Reworked a pesky area on my layout last night.

[jeffrey-wimberly]

6:20 pm


I've been doing some light layout work today. The evil 'S' curve at the front of the layout is fixing to go away. As the photo below shows I've already got the deck that'll hold the new track section in place.



After I've marked off the areas where the ends of the new section will marry into the existing track I'll cut out the offending section, trim the ends, put a piece of half inch foam down on the new deck and install the new track section. Here's a photo showing the new section set in to show what I'm going to do.

Any lovers of 'S' curves speak now or forever hold your peace.




Edit: 8:45 pm


The new track section is in place. Now for the ticklish part. The areas where the rails were cut is fairly difficult to get at to cut under the rail ends. So I'm having a spot of bother getting rail joiners in there. What I'm going to do is simply this. I'll clamp the rail ends in place so they line up precisely with each other and solder a piece of iron wire across each rail joint on the outside edge of the rail. After the area is ballasted it'll hardly be noticeable. Have I done this before? Yes. How many times? Twice, and that was many years ago.

BTW, all the track on my layout is Bachmann EZ-Track.



Edit: 9:15 pm

I now have the rail ends soldered together and I just ran a test train made up of my pickiest loco and cars over the area and they worked flawlessly. I label this project a success.

[AltoonaRailroader]

6:20 pm


I've been doing some light layout work today. The evil 'S' curve at the front of the layout is fixing to go away. As the photo below shows I've already got the deck that'll hold the new track section in place.



After I've marked off the areas where the ends of the new section will marry into the existing track I'll cut out the offending section, trim the ends, put a piece of half inch foam down on the new deck and install the new track section. Here's a photo showing the new section set in to show what I'm going to do.

Any lovers of 'S' curves speak now or forever hold your peace.




Edit: 8:45 pm


The new track section is in place. Now for the ticklish part. The areas where the rails were cut is fairly difficult to get at to cut under the rail ends. So I'm having a spot of bother getting rail joiners in there. What I'm going to do is simply this. I'll clamp the rail ends in place so they line up precisely with each other and solder a piece of iron wire across each rail joint on the outside edge of the rail. After the area is ballasted it'll hardly be noticeable. Have I done this before? Yes. How many times? Twice, and that was many years ago.

BTW, all the track on my layout is Bachmann EZ-Track.



Edit: 9:15 pm

I now have the rail ends soldered together and I just ran a test train made up of my pickiest loco and cars over the area and they worked flawlessly. I label this project a success.

Very good Jeff. I wish we could all be that lucky to have it be a success on the first run. I'm still having problems with a corner of my layout. I think it's going to be time to tear it out and re-lay it from the roadbed up. Grrrrr.

[jeffrey-wimberly]

I'm still having problems with a corner of my layout. I think it's going to be time to tear it out and re-lay it from the roadbed up. Grrrrr.

I've had to do that before. I've been a model railroader since 1964 and I still have those wonder moments in which I wonder 'How could I have done something so stupid!'. Of all the layouts I've built for myself and friends (I quit counting at forty-something) this one is the first to be DCC, though it was originally wired for DC and is still blocked.

[AltoonaRailroader]

What's funny is I didn't know I had a problem until I dug out an old PRR RS-11 I've had stashed away and tried to run it. All my other loco's are fine through that curve. The curve is a little sharp, probably a little less than 18 degrees and it comes out of the turn right into a switch, and as that sucker comes around the turn the lower front step hits the switch machine and Kablamo!!!! We are off the tracks.  So for now, my dear old RS-11 is a west bound only loco. LOL Or better yet, it has no couplers on it at the time so it makes a great pusher for my coal depot, the only problem with that is once I get the cars pushed in there, I have to use one of my other road engines to pull them out. Guess it's time to get some KD's installed.

[dknelson]

What's funny is I didn't know I had a problem until I dug out an old PRR RS-11 I've had stashed away and tried to run it. All my other loco's are fine through that curve. The curve is a little sharp, probably a little less than 18 degrees and it comes out of the turn right into a switch, and as that sucker comes around the turn the lower front step hits the switch machine and Kablamo!!!! We are off the tracks.  So for now, my dear old RS-11 is a west bound only loco. LOL Or better yet, it has no couplers on it at the time so it makes a great pusher for my coal depot, the only problem with that is once I get the cars pushed in there, I have to use one of my other road engines to pull them out. Guess it's time to get some KD's installed.

Heh heh -- my entire layout consists of pesky areas .... by the way I do not know what kind of switch machine you have, but if the RS-11 has problems it is likely other things will too, eventually .... best to resolve the issue now.  If we are talking Atlas at one time they had extenders for getting the switch machines a bit further away from the track.   And sometimes it is possible to shave away a bit of plastic from the switch machine without destroying the unit.  Obviously not having the switch motor right on top of the layout is the goal at some point.

Dave Nelson

[Butlerhawk]

Aren't some S curves inevitable, depending upon the configuration of the layout?

[jeffrey-wimberly]

There are times when ending up with an 'S' curve is inevitable. Careful planning can eliminate them or at the very least cut them to a minimum. I have two crossovers that are made up of #4 turnouts. Since they're not used for anything but shoving a couple of cars through from one track to the other it's not a problem.

[tinman1]

Aren't some S curves inevitable, depending upon the configuration of the layout?

Yes and no. There is  difference between an "s" curve and an "S" curve. I'm sure the layout is much more enjoyable when the most popular car is NOT a line crew with a crane to re-rail.

[jeffrey-wimberly]

I've since added a turnout for a short spur.

[skiloff]

I really like the scenic aspects of S curves, you just have to make sure you have a decent straight section between the two curves.

[jeffrey-wimberly]

Yeah, that was the problem with this one. No room for a straight section.

[Medina1128]

It looks good.  My only concern is how close to the edge your track is. I'd hate to see a derailment and a nice loco or car drop into the Floor Ravine.

[canazar]

Well done Jeffery.  You picked up alot of room too.  When I first started scrolling down and looking at al the pictures, i was thinking, "Sure be a good spot to squeeze some room in for a smal industrail lead".  Ah bingo when I got to the bottom.   Ha ha, great minds think alike.

Also, you do some good work with the Easy track, looks great.

[jeffrey-wimberly]

Yesterday I had to remove the new turnout from my layout. It was causing problems with some of the larger locomotives that I use. My curves are 18" radius (it's not possible to go larger) but the curved part of the turnout is more like 15" radius and some of the larger power didn't like it, and they're Athearn BB's. Get that! My P2K E's took it just fine but the Athearn P's wouldn't touch it.