Tomcat
I would suggest 30 and 32.5 inch radii. Prevents sideswiping problems.
You need space outside and track for subraod bed to be supported, say 3 inches.
This gives a a footprint of 71-72 inches.
Rember to install one circle of roadbed, and install track on it before installing second circle.
What is a removalists??? I understand Canadian and American, but Aussie is a truly foreign tongue.
Dave
Hi Dave
A Removalist ,If you need to move to a different house I come to your place and put all your furniture and boxes and stuff into a truck and take it to their new house, instead of you having to do it.
Thanks for the reply Dave and the radius you suggested are about what i have in mind . Its just the track arrangements going into and coming out of the helix im not sure on how they will work. I need an entry as well as an exit for the middle level and im confused as to how the track are going to cross ver
Also Ive been told that having turnouts in a helix is a bad idea, more chances of derailments and mounting switch machines.
What do you think.
Tomcat:
I have never built or operated on a two deck layout. Turnouts on hidden track can be a real problem.
You have a large space (I'm jealous) for a home layout.
Depending on where the door or doors are you could build a open ended E shaped layout, with good sized aisles and either one or two double sided peninsulas.
The have one helix going up to a second level. Forget the third level.
Calculate the modeling space this would give you.
What you call a removalist I would call a mover, and company a moving company.
These were omly ideas to get you thinking again.
What I'd suggest based on my experience is figure out where to put your main yard and where to locate your main line.Then figure out at least a couple passing siding locations.Exact locations and types of industries, however, you can indeed "wing it." I laid an entire industrial park in one afternoon with no real track plan... just a mess of track and turnouts. Worked fine, reliable, fun to switch. I knew where the entry track came in, and just built from there.
Disclaimer: This post may contain humor, sarcasm, and/or flatulence.
Michael Mornard
Bringing the North Woods to South Dakota!
Unless I missed it, you have never said what you are planing to run. That impacts the track plan more than anything! You can't run a bigboy around my layout, even though I had the space for it because I wanted an effect that I could only get with a smaller radius and since I run 40' or less stuff, this wasn't a problem.
rrebell Unless I missed it, you have never said what you are planing to run. That impacts the track plan more than anything! You can't run a bigboy around my layout, even though I had the space for it because I wanted an effect that I could only get with a smaller radius and since I run 40' or less stuff, this wasn't a problem.
That's true, design for the ops you have in mind -- and the equipment.
But if you throw a helix into the mix, that changes things. Even if you run toghter radii elsewhere, you're always well advised to make the helix radius as large are possible. The combination of curve and grade has a significant effect on operations if you make them too small beyond that, too small a radius also affects something unique to a helix -- the spacing between levels.
You want to make the helix radius as large as possible in order minimize the drag effects of the turns combined with grade. In this case, a little over 30" may seem OK, but 36" or larger would be better.
Making the grade less severe also helps with entry and exit from the helix. And it makes turnouts perform better. Using curved turnouts allows a double tracked helix so that the only interfence of one loop with another would be exit and entry to the center line at each level.
Another method would be to use the outer helix between Deck A and Deck B and between Deck B and Deck C. The inner helix coil would be dedicated to a direct connection from Deck A to Deck C. In these cases, you often designate the center coil as either a return coil or as a way to send trains from staging on Deck A back up to the beginning of a run on Deck C.
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
I agree with some of the others. I have yet to design a track plan. Basically I am the artist with a blank canvas. I figure out what I sorta want in an area and start putting track down, loosely, to get an idea. Maybe put a building or two around. Move things around, adding and subtracting track and buildings. Sooner or later, the ideas gel, down go the pencil lines, glue and then cork and then track. In one area of my layout, I have had two engine terminals and now I have a grain elevator. Never be afraid to rip stuff up if you are unhappy with it. I do enjoy looking at track plans and layouts in MR to get ideas of what could be possible and then translate them into what pleases me.
Ted
Some observations. First our removalist friend asked a provocative and interesting question and it seems upon reading the responses that there is no one agreed on definition for what a "track plan" even is! To me doodling counts. I would think a very clear mental conception without anything on paper could count as well (after all, classical composers as diverse as Mozart and Bartok would inform friends that a certain composition was "complete" because it was completely composed in their head, with little or nothing on paper). I think a series of marks or indications on the bare benchwork could also count.
Just fastening one piece of sectional track to another like I used to enjoy doing with my Lionel layout as a kid does not, it would seem, count as a track plan.
Before written track plans are held out as the gold standard, remember that sometimes traditional written, even published, track plans can lead you seriously astray because representing track with a simple line can be so seductively simple, making you think you have all sorts of space that you do not have in point of fact. For a time MR had an artist name Baron whose track plans would feature actual drawings of the track (rails and ties) rather than just a line. I tended to regard his plans trustworthy because of that.
