W R (Bill) Inglis

Written by Wiliam Irwin

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W R ('Bill') Inglis

Those of us who were active in the Meccano hobby in the late 1960s and 1970s will remember only one name when the subject of Meccano replica parts are mentioned. Bill Inglis is perhaps best known for his excellent replica channel segments, p/n 119, marked distinctively with his logo, WRI, first advertised in the Meccanoman's Journal MJ 17, October 1969. Bill went on to manufacture and market several other replica parts including special rubber motor tyres. These replica Meccano parts are sought after today as avidly as the genuine article.

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Advertisement for WRI parts from MMQ January 1975

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Bill's motor chassis using his WRI tyres, as used in his advertisements.

I have had the good fortune to have recently made contact with Bill, who is living in retirement in Australia. He has very kindly provided me with some reminiscences of his Meccano days and experiences, the most significant of which is an account of his trials and tribulations in manufacturing p/n 119 (see the ISM Collector/Historian series for a full account).

Bill lived in South Blackburn, a suburb of Melbourne, capital of Victoria, Australia in the 1970s. He was an industrial chemist, but an engineer at heart, like all Meccanomen. He always preferred working models, with plenty of mechanism in full view. He made a speciality of automating his models, the most well-known being his Automated Ship Coaler, published by the Meccanoman's Club as GMM 28, (still available from MW Models). Other automated models were the SML Baltic Tank locomotive moving back and forth on a length of track, and his automated Clock Kit no. 2 published by Mike Nicholls in Meccano Engineer no 7 as The Best Clock Idea for a Long Time.

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Bill's automated model of the Baltic Tank Locomotive SML no.15.


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Bill’s model of the Automatic Grabbing Crane SML no. 35 in his study.

Bill Inglis gave up the Meccano hobby in 1980 when he shipped his vast collection to the USA for disposal. Parts of his collection still surface from time to time even after 20 years, as occurred recently when his red/green GRB, p/n 167, surfaced in New Zealand (see the ISM Collector/Historian series, or http://www.dalefield.com/nzfmm/welg01/grb.html, for the remarkable history of this piece).

Bill's early history is here described in his own words:
I lived on a farm 7 miles from the nearest town in country Victoria as a lad and built up quite a nice sized Meccano Set by saving the money I made trapping rabbits and selling the skins and then spending same on our infrequent trips to Melbourne at Herbert Small and Co., the main Melbourne Meccano stockist prewar. My Meccano activities virtually ceased when I left home at age 14 and boarded in Melbourne to further my education. This was in 1943 and, except for school holidays and then the odd weekend, I never returned to my parents place and my Meccano was just stored away. In the mid 50's they had a house fire which resulted in the loss of quite a bit of my Set and the rest was just put away in a big box which eventually arrived at my house in Melbourne after I had married and bought our own house. In the latter part of the 60's I dug it out to make things to amuse my Son, this rekindled my own interest (Paul never showed much interest in it) and I went on from there amassing a huge (in my eyes) collection which eventually went to the States as you know. As a point of interest, and to show how the wheel turns, Herbert Small and Co. went out of Meccano to concentrate on their Photographic business and I bought the remains of their stocks of parts about 1970. Unfortunately I was a bit slow in contacting them about their redundant stock and they had already dumped all the old literature at the tip which was very sad from my point of view.

Bill Inglis was probably the leading Meccanoman from the Southern Hemisphere at the time, and despite the distance from Europe, was a frequent contributor to Maurice Morris's Meccanoman's Journal. His replica parts were well known and shipped to all parts of the world, and indeed are still sought after today.

William Irwin July 2001