Buckling tracks

[KemacPrr]

It has been cold outside so your heater has been working harder. That also means that the air in your house has been drier than normal. Even if you have a humidifier wood benchwork will still dry out a bit and shrink. Go back and cut some gaps now and you will eliminate the same problem in the future. When I lay track I leave small gaps between rail ends. Smaller ones in winter than summer. ------------  Ken McCorry

[CascadeBob]

 I had a similar thing happen on my last layout.  The track was held down with track nails into Homasote which was glued to 1/2" plywood.  I don't remember the season of the year in which it occurred, but since it happened in a straight section of track, similar to the left track in your photo, I fixed it by simply pushing it back into proper alignment and putting in more track nails.  I'd not be too quick to cut gaps in the rails since, as one of the other posters has pointed out, it may go back the other way when things warm up in the spring and the humidity goes back up.

Bob

[60YOKID]

It is the dry conditions of low humidity that causes the wood to shrink.  Cold weather=dry air.  When we turn up the heat, that causes the wood parts to shrink more and more when humidity is low. 

I have hot water heat in my basement floor and I almost never turn it on.  Last week a zone valve stuck and caused the floor to really heat up for a few days before I noticed it, and HO track that was not caulked down buckled. The humidity was very low at the time.  Most of us in the cold climates don't run much humidity in cold weather to avoid water and ice on windows.

[modelmaker51]

You can do as Camaro did and put down a foam underlayment, the plywood will move in relationship to the foam, but the track will stay relatively stable. Ballasting will also help lock things in place along with a few expansion gaps. The best time of year to do bench and track work is in the spring and fall when temps and humidity are in between the extremes of summer and winter.

According to some HVAC people I have talked to, it's not a good idea to shut off the heat in a basement, the heat will keep the walls and the floor from sucking heat out of the house and as the heat rises it warms the floor above which in turn requires less energy to heat that floor. Some double pane windows in the basement would help too, that's where the greatest heat loss is, cheap single pane basement windows, even using the shrink film kits for windows can help alot.

[rxanand]

CSXDixieLine

I However, yesterday when I went to run trains, my track looked almost exactly like the photo you posted above.

Jamie: Interesting to hear that I am not the only one with this problem. I tried leaving a small electric heater running but it was not able to raise the temperature significantly after a few hours. I don't want to waste energy just for the layout - utility bills are high enough as it is. In my case, I did not use nails anywhere. I used latex caulk both to glue down the cork to the plywood and the rails to the cork. I deliberately left a few areas not glued down - which is, in fact, exactly where the track has buckled. I am in two minds about what to do - it would be easy enough to trim the track and shorten it a bit but I am not sure if the wood will expand when it gets warmer. A thought: In model railroads, we seem to have exactly the opposite problem to that encountered in prototype railroads where rails break in winter as the steel contracts. In our case its the ground that shrinks :-) Rangachari Anand http://www.coralfringe.com

[camaro]

I had my first layout laying on 2" foam.  Regardless of humidity, the track always stayed true because the foam was thick and was resistant to warping. The track was glued to the foam, so if the foam moved the fixed track moved. The wooden benchwork possibly twisted, but had no visible  effect on the foam.  The foam was sat on the benchwork and was not glued down, but was more friction fit and  was held in place by side fascia.

[CSXDixieLine]

I just had the same problem with my test layout. I live in Atlanta, and we have been very cold (lows in the single digits or teens) and very dry. In fact, this is the first time I have turned off the dehumidifier since the basement was finished in 2002. I have a 36" x 80" hollow core door layout topped with a sheet of 1/2" Homasote. It has an oval of N-scale Atlas flex track laid on cork roadbed and has never had any problems in over two years of operation. However, yesterday when I went to run trains, my track looked almost exactly like the photo you posted above. I was even going to upload a photo, but the one you posted above is nearly identical to what I had. I figure that the cold the lack of humidity caused the paper-based Homasote to shrink and the wavy track resulted. Now in my case, this is just a test layout in use while I build my permanent one. The track is only held down with track nails into the Homasote, so I just pulled up the nails along the sections where I had the problem and allowed the Atlas flex to "spring" into a natural curve. I then put a few nails back in. The track has smoothly flowing curves again, although in some spots the centerlines between the cork and the track are almost a full 1/4" off (just as in your photo). Will be interesting to see what happens when the temperature and humidity go back up to more normal levels. This event has caused me to reevaluate the track laying plan for my permanent layout--I will now have regular expansion gaps in addition to the previously planned electrical block gaps. You have a bit of work to get your track back to where you had it, but good thing you found out now instead of after ballasting, scenery, etc. Jamie

[jeffrey-wimberly]

 Just cut gaps in the rails at the location of the buckling and that will relieve the stress. You can solder jumpers around the gaps.

[loathar]

Strange. Mine does that when it gets hot and humid. Cold, dry air causes my gaps to open up. You need to cut gaps in your rails, but just enough to take the kinks out. If you make them too big, you'll have huge gaps when your weather swings back the other way. It's definately the wood that's doing it.

[rxanand]

 I jsut went down to the basement after a long cold spell (I live in New Jersey) that we have been having. I found that some of the tracks had buckled! My guess is that the plywood shrank more than the track causing the track to buckle. See photo attached below - look at the right side track. The left side track has also buckled but not as much.Goes to show that its not only heat that causes problems. In thirteen years of having a layout in the basement, this is the first time I have had this problem. I guess this cold spell was particularly bad! I am wondering now whether I ought to shorten the track (Atlas code 83 flex incidentally). Any advice?