Just to make sure there's no confusion the Bentley Model Railway Group are based in Chippenham, Wiltshire, United Kingdom. Also we're neither of the following: Uckfield Model Railway Club; Westinghouse Model Railway Club
It all started with a layout, Bentley St. John's , which was built with the aid of a grant from the School fund and exhibited in Swindon in the spring of 1976. Things were a bit rough and ready back then (thinking about it I'm not sure they're all that different now). The layout stood on tables "borrowed" from the physics labs (lessons were conducted on the floor for a couple of days), and a certain amount of last minute "finishing off" was required on site. In fact, when the time to leave arrived we had to employ a hacksaw to dismantle the layout.
We started up again as a group of older, but no wiser, school friends who got together now and again to play trains. Since then we've been joined by a few other nutters and have a number of layouts that we show here and there. After going through a bit of a quiet patch we started exhibiting again with layouts such as Pengwynn Crossing , Crompton Fields and Gladstone Road. The major layout to exhibit will be Somerford but the rebuild project seems to be taking forever although just recently we have exhibited a reduced form entitled 'Somerford MPD' and revived version of an old layout Highbridge Road. Whilst the Somerford project lumbers on the increased membership has allowed a few concurrent projects including Tannenbaum, Wartime, and Mandlebury Central. Also plans are underway for our first 'new build' layout for a few years, Vaduz.
Our clubroom is located adjacent to the railway station in Chippenham. Despite claims that modern operations here are deadly dull there seems to be no shortage of people looking out the window every time something rolls through. Although the building looks something like an old barn, a number of people have proclaimed that without the lights on they thought it was derelict, it seems to have all to quickly been filled with layouts, wood, and more paraphernalia than you can shake a stick at.
Some of the membership also get out and about to some local fetes as well as in the nearby park running passenger carrying trains with 'Pipsqueak', a little battery powered 5 inch gauge locomotive.
On top of everything else the club organises two exhibitions each year,the Calne Model Rail Show on the last weekend in January and Trainwest in Bowerhill, Melksham in May. Trainwest is a major exhibition which regularly features over 30 layouts.
Membership costs £50 per year for adults (unfortunately membership has to be restricted to those over 18 years of age). Meetings are officially scheduled for each Tuesday and Thursday evening, starting at 7:30 p.m. and ending when everyone has gone home. If you would like to come along one evening to find out what we do and what we are like, just E-Mail the Secretary, Dave Spencer.
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Historical Model Railway Society
