Given the world crisis with Corona-virus we have had numerous discussions amongst the MIOG team and from theses discussions we feel that we now have no alternative but to cancel the show for the;

24th/25th of October 2020. 

We feel that we will not be able to offer an exhibition that would be not only safe, for exhibitors & traders, but also safe for visitors to the exhibition. We also have to think about our small dedicated Exhibition team, that would be involved in the set up and running of the show. Most of our families are involved with running the exhibition, it doesn't seem fair to ask them to step into a situation that isn't potentially safe. We don’t have the space to allow us to comply with social distancing regulations that are currently being enforced by the government. All be it that these may have been reduced by the time of our exhibition, but at this current time we can't afford to take chances when money is involved. We’ve been exploring various options regarding this, and unfortunately we feel that it would not be safe to hold the exhibition at the end of the year, and deliver the great standard of exhibition you would expect without making sacrifices. Combined with the none guarantee that the tourism trade will be back open. Which could make booking exhibitors and traders into nearby hotels difficult. It could also affect visitor numbers to the exhibition, and would mean the show could potentially run at a loss, and traders would be out of pocket. 

We hope that everyone who was signed up and planned to attend the show in 2020 will understand the difficult decision that we’ve had to make. It’s certainly not one that we’ve taken lightly. (We've certainly not enjoyed making it)

We endeavour to work with our sponsors Avocet Travel, traders & exhibitors to confirm a new date for 2021 this will likely be the same weekend in October, at the new venue of Crewe Heritage Centre. Once its safe to restart the planning process and running of exhibition in a safe manner. We will be contacting Traders & Exhibitors later in the year to book for our new 2021 exhibition once we have confirmed these details with the venue. 

We hope that you’ll understand our decision and continue to support the Modern Image O Gauge show & venture. If you have any further questions regarding this year's show, please don’t hesitate to contact us at modernimageogauge@gmail.com

In the mean time we will endeavour to bring you more content, guides and more exciting plans for the rest of the year! We'd like to thank all of our supporters, and most importantly stay safe!

​Thankyou
​from all of the MIOG Team

​

We're pleased to announce (better late than never) our 2020 exhibition. Due to unforeseen circumstances we've been forced to move our venue from the School in Rawtenstall & also change of date
​
This years exhibition is planned to be held at the Crewe Heritage Centre. A place rich with Railway culture and history. The planned date for the Exhibition will be the 24th/25th of October 2020.

We've already confirmed a comprehensive list of Trade & Manufacturer support for this years Exhibition, including the likes of;

-Dapol
-Heljan
​-Buzz Models
-Bufferbeam
-DCC Supplies
-EasyBuild
​-Intentio
-PRMRP
-Northumbrian Painting Services
-Made In Manchester
-RailRiders
-SBT Developments
-Skytrex
-Telford Steam Railway
-Todmorden Model Supplies
-Tower Collection

We'll be confirming more details on a dedicated post soon! We'll also be kicking off 2020's Roadshow with Bristol O Gauge Show​ on the 26th January so don't hesitate to come along and find out more information from the guys.

**Attached MIOG Flyer & Banner**

As promised, HELJAN is announcing a new O gauge diesel at the Modern Image O Gauge (MIOG) show in Rawtenstall. Appropriately for a show in the north-west of England, it's a class that was closely associated with that area. Our popular English Electric Type 4/Class 40 is back by popular demand, but this time as the centre headcode variant, as seen on the last 55 members of the class (D345-399).
Design and tooling work was completed recently and the first running samples will be delivered to the UK for testing in early-November. Five liveries will be available from mid-2020, covering the entire BR career of the class. The models will feature a ‘DCC Friendly’ chassis, LED lighting, a heavy duty chassis with twin motors and flywheels and fine detail specific to these later-built EE Type 4s.

