MERG West Midlands Area Group

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Contact Us

To contact us use the MERG West Midlands Area Group contact form here https://www.merg.org.uk/areagroup.php?area=17

For MERG members, you might also like to look at our area group forum.

Co-ordinator

Allan Gardner

MEETINGS

The next meeting of the West Midlands Area Group will be:

Sunday 14th July 2019

At Titford Pump House, Engine street, OLDBURY, West Midlands.

Google Map

About Titford Pump House.

There is plenty of car parking – mostly on Engine Street, some within the pump house compound. The address above includes a Google maps link. All facilities are at ground level.

This months topics:

1. Electrostatic Discharge: What it is and Why it is Important.

2. The Theory and Practice of a Simple MERG Kit

Programme

10:00 Coffee & Registration

10:15 Welcome Introduction: Allan Gardner

Housekeeping: Fire exits & procedure, First aid, Toilet, Mugs in the dishwasher.

Arduino Workshop: Expression of interest.

10.30 Electrostatic Discharge: What it is and Why it is Important. David Roberts

David will explain to us what Electrostatic Discharge is, how it is caused and the damage that it can cause to modern electronic devices and systems. Simple and affordable measures to mitigate the problems will also be described.

11:30 Refreshment Break

Tea, Coffee and cake.

11:45 The Theory and Practice of a Simple MERG Kit: David Roberts

Some of us assemble kits without knowing very little about the types of components used and why they are important. David’s presentation will consider a simple MERG kit – the CANACT – look at the components used and explain why they are chosen and how it works.

12.45 Discussion: Any Questions and any Answers!!

Opportunity to discuss things further.

13:00 Lunch

Bring your own or eat loads of cake!

13:30 Practical Workshop Session 1

David will be with us all day so, take the opportunity to delve deeper into today’s subjects. If that's not your thing then work on your current project. We will do our best to help with construction and problem-solving. Bring your own tools including your soldering iron.

14:30 Refreshment Break

14:45 Practical Workshop Session 2

Continuance of the practical session

15:45 Clean up, Wash Up and close

Interested in attending?

The meeting is open to all MERG Members.

To give us an idea of numbers, could you let us know you are coming by contacting me allanhgardner@gmail.com or use the MERG contact form above.

We will need a contribution of £3 to cover the costs of the meeting.

Meeting dates for 2019

The dates below are for the quarterly meetings for 2019.

Winter - Sunday 13th January

Spring - Saturday 13th April

Summer - Sunday 14th July

Autumn - Saturday 12th October

We have booked the Titford Pump House for these dates.

Format of Future Meetings

We are seeking views from members with regards to the structure and format of future meetings.

The areas we would welcome comments on are:

Fixing dates for the next year

Saturday or Sunday

Venue

Meeting format

Speaker and contents

If you have a view on any of the above, please share with the co-ordinator using the contact form above.

Previous meetings

April 2019

What is Arduino and what can it do for railway modellers

Tony Chamberlain and Dave Thomas will present all things Arduino

October 2018

‘Wiring and Power supplies for the Railway Modeller’

We were delighted to welcome David Roberts as our keynote speaker on that occasion.

David gave two talks in the morning.

The first one, focused on wiring for the railway modeller and included

• Theoretical aspects of electrical wiring • Design & Implementation of electrical wiring • Examples of wires, tools and terminations

His second talk was Power Supplies and explored:

• History • Direct Current (DC) Supplies • Linear Mode Supplies • Switch - mode Supplies • Sources of Power Supplies • Commercial Devices • Surplus Computer Supplies

July 2018

Howard Watkins as our keynote speaker.

The theme of our meeting was ‘Back to Basics’

AM - Two talks given by Howard to include

- Theory and practise of Soldering. - Tools and Supplies - Component recognition - Using LEDs

PM - Practical 'HANDS ON' session to include an opportunity to build a track tester,

Links

Help page for coordinators