Auto rack trains

[Anonymous]

What would be the minimum radiouse curve be for running auto racks reliabley?

[Anonymous]

For looks the smallest radius I would do would be 24". I'm assuning HO of course. That's pushing it but the overhanging probably wouldn't be to bad. Anything smaller the overhang would be to much. I don't have one but I have an 89' boxcar that I have run on 18' radius and it looked bad because most of it hung over off the rails, something you wouldn't see in the protype.
Andrew

[Anonymous]

It is HO scale.

I was wondering because my dad had an ato rack and it didnt like the 20'' radiuse curves.

[nfmisso]

24" radius is very very tight.

Athearn recommends 26" absolute minimum for thier Auto-Max.

30" is a good minimum radius......

[Anonymous]

I have a 24" minimum and they run pretty good. Any radii smaller than that is risky with such long cars. They will look and perform better on a larger radius.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the info.
Im hopefully going to get some snap track in a large raduise and make a loop that i can set up in the living room.
Cause i dont think my parents would like the idea of building a layout that runs around my bedroom
lol

[Junctionfan]

I would recommend 36 inch radius minimum if your are runing a double or more track main line. Anything else and the autoracks will scape into other autoracks, 86 foot auto boxes and 85 foot passenger cars if you are running autoracks beside those kind of cars. I don't believe automax cars are indanger of that though because they are articulated.