It is easier to lay perfect track with staggered joints but you can still have perfect track with unstaggered joints, just takes more work.
Boise Nampa & Owyhee It is probably more important that you have no kinks at rail joints than whether they might be staggered. Staggered can often be wasteful of track also. When laying flex track in a long curve, solder the next section to the previous by holding it straight out, then pulling it into the curve and pin or glue it down. This prevents the rail from trying to create kinks at the joiners. This is especially important when constructing a helix. Bob
It is probably more important that you have no kinks at rail joints than whether they might be staggered. Staggered can often be wasteful of track also.
When laying flex track in a long curve, solder the next section to the previous by holding it straight out, then pulling it into the curve and pin or glue it down. This prevents the rail from trying to create kinks at the joiners.
This is especially important when constructing a helix.
Bob
Ditto this. Thats exactly how I do it. I learned from an old school flex track method, I think described by John Armstrong and co-horts, and it works great. Staggering rail on flext rack is unnecessary and wasteful.
I used heat sinks when soldering track too to minimize the risk of melting ties.
As for soldering, I have found if you are in an environment where track can expand and contract a great deal, its good to avoid soldering track where possible and leave a small gap between rails. This allows track to "float" a bit and avoid broken solder joints where track contracts too much or kinks where it expands too much.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
Almost all of my curves are now soldered flex track without any staggering of the rail joints.
I just clip off the end ties on each piece of flex track, add rai joiners to the rails and solder.
Works like a charm, no kinks, no derailments.
Rich
Alton Junction
We stagger the outside vs inside rail of the flextrack on curves. By about 2 inches. And use the ties of one section for one rail of the next by inserting the rail bottom of one into the tie plates of the other. This really helps avoid kinks and makes things smooth.
Richard
IRONROOSTER I think what they mean is to not have a track joint directly on top of a roadbed joint on top of a sub roadbed joint. I have frequently had the joints in the two rails at the same place without a problem. But I make sure that the cork roadbed joints are not on the sub roadbed joint. I use a surform tool to smooth out the cork roadbed over sub roadbed joints where there sometimes is a little bump. I also use it at cork roadbed joints well, so there's no bump. I don't worry about where the track joints fall.
I think what they mean is to not have a track joint directly on top of a roadbed joint on top of a sub roadbed joint. I have frequently had the joints in the two rails at the same place without a problem.
But I make sure that the cork roadbed joints are not on the sub roadbed joint. I use a surform tool to smooth out the cork roadbed over sub roadbed joints where there sometimes is a little bump. I also use it at cork roadbed joints well, so there's no bump.
I don't worry about where the track joints fall.
Paul hit it on the head - make sure you don't get every joint from the benchwork frame to the railhead in a single place.
Staggered rail joints are nice - but, except on curves, I don't go out of my way to stagger them. On curves, it's a good idea to stagger the joints, which will happen naturally if you slide the inner rail into the next section of flex track. Keep the fixed rail to the outside, and anywhere from one to several inches of the inside rail will protrude past the end of the last tie.
For what it's worth, my prototype doesn't stagger joints. It squares them, and carries the joint bars on two closely-spaced ties. I've modified my flex track to simulate that (without cutting rail into 16 meter lengths.)
And now for the kicker! If you build dominoes or other modules that are intended to be disassembled, the point where the rails meet the border goes exactly opposite all of the above. The answer there is to make sure that the rail ends are absolutely in alignment and secured that way forevermore. [I leave the method(s) to be used as an exercise for the student.]
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - with removable yard throats)
Good luck
Paul
see ya
I don't stagger joints at the ends of turnouts. I have trimmed the turnouts to fit better, or to get a better diverging angle started sooner, but I don't bother staggering the joints to the turnouts.
Yes, tangent staggered joints are easy, but they should still be joined, and the way to do that is to saw a joiner into at most thirds, but I do it in fourths, and solder the smaller lengths into the joint between the ties. It's very time consuming,often frustrating, but the results are worth it if you want realistic looking track. Or, you can just solder the two butted ends together if they are filed squared off to a good fit.
The short staggers for reversers is a good idea. The instructions for the PSX-AR say so, at least.
When you lay turnouts, remember throwbar lengths and actuation. Also, no need to caulk them in place. Suspend them between the caulked/fixed lengths of track meeting their entrances, and simply ballast them, ensuring grains of ballast get under the ties to actually support the entire appliance. Fix the ballast with white or yellow glue, diluted. Later, if you need to lift the turnout for any reason, simply wet the ballast, wait two-three, and then lift the turnout. If you soldered it into place you'll have to undo that, or ideally simply slide back the joiners.
Crandell
I'm about to actually lay track...I laid out 3 turnouts and flextrack connections today, pinned down on the cork...two detail questions arise as I review my notes before adding turnout shims, a frog wire, drilling the Tortoise wire hole, etc and getting out the caulk gun:
a) a booklet I have advises to stagger subroadbed, cork & track joints...not at the same point. On the track part, is it necessary to create a staggered rail joint on straight section connections? If so, at turnouts, is it necessary to do so by nipping a bit off one of the turnout rails; e.g. where a curve will start after the turnout leg? These are curved turnouts, so if it's necessary to stagger the opposing rail joints I'll have to trim one turnout rail and re-cut the curved connecting tracks...a bit of a bother as otherwise I'm ready to proceed.
b) I've got OG-ARs and OG-CBs for my DCC subdistricts. I believe the instructions say to make a 1/8" stagger (maybe fjust for the OG-ARs), so same question...is this necessary? I think I've read about this on the forum before but haven't found it.
I laid out the first track area today with 3 curved turnouts and short connecting tracks but overlooked the above issues. I'll make adjustments if needed before securing the pieces but prefer not to make unnecessary adjustments. Thanks for any input on these issues.
Modeling HO with a transition era UP bent