Been pretty busy with the "G" and "O" projects. Yesterday was one that I would prefer to forget about real quick.
Saturday got the ballasting & gluing finished, did rail inspection yesterday morning to make sure non of the ballast would create a derailment. Did some minor cleanup on the ballast and cleaned any remnants of glue from the track, and now it's "Showtime".
The little LGB engine just goes zipping along the front straight, goes around the the Sago curve, zips down the back stretch thru the slight dogleg right, goes behind Rockpile Mtn over Flagstone Wash and CRUNCH. I learned yesterday that either (1) it is the nature of the rail clamp beast or (2) I possibly overtorqued the rail clamp cap screws. The geometry of the curves had changed as a result of installing the rail clamps and the resident idiot did not realize this until after everything was all glued down and had my first test run. It increased the diameter of the curve enough that the locos would, as the front swung wide, contact the front of the upper retaining wall.
Problem solved, a few minutes with a chisel and a 5lb. hammer gave me sufficient clearance for all traffic to prceed w/o delay. All I needed was for someone to play the "John Henry" song.
Got lots to do today, gotta get ready for an unplanned run at the museum tomorrow. However, to look at it in a positive way at least it's not Free Tuesday. First Tuesday of the month is free and you talk about CROWDS.
Are my assumptions correct as to the effect of the rail clamps on the curve radius ? I would also assume that the amount of change is also dependent on the size of the radius, R1 greater impact R5 lesser impact.
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While I am a beginner in the garden railroad business - the Seashore, Horry And Georgetown (SHAG RR)is getting it's final siding installed this week - I suspect that more normal expansion and contraction are the culprit rather than the railclamps.
I use Sunset Valley Code 250 atop Mainline Enterprises roadbed with 5' radius curves. Railclamps hold the rail ends in a straight line for a little bit, and may create a slight variance in the smooth curvature, but I can't detect either of my locomotives having any visible response to that. I have been surprised, however, with the track movement that occurs on a fairly regular basis. This is a new railroad, and so far it has been exposed to temperature shifts between about 65 and 95 degrees F. Once I installed ballast, I observed that cracks develop on the outside of the curves between the roadbed "board" and the ballast. Most of the time that has been in the nature of about 1/16", but it is visible. It appears that the entire dogbone loop of track expands and contracts on a regular basis. I knew that things had to expand and contract outdoors, but am fascinated by all the little challenges involved outdoors.
I did recognize before construction began that the "scale" issue in garden railroading would create clearance issues. I model 1:20.3 , but there is so much variance in some items that it is not the same as depending upon the NMRA clearance gauge in HO. I allowed 12.5" center-to-center on the passing track just to be safe.
Good luck with that hammer work. Bill
Beach Bill wrote: While I am a beginner in the garden railroad business - the Seashore, Horry And Georgetown (SHAG RR)is getting it's final siding installed this week - I suspect that more normal expansion and contraction are the culprit rather than the railclamps.. This is a new railroad, and so far it has been exposed to temperature shifts between about 65 and 95 degrees F. Once I installed ballast, I observed that cracks develop on the outside of the curves between the roadbed "board" and the ballast. Good luck with that hammer work. Bill
. This is a new railroad, and so far it has been exposed to temperature shifts between about 65 and 95 degrees F. Once I installed ballast, I observed that cracks develop on the outside of the curves between the roadbed "board" and the ballast. Good luck with that hammer work. Bill
Just curious, what did you use as ballast, and what did you use to hold it in place, that allowed cracks do develop.
I plan to use Calcium Carbonate (Chicken Scratch). As ballast, and fasten/glue it to a sub-base of galvinized 6 inch industrial metal studding, a raised layout.
As yet I am undecided as to what to use as a retainer or "stic'em' to keep the ballast in place, yet allow for track removal or repairs, yet I don't really want to deal with what you seem to describe here as your problem with too much expansion.
Any suggestions anybody......out there.....
See heres what I've got.......Byron
I use Split Jaw rail clamps and have found that it isn't super easy to keep the rails together when installing the clamp especially on curves where I might have deviated from the track section curvature to fit my terrain. The split in the clamps should be oriented to allow them to bend with the curve. The brass ones do bend but the SS ones don't. Also the clamp only grabs the bottom part of the rail leaving the top part free to roam. I've needed to bend the top in a couple of cases to make the rail match up else there would be an alignment issue. As far as the clamps themselves causing a change in curvature I would say it's possible but only for a few mm. A trusty rail bender will fix that problem by bending the clamp as it trues up the connections.