#4060 BR green 'as delivered' unnumbered
#4061 BR green (small yellow panels) unnumbered
#4062 BR green with full yellow ends unnumbered
#4063 BR blue with full yellow ends and headcode display unnumbered
#4064 BR blue 40155 with 'domino' headcodes

Prices will be confimed shortly.
​

The Dapol Class 66 O Gauge model will have the following features:
Electrical

• Operating front/rear lights (independent operation for DCC, (switched for DC use) Includes day/night mode)
• Operating ‘side’ lights (where lighting cluster is applicable)
• Cab light (independent operation)
• Illuminated cab control panel
• Two motors (balanced & matched) for maximum pulling power and slow speed running control
  • • •
  Chassis & Body

• Etched grills with ‘through body transparency
• Separate detail (Handrails, Handles, Grills etc.)
• Heavyweight Diecast chassis
• Diecast bogie frames
• Sprung centre wheel
• Rotating axle centres
• Appropriate couplings attached
• O gauge society wheel profiles
• Sprung buffers
• Expertly applied liveries 

7D-066-001
Class 66 66001 EWS Livery
£325.00

7D-066-001D
Class 66 66001 EWS Livery DCC Fitted
£355.00

7D-066-001S
Class 66 66001 EWS Livery DCC Sound Fitted
£475.00

7D-066-002
Class 66 66504 Freightliner Powerhaul Livery
£325.00

7D-066-002D
Class 66 66504 Freightliner Powerhaul Livery DCC Fitted
£355.00

7D-066-002S
Class 66 66504 Freightliner Powerhaul Livery DCC Sound Fitted
£475.00

7D-066-003
Class 66 66709 GBRF Sorrento MSC Livery
£325.00

7D-066-003D
Class 66 66709 GBRF Sorrento MSC Livery DCC Fitted
£355.00

7D-066-003S
Class 66 66709 GBRF Sorrento MSC Livery DCC Sound Fitted
£475.00

7D-066-004
Class 66 66421 New DRS Livery
£325.00

7D-066-004D
Class 66 66421 New DRS Livery DCC Fitted
£355.00

7D-066-004S
Class 66 66421 New DRS Livery DCC Sound Fitted
£475.00

7D-066-005
Class 66 66789 GBRF 'British Rail 1948-1997' BR Blue Large Logo
£325.00

7D-066-005D
Class 66 66789 GBRF 'British Rail 1948-1997' BR Blue Large Logo DCC Fitted
£355.00

7D-066-005S
Class 66 66789 GBRF 'British Rail 1948-1997' BR Blue Large Logo DCC Sound Fitted
£475.00

7D-066-006
Class 66 66783 GBRF Biffa 'The flying Dustman'
£325.00

7D-066-006D
Class 66 66783 GBRF Biffa 'The flying Dustman' DCC Fitted
£355.00

7D-066-006S
Class 66 66783 GBRF Biffa 'The flying Dustman' DCC Sound Fitted
£475.00


Advanced CAD Stage—Going to tooling soon Dapol reserve the right to adjust the price and details 
​

Well the times here folks. The exhibition floor plan is here. Whilst working tirelessly to finalise every last detail of the exhibition, we've finally signed off a finished floor plan. We've tried to create a plan that gives something to see in every room, and that will mean there's a great mix of trade and layout balance across the entire show!

We have also added an additional stand in the form of a Bring & Buy stand which will be located in the drama hall. So don't forget to pack your unwanted hidden treasures. Please follow the following guidelines

-Please have a price ready for the product.
-Please make sure it's as described working or not.
-We need a contact number for you incase an offer is made.
-There is a 10% surcharge for sale when completed.

So get your shopping list planned and your layout view list at the ready! Just over a week to go till the doors open! We hope to see you there!

Alternately you can download the file from here

 We're now less than 2 weeks away from the exhibition, and things are entering the final stages, before opening the doors to you the public! We've got a great line up of traders & layouts, supported by two great manufacturers of Ready to Run O gauge. We've also got announcements for new products at the exhibition from both of these which we're really excited about!

We've received the tickets for our exhibition today, but you'll have to wait until the saturday of the show to get your eyes on them!
​
We're in the process of finalising a bus for the exhibition which will be running between Rawtenstall Station (East Lancs Railway) & the exhibition venue. This will also give you the opportunity to ride the line as-well as visit the exhibition. More details of locos that are out in traffic that weekend will be available from there website. We will also be publishing a full timetable for the bus that'll coincide with the services that they're running.

Alongside finalising everything for the exhibition we're also pleased to announce that Richard from New junction will be attending and following the journey of our first exhibition and all of the antics of the first day of the show!

On-top of him attending the show we've given him a set of tickets to give away to his followers! So keep an eye on his facebook page & youtube channel for further information. These can be found here for facebook and here for is youtube channel.

As we are just over a month away we've been busy working away behind the scenes finalising and preparing everything for our first exhibition.

