In the 1970s, members of the VMRS agreed to construct an exhibition layout on which could be displayed models built by members. The layout was to be of a Victorian Railways prototype. It would need to feature double track and the surrounding area should be of scenic interest. It was decided to base the layout on Malmsbury station, on the Bendigo line and was the first serious HO scale layout based more or less faithfully on a VR prototype to appear on the exhibition circuit. The layout is installed in the clubrooms awaiting restoration and re-commissioning.
The layout was faithful to the prototype track plan and there was a double-track oval running through the seven-road fiddle yard which featured push button route selection based on ex-PMG relays.
The structures were scale replicas of the real ones. The two storey station building, the goods shed and the spectacular viaduct over the Coliban River, all bluestone, set the scene for the station being on the Bendigo line. The bridge and the walls of the buildings were thin latex castings applied to a timber structure. The latex was re-inforced with tissue paper for strength. Other details were assembled using the technology of the time; it was before the ready availability of sheet and strip styrene and other modelling materials that are taken for granted nowadays.