Temperature does cause significant flexing so any clamps that are not firmly connected will slip with expansion/contraction. That goes mostly for the outside rail in turns. If you're counting on electrical connectivity with the clamps then you need to check for slips every once in awhile. I'm battery power this time so it isn't as critical.
Solution? Grab your trusty Train-Li rail bender and run it through the clamped connections. If it slows down at the clamps then you can say for sure that the clamps were causing a problem that your rail bender just took care of however now you need to file/cut off the excess inside rail or live with the gap.
My two cents,
Rex
Byron at Empire II:
As to ballast, I've been reading Garden Railways for a number of years and also looked through postings on this site before beginning. There doesn't seem to be much consistency on the recommendations, or at least no "sure fire" ballast solution.
I was going to use chicken grit, but the nearest good farm supply store is about 35 min. away, and it would be hard to know just how much to buy at the outset. Others had recommended crusher fines, but I didn't really want to take my little car down the quarry road and talk to folks about 50-lb bags when they sell by the ton. I've already had to replace one windshield from the rocks coming from trucks from the local quarry, and I didn't really want to go there. So, I took another slow walk through the local big box home supply store and talked to folks there in both the cement and the outdoor aisles.
I ended up using Patio/Paver Base, which comes in .5 cu. ft. bags from a company called Kolor Scape. This is crushed stone with a very pleasing grey color. It is "edgy", so it packs well. There are some rocks which are too large, which have to be removed from between the rails at installation. My layout isn't that big (about 150 ft. of track total), so using a little care at installation hasn't been a problem. We get "tropical" rains here (I'm just a couple blocks off the blue Atlantic), and I expected that rain would cause some settling of the ballast. I have had to go back and "side dress" the new ballast after a heavy rain, but after that second application it seems to be holding reasonably well. [Real railroads used to send out the section gang after a heavy rain...] I do not use any cement, glue, or fastening agent at this time.
The SHAG RR is built down on the ground (sand), and so a little erosion to the sides of the ballast embankment does not create a problem. For an elevated RR such as yours, loose paver base would wash off. I can't recommend a fastening agent, but it sounds like you need one. Elmers glue, water, and liquid soap that is so effective in HO just won't hold outdoors.
I think that the expansion/contraction is not just from the rail, but also from the Mainline Enterprises roadbed itself. This stuff is the same material as PVC pipe but in board form. The compacting of the paver base ballast is seen in how well the ballast holds in place when the roadbed contracts away from it. I get a rather distinct crack along the edge of the roadbed, in the 1/16 to 1/8 inch range. If someone is coming to look at the railroad, I can quickly go around the edge and pat the ballast back into contact with my shoe... and the fire ants seem to like using the gap!
Bill
Beach Bill, it would be nice if you were to go back and reset your profile to give even a rough general idea of your geographic location. What works for someone in Coastal Florida would probably not work in central Vermont or Desert Southwest!
While I do like to read solutions to things from all over, often you have to think about modifying that solution to your climate!
Where did you get the 6" metal studs, I haven't been able to find any; only the 4" jobs.
Gobbler is correct, and may have made that deduction from the railroad name of "Seashore Horry And Georgetown".
For readers from England, yes I do know what SHAG means in Great Britain, but it means something completely different here in Coastal Carolina. The main water tank here in North Myrtle Beach, SC about five blocks from my home is lettered with "Home of the Shag". The Carolina Shag is the official dance of the State of South Carolina and is a smooth form of swing dance that developed here in the late 1940s and early 1950s. In September, about 10,000 shag dancers will come to N. Myrtle Beach for the S.O.S. Fall Migration. Mrs. Beach Bill and I usually go dancing twice a week.
While I no longer have to worry about frost, I expect that "paver base" may be a useful solution to many in various climate zones. Readily available at places like Lowes or Home Depot, the color in stock here is a really nice grey. This is sharp-edged crushed rock, so it packs well. I expect that I will use some for a base under station areas in addition to having used it as ballast.
The Mainline Enterprises roadbed has depressions formed into it under each rail, and they advertise that those depressions are designed to help hold ballast in place. The depressions or grooves are not completely successful in that. The smooth surface (I painted mine with Krylon for plastic in a sand/tan color) doesn't help hold much of anything in a heavy rain.
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