Where I think some sort of disciplined, thoughtful planning process is most needed is when thinking of capacity of passing sidings and yard tracks, as well as fouling points in tight situations. The cost of turnouts has become so dear that you really want to know in advance if you are possibly wasting your time or not. Again representing yard tracks with a simple line can make you think you have capacity that just ain't there once the track is in place.
One situation where a written out track plan is really useful is when thinking about wiring -- finding "hidden" reverse loops and such. Maybe that mattered more in DC days than DCC days but it still matters. And a written track plan might reveal more clearly in advance where you are running the risk of creating a doozy of a tight S curve that you will later regret.
Even with DCC at some point it is useful from a troubleshooting standpoint to have a track plan showing what wiring was actually done. But it could be after the fact.
My mom had a saying "Marry in haste; repent at leisure." A modification of that phrase can be used to describe the process of layout planning and creation.
Dave Nelson
Wow
Love all the responses. Dave raises some very clever points and ones that I can relate too. I play drums and its like I am sitting down at the kit with a great beat in my head ,know what it sounds like but just cant for the life of me play the damn thing!!!
I do have a fair idea of where certain industries will go and where the RH and TT will be, its just all about the track arrangement . The staging yards I would like on the first level, I am thinking 2 yards one will be for American trains and the other for Australian. Does anyone think it would look funny if I had American and Australian trains together in the same yard?
Keeping in mind that this will not be a prototypical layout in anyway , apart from what the locos will be pulling. (there wont be and Australian Loco pulling freight cars from America, vice versa, Passenger locos pulling a coal train) that sort of thing
I do have the real estate for a larger radius helix say 36-38 which would require around 2mx2m area.
I am also having to consider having having wider than normal aisle width as my better half is in a electric wheelchair which needs room to turn around between the benchwork. I want to go with 900mm width benches
For those who want to know, it will be a freelanced Layout for running passenger trains , frieght, industry and switching.
Something I was pondering.... How would it work if I make a helix from deck A-B and then a second helix on top of that one to access train from B-C decks. So basically a 2 in 1 helix that will have their own enrty and exit points.?
Has anyone done this ?
Wider aisles are always a good improvement, even if you need to give up a bit of ROW to do so.
tomcatSomething I was pondering.... How would it work if I make a helix from deck A-B and then a second helix on top of that one to access train from B-C decks. So basically a 2 in 1 helix that will have their own enrty and exit points.?
Actually, that was one of the options I was describing, but with the addition of a second track on the inside of the first that would take trains back to Deck A staging directly from Deck C (and vice versa). If it is low frequency ops, you could get away with a single track version that did exactly as you say.
OK after much deliberation with the co-designer(the other half) I have decided to go with a nolix as we dont really want to sacrifice the real estate needed to build one. Also It would be my first helix to build and I think its best just to put it off a little longer.
I will go with a no track plan idea and wing it when i get to laying track.
I will start the track laying from the points where the nolix begins and ends and fill in the gaps,placing industries and stations etc as i go.
I want to thank all you wonderful people on here for their invaluable input and I will try to post some pictures as I go along.Its so great to be a part of this forum with so much help available
If there is anything else you think I should know please let me know
you guys are just absolutely AWESOME !!!!!.
Model railroading in the States wins hands down over here in Oz. Im not afraid to say you are the best in the world. All the videos on You Tube gives you all the proof you will ever need.
Love you all
Tom from Down Under
Tom,
You're welcome. Glad to help. Just be sure to leave level areas between the grades big enough to generally suit your needs.
Also, don't be too hard on the home crowd. I've got an Aussie buddy who makes great and very useful model railroad videos. He's mainly narrowguage, but also works on standard gauge stuff. Many techniques and tips are gauge/scale insensitive, so I can highly recommend Laurie McLean's channel. Much of it is electrical and if you are interested in animation, he's got the goods. He's also a MMR and this is part of how he's dedicated to spreading his wisdom: https://www.youtube.com/user/scoopmmr
Someone just posted this link to the Kalmbach book on helix design in another thead. Looks like it's on 50% off sale this week, but don't know how that applies to foreign sales. Since an ebook, maybe the same deal?
https://kalmbachhobbystore.com/model-trains/digital-downloads/mrpdf032__Guide-to-helix-and-staging-design
Anyway, food for thought if you waver on the nolix design and reconsider the helix. They can seem mysterious, but I don't see them as particualrly difficult, although I;ve never built one. I have built a nolix and that is probably more difficult of a task.
One thing that I highly recommend with a nolix as a tool is a good quality digital level. It should be able to directly read out grades to 0.1 degrees in order to work well on a model layout. Keep checking everything, including side to side, too, as you build. It will save you a lot of headaches later on when you lay track.
Mine is a unit made to be inserted into different level "bodies" so that you can go from long to short easily. It's about 9" long and I use it "naked" on the layout, as that's a very handy length.