - £5

The club stand had a whole box of these and other Gaugemaster automation modules and I couldn't resist at that price.  See how I get on wiring this in on another layout

Lima Palethorpes Siphon-G Wagon - £8

I already have one of these for my layout and as I have a Palethorpes Sausage Factory as practically the only industry on the layout I deserve to have a small rake of these wagons. 

Obligatory Running Video

The postman delivered my haul of secondhand track so work could start on my own Budget Model Railway Floating Shelf Challenge layout.  As you can see the Coaling Station is already installed on the layout and pretty much dictates the theme for this layout.