I know to work in sections w/ the tracklaying, but I have just one more question:
Doesn't it make sense to connect ALL the mainline track together w/ rail joiners solder the sections, and then glue the track down? I am using ME code 83 flex track. If not, what order to go for soldeirng the sections, gluing them and connecting the track sections together.
TIA!
Lee
You should only solder flex track together on curves, track needs to be able to expand and contract. It won't be able to do that if its all soldered together. On my layout I used no rail joiners and no solder except on curves.
If your layout is located in a NASA standard climate-controlled clean room where the temperature and humidity will never vary by more than 1%, that MIGHT work. OTOH, if the wood products in your layout were drier or wetter than the fixed humidity level when assembled, you will still have problems.
I take the opposite approach. NONE of my rail joints are soldered. I deliberately leave fairly wide gaps when I lay rail in the cool of winter - and have watched them close up when the summer temperature in the layout space approached sauna levels.
IMHO, the key isn't to solder every joint. It's to take a file to the inside of the railhead at each joint, and cut a barely-visible acute-angle bevel so passing flanges won't find anything to catch on and climb over. That, pre-bending my flex track to the intended curve radius, staggering the joints on curves and using spiral easements combine to make my track just about bulletproof.
If your concern is with electrical continuity, then solder jumpers around your joints or solder a drop to every rail length. As for soldering the rails themselves, the only place I do that is at the frogs and guard rails of my hand-laid turnouts.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - on flex and hand-laid specialwork)
I take the opposite method to Chuck, soldering all of my rail joints, and have had no problems with expansion and contraction, nor electrical problems, although I don't have the wide fluctuations in temperature to contend with that he does. The track was held in place with Atlas spikes, then soldered.
Wayne