Michigan LEGO® Users Group

Attendees:

Overall Picture Directories:

Scott Sanburn	Ken Koleda
David Kohrman	Peter Guenther

Friday, January 24th, 2003

(3:00PM-10:30PM)
The setup started early, as Steve-2 and Paul where already there when Tony, Nick, and I arrived at 3:00PM. Others began arriving soon after, and started doing various things. We started out in the wrong location, and had to move back one column. Fortunately, we had a lot of people helping with this setup, and things went pretty well. The tables went up in 2.5 hours, and people quickly started working on their areas. My corner was one of the last, but all the tables went together smoothly. A few quick strikes with the hammer always help manage ill-fitting tables. We had a few minor problems, namely we forgot to tell Steve-3 to bring the regular green baseplates, and we needed those to finish the layout, and the fact that I forgot my TECHNIC pegs for his modules, so that was delayed. All in all, we had most of it setup by the end of Friday night, and went to our usual hangout, the Big Boy near the Expo Center. We had a fun time, and the waitress actually survived the massive train show arrivals, which pretty much filled the restaurant. : )

Saturday, January 25th, 2003

(7:00AM-?)
Saturday morning started at the nice hour of 7:00AM, I arrived late due to an alarm clock error (The volume was turned off of the radio part). We got the plates from Steve-3, and finished the track layout and the other layout areas. Stefan’s mom, Victoria, Ken, and Nick did a great job assembling our new skirting with the guards, which Jason Spears parents made for us (Thanks again) We were pretty much ready to go by 11:00AM, when the show started, we even got the monorail up. : ) The crowds were typical Novi, 3 deep at times, with a lot of questions concerning everything from sales to bricks to set up times. While I did not really finish my area until 3:00PM, it was a very cool display. Paul Janssen’s mountain and cathedral was the hit of the show, which was massive 80,000 bricks or so and stood at least 5 or 6 feet tall. We got some videos on the trains, which will be put together soon. The Saturday show ended at 5:00PM, and most of us went to Chris Leach’s house for an indoor barbecue, and had a great time.

Sunday, January 26th, 2003

(10:00AM-1:30AM)
Sunday morning started at 10:00AM, where we still are having problems with the parking, with different standards and the like. There was a group of people waiting in the freezing wind and they finally let us in. I set up some additional items around my layout, and the show started again at 11:00AM. Chris expanded the monorail loop, and fixed up the original one, with only one minor crash. : ) The crowds seemed smaller that on Saturday, we were guessing it was because of Super Bowl Sunday. Anyway, we got even more footage of video of various trains and riding around the layout. The show ended Sunday at 5:00PM, and we started tearing down soon afterwards. I was the last person to tear down, simply because of my layout, and I want to thank Larry, Al, Ken, Victoria, and Stefan for their assistance. Since we had to transport tables to Spencers, we had to pack the trailer for various stops, mainly the tables in last, Tony’s stuff in the middle, and mine in the back since Indiana was the last stop. We took off from the Expo Center around 8:00PM, and drove to Spencer’s house in Ypsilanti. He was nice enough to store the tables for us, thanks again, Spencer, and we had a lot of fun trying to get Scott and his Tahoe parked correctly, but after that, it was a relatively quick unloading. Larry, Al, Spencer, Tony, Nick and I then headed for the Olive Garden in Ann Arbor for a late dinner, and we took off from there around 10:00PM or so. I dropped Nick and Tony off by 1:00AM, and ended up in a hotel in Lansing. I drove to Indiana Monday morning, and got to work late.

For this show, we learned a few things. I think this size of layout is the biggest we can do, logistically it is tough, and we had a lot of people and some great creations, and it turned out well. The skirting looked great, and the new approach to the handouts went well. Our search for sheets had a lot of people looking, which is a great thing.

Scott S.

Layout Details:

Layout Pictures: