In 2002, Lionsmeet was held at Bromsgrove SME. The host club extended the usual warm welcome to OLCO members and the weather was very hot. Only the traffic congestion on the M5 and adjacent roads detracted somewhat from what proved an excellent location. It’s always sad that so few of our membership are able to attend Lionsmeet. Ownership of a model is by no means necessary and attendees are assured of a rewarding day, whatever their interests.
Bromsgrove SME lies in a rural location on the edge of town, adjacent to the Avoncroft Museum of Buildings. The museum is worth a visit in its own right. Together with a wide assortment of re-erected historic buildings, it houses the National Telephone Kiosk Collection and working telephone exchanges! The Birmingham – Bristol main line lies a few hundred yards away and the day was punctuated with the sounds of passing trains. Particularly noticeable were the HS125’s taking a run at the Lickey incline.
The multi-gauge elevated track lies in mature grounds with elaborate covered steaming bays, a substantial station and adjacent clubroom. The original oval track has recently been lengthened into a dumb-bell shape, with a 6 m.p.h. limit currently on the new track. Running is anti-clockwise with a colour light home signal at the approach to the station and a colour light platform starting signal leaving the station. The home signal also has a calling-on aspect for bringing trains into an already-occupied station. Because the all-over station roof impairs the visibility of the starting signal, there is a banner repeater signal under the station roof. Opening the gates to the platform area automatically places the signals at danger and there is a ‘Train Ready to Start’ switch for the station staff which illuminates an ‘R’ sign adjacent to the starting signal. The site slopes down from North to South, so the line through the station is downhill in the direction of running whilst the "back straight" is "collar work".
The passenger cars are substantial bogie vehicles in ‘Inter City’ livery, weighing in at 300 lbs each and provided with vacuum brakes and battery-powered exhausters. When not in use, they are stored adjacent to the station. An overhead crane is used to lift each car from storage, traverse it above the running track and lower it onto the rails.
The parallel steaming bays are connected by a traverser to a "shed road" which runs to the station parallel to the running track. At the station, another traverser moves the locomotive across to the running track, but a few inches above it. Finally, a re-railing ramp is used to get the locomotive from the traverser to the running track. This means that the running track rails are unbroken, avoiding problems of ensuring accurate alignment when a conventional traverser is used.
In addition, there is a separate elevated ‘garden railway’ of 16mm and gauge 1 with some fearful looking mixed gauge pointwork. In the afternoon a variety of radio-controlled live steam models performed on this track.
As you may readily imagine, on public days hundreds of passengers can be carried. Lionsmeet, however, was arranged as a private event, although a number of museum visitors came to watch the proceedings. There were plenty of members of the host club present and beverages and snacks were available in the clubhouse. OLCO stalwart David Neish was an early arrival, accompanied by his son, Andrew. Jon Swindlehurst had brought his ‘Lion’. Frank Jones, our host at Bromsgrove, was fielding his own ‘Lion’. This had been completed and received its first boiler certificate only days before, so Lionsmeet was the "running in turn" for this brand new locomotive! Later, Alan Bibby arrived. Last year Alan won Lionsmeet at Leyland SME and Alan was keen to defend his title. Another Bromsgrove SME member had his unfinished ‘Lion’ on display.
As usual, informal running took place in the morning. This is when competitors can "learn the road" and develop strategies for the later competition running. We were treated to the usual exciting spectacle of diminuitive locomotives whizzing round at improbable speeds. Frank Jones’ locomotive performed so well that he very kindly allowed a number of lucky OLCO members and Bromsgrove SME members to take her for a spin. The writer was only prised from Frank’s engine with some difficulty. For a "fresh off" she ran really sweetly – a tribute to Frank’s engineering skills. Although some test running was carried out using a driving trolley and a single passenger car, the trailing weight combined with the curvature and adverse gradient made running rather uncertain. In the competition, all competitors elected to haul only a driving trolley and a second driving trolley for the observer. As a consequence, the winner would effectively be the competitor who achieved the greatest distance run in 10 minutes. As David Neish commented, this meant the driver who was prepared to exceed the 6 m.p.h. speed restriction by the largest amount.
Frank Jones was the first to compete and, as usual, started with a trial circuit. He elected to run with the Dynamometer car and a passenger car. On the falling grade leaving the station, he quickly worked speed up to 7.5 mph. However, on the left-hander over the bridge and the rising gradient to the back straight, speed fell until he stalled completely. A push start allowed him to bring the train back to the station, where the load was reduced to the dynamometer car and a driving trailer for the observer. The initial circuit had clocked up 4,500 work done and a distance of 1200 feet. His 10 minute trial started at 2:35:45 and speed was quickly worked up to 8mph, falling to 7mph over the bridge and 6.5mph on the back straight. The first circuit was completed in just over 2 minutes and the station passed at around 8mph. Peak speed recorded was about 9mph. Matters continued well until the observer’s driving trolley derailed on the right hander leading into the new extension. After a quick examination, the trolley was re-railed and the run continued with less than a minute lost. At the end of the ten minutes, John Hawley determined that an allowance could be made for the lost time, but, even with this allowance, Frank did not do enough work to take the trophy. But he has built a very fine ‘Lion’ which we hope to see running in the next LIONSMEET!
Next, Alan Bibby came onto the running track for his warm-up lap and started his timed run with the same load as Frank and producing a similar drawbar pull of around ten pounds. Alan held quite a constant speed, generally between 7.5 and 8mph. Work done comfortably exceeded Frank’s performance.
The third contestant was Jon Swindlehurst, again with the same load and similar drawbar pull. Fairly constant speeds around 8 or 9mph were sustained and his work done figure was higher than Alan’s.
David Neish came next and, dispensing with a warm-up lap, immediately started his timed run. After three laps, speeds of 10mph were being seen and, after 10 minutes, the results gave a strong result for David.
The locomotive was then handed over to Andrew Neish, who was the final competitor. With a well warmed-through steed, Andrew made good times and speeds of 10mph were seen on the second lap. Although the observer had some uneasy moments on the lightweight vehicle, knowing it had ‘come off’ once, we didn’t derail (an unbraked vehicle at the rear of a train on the ‘big railway’ is often referred to as a ‘swinger’ – quite appropriate) and, at the end of the measured period, Andrew had just managed to beat his father’s performance, winning LIONSMEET, I think, for the first time.
The necessity for competitors to run with similar loads took out some of the gamesmanship which is usually a feature of the competition but it was, nonetheless, a stirring performance by all the entrants.
