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Club v Stand alone

5748 Views 47 Replies 22 Participants Last post by  neil_s_wood
Is it worth belonging to a model railway club? Let the debate begin…..

Have you found the 'Club clique' extremely hard to break into?
I do wonder, as sometimes encountered, the 'old club members' who don't want newbie's or aren't to pleased to pass on their skills etc.
While the overall picture is one of gaining vast expertise from those who have been club members for many years, in reality often it is found that your efforts are scorned upon as being 'below club standards' etc.
You can often be placed under pressure to give up your weekends to help out with layout operations and use your car as a vehicle for club use in transporting layouts and members to from exhibitions etc.

As a 'stand alone' modeller one can gain information, expert advice and even watch demonstrations etc.
Magazines, books, videos/DVDs and the internet all offer a wealth of help guidance and knowledge.

What a stand alone doesn't have is first hand one to one debates, but even this is now taken care of via forums like this one!

So, is club life worth the hassle??
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QUOTE You don't need the words model rail club to imply anorak in this game. Just mention to someone that you are into railway modelling and the implications are a cross between Dwayne Dibley and Roy Cropper.

I get the exact same, and I get it from my wife, her family and my work mates. I don't see why we get the "anorak" stigma when it's ok to be interested in cars or trucks or golf or whatever.
Theres one guy at work I sit next to who is in the Aussie equivalent of the Territorial army when he occasionally brings up the anorak thing, I say to him "hey, your in your thirties and still playing in the mud at soldiers, I'm in my forties and my hobby involves woodwork, electronics, art, computer technology who's the big kid?"


I don't really see why we get it but it's pretty universal. I even seen a dig at model railways on Red Dwarf on TV. The worst thing is I don't see how we could change this.
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I sometimes wonder if it's a jealously thing. We have an interest that demands all sorts of skills and knowledge, but is it the 'modeller' people are really referring to when they talk of 'anoraks'? I must admit, I can perhaps see the analogy when I see hoards of middle aged men stood at the end of some wind swept platform scribbling down numbers in the pouring rain (complete with anorak of course!).
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My wife laughs at me logging on to forums as say's that i'm sad whilst she's transfixed to the box watching bloody Eastenders, Holby City , Casualty etc, etc and i'm sad
.

As for the TA
, most of them are a waste of space, I spent 12 years in the regs and we used to hate them with a passion
.
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All I willsay is look around you next time you go to an exhibition and you will see that possibly there are those who look the part so maybe the stick is partly deserved. As for train spotting I only take photo's if i'm at a station to catch a train anywayso wouldn't confess to travelling the length and breadth of Britain to "cop" a particular loco. Perhaps we should start having a pop at those sad gits who have fun sitting by a river for 8 hours trying to land a minnow. You think this is an expensive hobby, a clooeague spent £50 on lures and came out with around 10. He even confessed the other day that the last time he went he kept falling asleep and waking up as the rod made a plunge for the river. At least as a trainspotter you are more or less guaranteed to cop summat unless you are sat nest to a line that has been closed for repairs!!
Without doubt some individuals deservedly get the stick they receive but at the end of the day because i'm into model railways I immediately get branded a trainspotter
(you wont find a striped wooly hat, spotter jotter and bright yellow rain mac in my wardrobe).
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I too am sick of the stereotypes and as I still attend a school the piss taking is more widespread especially when we are working on the railway and we have something running if I got a penny for everytime i heard "Make it Crash" and "make it go faster" or "ha its come off its rubbish" we have even given up placing scenery on at school as kids start mucking around with the cars and some particulary sad people find it funny to pose cows in sexual positions
As towards us being sad there are sports which involve Sitting by a river for several hours pulling a fish out of the water and throwing it back and even dafter a game designed by a bunch of ginger scots (sorry for the stereotype) who decided they were fed up of being oppressed by the english and decided then to hit a ball into a hole with a stick fish it back out again and hit it into another hole and we are sad because we enjoy creating a little slice of paradise and running trains on it in my opinion anyone who calls someone "sad" is by all rights "sad" themselves
Sorry for any offence created in this post if any
Also I am a great advocate of the club although some clubs could do better to persuade members Spongebob mention Shipley model railway club I contacted them last year and they totally blanked me wheras Bradford Club a lesser known and smaller club replied is their a moral to this?
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I've just looked on the Bradford MRC website so now is a good time to plug their up coming exhibition this weekend(29-30th April). I may get there on Sunday depending on what 'er indoors has planned. Nice website too.
QUOTE as I still attend a school the piss taking is more widespread especially when we are working on the railway and we have something running if I got a penny for everytime i heard "Make it Crash" and "make it go faster

I usually tell them how much it's going to cost them and tell them to come back with the money first. Sometimes shuts them up. Usually the parents remove them when they hear this.
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