We've now added a finalised list of traders/exhibitors & societies to our website page, this is obviously all subject to change during the weekend (The Weather playing a major factor)

Details of our planned menu will be released soon, along with a timetable for our shuttle bus which will be running from the East Lancs Railways station at Rawtenstall.

A couple of things that have been asked for is a list of comprehensive directions on how to get to the venue, we've now added this onto our exhibition page which can be found here.

Along side this we plan to be releasing a finalised plan of the floor plan in due course so that you guys can plan your shopping trips! We've also finalised the design of tickets and various other artwork which you'll have to wait until the weekend to see!

We've also been asked about if we are doing weekend tickets. We'd initially planned that we wouldn't be doing but after a long consideration we are pleased to tell you that we will now be offering Weekend Tickets. These will be purchasable on the Saturday of the exhibition and valid for both days for a fee of £10 this will give you a massive saving of £2. If you were to attend both days.

Any other questions please don't hesitate to contact us via the Facebook Page or email us at ; modernimageogauge@gmail.com

We hope to see you soon!

Whilst we've been busy squirrelling away getting ready for our Exhibition which is just over a month away! We are now proud to announce that we'll be teaming up with the newly re-formed 'Rail-Riders'  We've attached a press release from the guys at Rail Riders as to what it has to offer, and what to look forward to! They'll be at hand to answer any questions that you might have! Also keep your eyes peeled for our exclusive Rail-Riders Polos with the MIOG branding on at our show worn by our members! We'd like to take the chance to wish Simon Buxton of Buffer-beam all the best with his new venture!

'Rail Riders is returning

After 29 years away Rail Riders will be returning in February 2020
The owners of Bufferbeam (supplier to preserved railways and locomotive groups) have set up a new company Rail Riders Ltd to bring back the former British Rail children’s club which ran from 1981 to 1991. Bufferbeam has been selling merchandise with the former club logo on for over a year and the feedback about the club generated the idea to bring it back.

Bufferbeams parent company applied for and obtained Trade Mark protection on all Rail Riders logos to insure that the club could retain the original name and the distinctive logo due to the fond memories held by former members.
The new Club will be available to all age groups this time, compared to the original club that was available to 5 to 15 year old children. Rail Riders has already got the cooperation of various Preserved Railways wanting to offer discounts to club members and also various model railway shops and a railway book publisher.
The aim is to make Rail Riders a general Railway club available to everyone and to promote the hobby, in doing so help preserved railways increase ridership and hopefully generate some volunteers for them as well. We hope to get as many railways wanting to be part of the club as well as other railway themed businesses too.
Rail Riders will be bringing back the Rail Riders Express magazine for members of which there will be 4 a year, these will have lots of features and competitions, with the emphasis on making the hobby fun. There will also be a passbook that members will get stamped at various locations participating to encourage ridership or visits at participating outlets and railways.
It is also planned once membership gets to a healthy level that event days will be planned and eventually even railtours.


The original club had at its peak 80,000 member and is fondly remembered, Simon Buxton one of the people bringing the club back was a member of the club in the late 1980’s. While setting up the club, Rail Riders has fond one of the original membership secretaries, Angela and has agreed to give an interview to feature in an addition of the club magazine.
At the moment Rail Riders is having their website built which will feature a members section which will feature events, news, photos, competitions and merchandise. There is a Facebook page open to everyone that is live www.facebook.com/railridersclub and a twitter www.twitter.com/ridersrail


A quote from Simon Buxton “As a lad I can fondly remember going to Rail Riders World at York and watching all the trains on the layout. Getting the famous wall chart with the spaces for the stickers we got from various places that issued them and waiting for the magazine to come through the post. I decided to add the logo to my range of railway images last year and could not believe how many remembered it and the seed was planted to bring the club back, the response since going public with our plans has been fantastic and I see this as a way to bring people together and promote the hobby. We plan to go live with membership in February 2020 and hope old members and people that were too young or not even born would like to join”.'

Whilst we may have slipped off the radar a little we've all been extremely busy getting things prepared for the show. We had two shows that we attended both Doncaster & DEMU, which proved extremely busy with questions and feedback about what we're doing. So if we saw you at either of these shows thank you for making the time to come and speak to us.

We've now fully booked out our venue which means a finalised list of Layouts & Traders will be announced very soon.  Please keep an eye on our Exhibition page which can be found here

Our next intended show will be the Telford Gauge O Guild show. We will be in attendance with a whopping 12ft display full of goodies for you to look at. So don't forget to pop along and say hello!

