track length and grade

[mgilger]

You have to do what you have to do. If you can keep the grade to below 3% that's fine. If you can't, then keep it to as little as possible with 3% being your goal. You will see many railroads with less than ideal grades, but operate just fine. You can always use helper service to get up the grades if need be. That would be real prototypical and a fun operation. My layout has a few 2-3% grades and it's never caused any noticable problems.

 If your layout will be positioned in the 80x16 foot area, you probably will want to shoot for 10 foot diameter curves. Even though currently you might not plan on operating any larger engines, the time might come when you will want to and then have to go back and change everything. That's what happened to me. After 5 years, I ended up moving all my curves out from 6 foot to 10-12 foot. I should have done that initially, but I thought I knew better.

 Regards,

Mark

[IRB Souther Engineer]

Definitely keep the grades below 3% (3" rise over 100").

[ttrigg]

Ski:

We’ve had a few discussions (some were very in depth) in other postings here. I would suggest doing a bit of reading. In the mean time, there are two rules of thumb in the garden. #1: The flatter, the better. #2: Wider is better. Now of course all rules were built to be broken.

#1: Flatter is better: If your intent is to pull as many cars as possible behind one engine, then you are looking for absolute flat. Since that is an impossible goal for many, 2% or less is acceptable. Going steeper starts to reduce performance and increases wear and tear on the locus. Now to break the rule. I wanted to run a trolley line to the top of my waterfall. I had to build a bridge to get there, and the grade approaches 17.5% (yes I said seventeen and half), I went into this knowing that performance would suffer, and that life expectancy of equipment running the bridge would be reduced. That is a choice I made with knowledge of the consequences.

#2: Wider is better: Again. If your intent is to pull the maximum number of cars, then you will want the widest curves possible. When you get smaller than ~10-foot diameters you need to start watching what you plan on running. Below 8-foot diameters some equipment will not run. LGB, for one, is designed for the 4-foot curves. Now to break this rule. Have a look at Vic’s Pizza (portable layout). He is pretty well limited to "kit-bashing and scratch built two axle rigs, but that is his choice.

[mbednarski]

Thanks, Dave

I measured the house it is about 80 ft long and I want it to extend the full length. I garden where I am placing it averages about 14-16' wide with a few spots are are less than 8' wide. My location is Huntsville, AL.

Thanks for the information and the welcome.

[dwbeckett]

How Much Room Do You Have That Is What Limits How much track you can have The standard grade is 1-2% Less is better.

  to the fourm and please add a location it helps us help you.

 

Dave

[mbednarski]

I am a newbie to the hobby and have a few questions about setting up my track. Is there a limit to the length of track? My home is 82ft long and I would like to run the track the entire length. Also what is the steapest grade that a G scale train will climb. I understand the optimial situation would be level grade, but I am not entirely sure i can do that.

Please advise,

thanks