Around 36 model railway layouts will fill the Southland Society of Model Engineers' clubrooms and the adjoining badminton halls at Surrey Park this weekend, the largest line-up the Great Little Train Show has put together in many years.

The show, which has run for 41 years, is open from 10am to 4pm on Saturday 24 and Sunday 25 October at 18 Surrey Park Road. It is the club's main fundraiser of the year, and organisers expect up to 5,000 people through the doors over the two days.

Three club members are exhibiting new layouts for the first time, the Central Otago Model Society is bringing some of its layouts south, and a group of Meccano enthusiasts from Christchurch is taking part for the first time.

Visitors will also find model boats, radio-controlled buggies, a LEGO display from LUG South and an outdoor ride-on train, with both steam and diesel engines on show.

Six hours to collect, six to set up

Club president Greg Fordyce said gathering the layouts from around the city, including two from Bluff, takes about six hours, and setting them up takes about the same again, before everything has to be packed down at the end of the weekend.

"We try and have a real variety on the day," he said.

Fordyce said the club's membership ranged from teenagers to people in their 80s and 90s, and he hoped the show would keep running for many years yet.

His own involvement began at 13, when he discovered his father's layout in the garage and set about rebuilding it. After modifying it in what he described as army style, he joined the club, and has since built about nine or ten more layouts.

Among the long-serving exhibitors is 92-year-old Owen Davies, who brings clockwork Hornby metal trains dating from the 1920s.

The club itself dates back to 1937.

Part of a busy long weekend

The train show is one of several events in the city over Labour Weekend. The Southland Transport Invercargill Truck Parade gathers from 8am on Sunday at the NZ Woolhandler yard on Fox Street, where the public can view the trucks, before the parade leaves at 1pm along Bond and Tweed streets and finishes at Regent and Tweed streets.

The Southern Farmers Market runs at the Railway Station on Leven Street from 9.30am to 1.30pm on Sunday, rain or shine, and the Spring Exhibition at Anderson House opens on Saturday and continues daily from 11am to 4pm until 8 November, with $5 entry and children free.

Entry charges apply at the train show; the club has not published its door prices.