Finally, our latest and one of our biggest announcement is that we are proud to announce that Heljan will be attending our show in November. The well known manufacturer will be joining the names of Dapol & Easy-build on the list. 

They have also told us they are planning to make an announcement at our show! So thats one think to make sure you coming along to the show and find out what they'll be unveiling!

​

 We have today received images from Ben Jones at Heljan, with the painted mockups for the new forthcoming Class 50, Heljan are producing the model in refurbished form and with no less than 7 liveries will be available for purchase. 

Features Include
- Highly detailed exterior model.
- Highly detailed cab interior. 
- Two powerful 5 pole motors with new drive system to enable the grills 
- Directional changing lights (Headlights/Taillights)
- Designed with sound easy fitment of sound.

The product codes for the locos are as below;

HJ4020 English Electric Class 50 -BR Blue £699.00
HJ4021 English Electric Class 50 -BR Blue Large Logo £699.00
HJ4022 English Electric Class 50 -Network South East (Original) £699.00
HJ4023 English Electric Class 50 - Network South East (Revised) £699.00
HJ4024 English Electric Class 50 -GW150 50007 "Sir Edward Elgar" £699.00
HJ4025 English Electric Class 50 -Railfreight 50149 "Defiance" £699.00
HJ4028 English Electric Class 50 - GB Railfreight 50049 "Defiance" £699.00

Alongside this Hattons have commissioned a further two liveries. Which will include the Dutch livery carried by 50015, and also the livery 50008 carried during the end of its working career with BR.

We have been asked by Ben at Heljan if anything strikes your attention as wrong, or any details you notice that are out of place or factually incorrect to point these out. We can't stress enough that if you don't mention it now for us to feed this back theres a high chance they wont be corrected before release.
​
Click the images below to enlarge.

While we've been very quiet on the website/Facebook front we've been busy working away behind the scenes getting important things ready for our show in November, we thought it was time for a small update. 

So with the saddening news last weekend of the horrific break in to the Stamford Show, its left us re-assessing our safety and security. We now feel that we have plugged that loop hole and all of our traders/exhibitors have received emails this week regarding this.

We've got two shows that we will be attending in June with our Road-show teams, which are both actually the same weekend. So we've had to split our team in two! 

Weekend of the 1st/2nd of June we will be attending DEMU's annual showcase exhibition which this year is at a new venue in Swadlincote, more details about the show can be found in the link below; 

https://www.demu.org.uk/showcase/showcase-2019
​
We felt that this show would make for a good and interesting weekend getting to meet people that perhaps haven't heard of us before now. This also means that the DEMU team will be attending our exhibition which will add another dynamic towards the exhibition, and allow more networking between the two groups.

Our second show that we are attending will be the Doncaster O Gauge Show, on Saturday the 1st June, this is one thats been confirmed for some time now, and we are looking forward to attending and being there to answer for all your modern Image questions and needs. A link below with all the event details is below;

https://www.gauge0guild.com/events/guild_shows.aspx?id=7

Please don't be afraid to approach us with any questions regarding anything Modern Image.

We've also been working away on producing some much anticipated Merchandise, that will hopefully be available for Pre-order very soon priced £14.99 for the Polo shirts, these will feature a unique logo that is very similar to ours but incorporates , We've attached a couple of images for you below. Feel free to contact us via the Facebook page/group or via email to register your interest in these.

I know a lot of you are probably thinking what has this got to do with Modern Image O Gauge, well... We've been asked recently what we could consider to be 'modern image' and the guys have agree'd that we aren't anti steam, and that we would welcome any layout/steam loco that is currently preserved or made it to work on the mainline after the 1968 'BR Farewell to steam' 

Hattons are attending the Alexandra Palace this weekend for the London Festival of Railway Modelling this weekend, and they've taken along with them the first painted samples of there commissioned LNER A3 & A4 loco's and we've attached some photos of 'The Flying Scotsman' below so you can see these fantastic models in there true form.

Hattons have these listed on there website for pre-order now from there website here, with an RRP of £750 they certainly look like they're shaping up to be worth the money!

Northumbrian Painting services have just released a brand new Portable Cabin kit for the 7mm Market, made from an MDF kit. They had these on show at the Kettering show at the weekend and they were flying off the stand to the point where I believe they'd only got the demo one left!

A few details on the kit are below provided by NPS;

'​MDF Kit
O Gauge Porta-cabin
Width - 24cm
Depth - 6cm
Height - 7cm (includes feet risers)

Comes as a comlete kit with acetate for the windows
Door can be open or shut
£15'

These kits are now available for purchase over on there website below;

www.paintinghistory.co.uk

​I've also attached the images provided below so you can see one ready built.

Although it has been very quiet on the exhibition front, we've been busy working away getting all the details refined. We've also been out on the road visiting no less than 4 exhibitions since we launched our show and venture at the beginning of January.

Since our last update we've managed to extend the list of traders further by getting the guys at Easy-build coaches to sign up to the exhibition. They only tend to do Gauge O Guild shows so we see this as a step in the right direction in getting a great list of traders/layouts together for our exhibition.

Also now confirmed to be attending are PRMRP although previously announced on our webpage we've not really made a big deal about them until we had some concrete information from them!. These guys supply a massive amount of different kits for the Modern Image modeller, and we are delighted they have agree'd to attend the show.

Our third and final trader to have confirmed for the show, is Dapol. We are over the moon that the guys at Dapol see our venture as a viable thing to turn up and support. Since making the Class 08 Dapol have made a massive impact on the 7mm Market with there constant stream of Steam/Diesel appearing, especially with there very reasonable price structure on stuff. 

We feel that we are working our way towards getting a solid line up of traders to go alongside our layouts, comments and suggestions are always welcome as to who you'd like to see. We are now trying to finalise our floor plan within the coming couple of months to help continue us adding traders to our lists.

Thats all for now!
​

Steve Beattie of SBT Developments has today released a massive gap filler that has been seen since the demise of Just Like the Real Thing, was the Air Tanks for the Class 26/27 that were note-able on the air-braked versions of the Class. 

Taken from SBT Website
'Contains pack of 3 loose resin air tanks and two 3d printed angles to represent the air tank modification to Class 26 and 27 Locomotives.' 

They're priced £7.50 a pack and are available from there website now, so head over and get yours!

https://www.sbtdevelopments.com/product-page/class-26-27-air-tanks?fbclid=IwAR3XKraxK2BXztTYwSsIG4E5KVbI1dmC_ZxdO9zmTL2_PbeesYORFCR711Q

We spent the day at the Kettering Gauge O Guild show, after being invited to help promote our show ahead of the exhibition in November. It was a long drive there and back being up to 3 hours for some of our team. Our trade stand was a constant hive of activity with a steady stream of people popping in to have a chat and see what we were up to. We had a great selection of stock on view to try and give a varied and balanced selection to view, including Chris's 37175 in Colas livery.

It was a venue packed to the rafters with a good selection of traders/manufacturers and full of surprises, and announcements. Dapol, Easybuild just to name a couple;
​
Dapol were present with there painted samples of the Class 08's for the next batch due sometime during 2019. The liveries present were Freight-liner Green, Intercity, and 3TG (Trainload Grey). These models were view-able on their trade stand. Along side that they also had a working copy of the 7mm Semaphores which we have been told are due to enter production anytime within the next 2/3 months. These feature working servo's which unlike the early 4mm version of the signals give you the realistic signal bounce when you lower them. We've also been advised that the Class 121/122 DMU's are aiming to be released and into the shops by the end of April. Which for anyone waiting on these they are a bargain at the prices people are advertising them at. Unfortunately there were no samples present at the show.

Easy-build also announced there BR MK1 Metro-Cammell Pullmans and they we're on display also at the show, please see the article below for detailed write up on these!

We've also confirmed our next show to be attending which will be the Gauge O Guild show in Doncaster on the 1st June. We'll update you more on that closer to the time. We've also got a couple of announcements to make over the coming week regarding the exhibition so keep your eyes peeled for that.

Thanks for now the MIOG Team

Today we attended the Gauge O Guilds show at the Kettering conference centre, and there was a great selection of traders/demonstrators in attendance. Whilst there we spotted 'Easy-build' were in attendance at the show and showing off their latest coach kit to be hitting the market soon. These coaches were built in the the 1960's by Metro Cammell based on the original BR MK1 Design for use on Pullman services up and down the country. 

Easy-build have told us today that they intend to have the Kits ready for purchase by the Telford Exhibition at the end of August. We've attached a couple of images of the first sample below. They'll certainly be something to behold!