Autumn Weekend

 Our next Autumn weekend will run from the evening of Friday November 6th to Sunday 8th 2026. We will offer a range of courses that will run in different rooms around the Chartered Institute of Marketing in Cookham, with each course having at least one specialist tutor in the subject on hand. Attendees choose a particular course for the weekend but are encouraged to wonder around and view what is on offer in the other rooms. Courses are

• Practical in nature,
• Designed to allow you to progress in your chosen field with the aid of experienced tutors,
• Demonstrations and the other like minded modellers around you.

The courses on offer this Autumn are yet to be finalised, but will include Locomotive and Kit construction in 4mm scale and below and in 7mm scales and above. We also will be offering our weathering course, track construction and painting & lining along side at least one other course yet to be confirmed. 

4mm Locomotive & Kit Building

4mm Locomotive & Kit Building

Tony Gee and Jerry Clifford once again team up to tutor this ever popular course. Predominantly the course deals with locomotive and rolling stock building using etched or white metal cast kits.

The room caters for modellers of all scale up to and including 4mm to the foot, with typically a mix of gauges of stock being produced. 

7mm Locomotive & Kit Building

7mm Locomotive & Kit Building

Kevin Wilson will once again tutor the larger scale locomotive & kit construction course.

A room of 7mm and larger scale modellers building locomotives and rolling stock items from etched or cast metal kits.

7mm Locomotive & Kit Building

CAD for Railway Modellers

Justin Newitt will be running a computer aided design course covering both 2D and 3D CAD and demonstrating how these are the tools that unlock creating etches, laser cutting and 3D printing to enhance your modelling.

Painting & Lining

Painting and Lining

Geoff Haynes will be with us for the Autumn weekend once again after his inaugural course in 2024.

This is a mixture of a taught course with hands-on painting and lining exercises. Modellers usually bring a few models to paint and/or line under Geoff's expert tuition.

Track Construction

Track Construction

Building scale track work with Tony Geary.

Tony will cover all the aspects of building your own scale track work, focusing on points and crossing. He will also demonstrate his techniques for ballasting and laying track.

Painting & Lining

Weathering

Chris Hopper  will once again be taking the weathering course. Chris will cover a variety of methods for achieving realistic weathered effects on your models, using both air brushing and non-air brushing techniques.

A limited number of air brushing stations will be available for those that do not have their own.

As usual at the Autumn weekend we will offer both residential and non-residential places, with modellers arriving on the Friday evening in time for dinner and to setup for a weekend of practical modelling. Modellers can start work after dinner on the Friday, and the modelling continues until Sunday afternoon, interspersed with tea/coffee, breakfast, lunch and dinner. Not to mention a number of demos and talks given by tutors and other attendees. There is also plenty of opportunity to visit other modelling rooms to see what different groups are doing. There is a licensed bar and of course the bedrooms for those who have opted to stay at the venue.

• Typical Weekend Timetable

We usually feature 3 demonstrations that are open to all during the course of a weekend, these are in addition to any that are done for the individual cause by the tutors. Below are a selection videos of demonstrations that have previously been given, click on the links to watch the videos.

• Lightening track laying with Norman Solomon
• Cutting sheet metal to make replacement parts with Tony Gee
• Getting Started Lining with Geoff Haynes
• Lining a tender with Geoff Haynes

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