BigDaddy CTConrail My grades do not sit soley on a radius, only partially. There are straight sections also. Does this help my case as far as lowering my grade % some? It only helps it on the straight sections. I'm not sure how far along you are in the construction but I would do a mockup with (box) cardboard. It only has to be sturdy enough to run your train once and it doesn't even have to be on your layout. You want to see how your trains run. If it doesn't work, you've only wasted your time with some recycled cardboard.
CTConrail My grades do not sit soley on a radius, only partially. There are straight sections also. Does this help my case as far as lowering my grade % some?
It only helps it on the straight sections.
I'm not sure how far along you are in the construction but I would do a mockup with (box) cardboard. It only has to be sturdy enough to run your train once and it doesn't even have to be on your layout. You want to see how your trains run. If it doesn't work, you've only wasted your time with some recycled cardboard.
Ahh ok I see what you are saying. I just used the grade calculator .it says that i am at a 3.25 grade with a 15" radius if I lower the rise to 2" where if it was straight I would be at a 2.08% grade. I have not started construction yet. Hoping to in the next week or so. Still in the track plan phase which I thought I was almost done with. I will definitely do a mockup before I do anything permanent. I have some good engines and then some middle of the line engines however I don't want to have to run 3 good engines to pull a train and have fun with it. I will reassess my plan today and see where I can make alterations to it also.
What are you using for your base? If you are using foam, you could dig in a little to lower one track, while using the risers for the upper track.
There is a tunnel in the southern part of our state where they did just that, dug down to lower the trackbed so that taller cars could go through the tunnel.
Just a thought.
Good luck,
Richard
Yes I am going to use foam actually. Thats a good idea. That can help me out as it seems any little bit of height I can save counts towards a lot.
Just spread out the 3 percent, you need to do this consitantly though, like a 1/4" per peice or whatever works out to 2 1/2 percent. As an alternative, you can put it on the side and sharpy with a straight edge and hot wire off the extra. Love this stuff and would never go back to ply. Just make sure you transition the bottom and top (you have to hot wire the top for this anyway). I run cork on top of mine so the bottom transition is easy and it allows for me to gauge the top corectly.
CTConrail.... I was very curious to see where this thread would go. I think it is very wise you are deciding not to do 2.5 grades. A two percent grade on an 18 inch radius in N scale is somewhere close to a 2.7 degree grade with the radius drag ratio added. This is what I decided to stick to for a maximum, after careful planning.
I am not ashamed to admit I spent two years in planning my N scale layout. That would mainly be two full Winters. I'm not inside doing my hobby when it's nice outside up here in Minnesota. We have to take advantage of those days.
I did a one-to-one ratio plan on a 4 by 7 foot sheet of paper (railroad board, full scale). I started over and over tweaking things a little each time until I got my objective achieved. No grade over 2% and no radius under 18 inches.
I am not short on money but that doesn't mean I like to spend it. I call them cheaters, I didn't necessarily not want to buy the Woodland Scenic's styrofoam grades. It just occurred to me if you made a cookie cutter layout out of 1 inch extruded foam keeping your risers 6 inches on center with only 1/8 inch of rise every 6 inches, this would be equivalent to a 2% grade. 1/48 is close enough to 1/50. I like to keep things simple.
There are three levels on a 4 x 7 100% foam layout. Nothing over a 2% grade. Nothing under an 18 inch radius. It took long enough in the planning but I think it will be worth it. As of now my layout weighs about 5 pounds. That will make it easy someday when I'm old, going to train shows. I just need to get finished with my scratchbuilt bridges so I can lay my track
I wish you the best of luck with your project.
Track Fiddler
Great idea TF, I think that looks good.
I kind of did the same thing with a big island style layout, using foam scaps from work for risers, only I used homosote for the road bed, as back then, I thought you HAD to spike the track down.
Mike.
My You Tube
Thanks Mike.... I do remember spiking down my track in the early 70s when I was a kid. I suppose if one was hand laying track with spikes on foam risers, homasote roadbed would be way to go.
I don't think using homasote was a wasted effort Mike. Even if you found out you really didn't need to do that, the sound deadening qualities of homasote are phenomenal, very dense stuff.
We didn't glue our track down with caulk back in the early days. We could have, I guess nobody had thought of that back then.
I have chosen my track, Micro Engineering code 55. I forget who, but one of the other Forum members here suggested it to me. They said it holds its shape. I tried it out, it sure does! It holds its shape so well, I see no reason to solder track connectors on 18 inch radius curves.
I'm also going to look into Fast Trax turnouts. They look fun and I like the fact that you can have a larger variety than just number 6 turnouts TF
Track fiddler CTConrail.... I was very curious to see where this thread would go. I think it is very wise you are deciding not to do 2.5 grades. A two percent grade on an 18 inch radius in N scale is somewhere close to a 2.7 degree grade with the radius drag ratio added. This is what I decided to stick to for a maximum, after careful planning. I am not ashamed to admit I spent two years in planning my N scale layout. That would mainly be two full Winters. I'm not inside doing my hobby when it's nice outside up here in Minnesota. We have to take advantage of those days. I did a one-to-one ratio plan on a 4 by 7 foot sheet of paper (railroad board, full scale). I started over and over tweaking things a little each time until I got my objective achieved. No grade over 2% and no radius under 18 inches. I am not short on money but that doesn't mean I like to spend it. I call them cheaters, I didn't necessarily not want to buy the Woodland Scenic's styrofoam grades. It just occurred to me if you made a cookie cutter layout out of 1 inch extruded foam keeping your risers 6 inches on center with only 1/8 inch of rise every 6 inches, this would be equivalent to a 2% grade. 1/48 is close enough to 1/50. I like to keep things simple. There are three levels on a 4 x 7 100% foam layout. Nothing over a 2% grade. Nothing under an 18 inch radius. It took long enough in the planning but I think it will be worth it. As of now my layout weighs about 5 pounds. That will make it easy someday when I'm old, going to train shows. I just need to get finished with my scratchbuilt bridges so I can lay my track I wish you the best of luck with your project. Track Fiddler
I think it actually works out to around 2.08% grade for me to be honest but that is also not factoring in the radius which is 16.25 inner and 17.5 outter so I may run into a little bit of issues with long trains. Layout looks awesome by the way!
CTConrail... thanks for the compliment. I see where you got your 2.08 from. I never did divide 100 by 48 before when I mentioned 1/48 is close enough to 1/50, it is 2.08
To be honest with you the second picture of the lowest level was an after-thought. It's a spur that will go down to a lumber mill built over a lake with logs floating around. This grade is a 2.6 before figuring in radius drag. 5/16 rise per foot. It's amazing what an added 1/16 can do.
The reason I'm bringing this up is because I ran some tests on that grade. My SW 1500 switcher with traction Wheels could pull 15 cars up that grade. My F 7 with no traction wheels could pull 13.
These were kind of junk cars that did not have Micro trains trucks on them. Some of them didn't even roll on their own. I don't see the need to pull or back down more cars than that to a lumber yard, so I guess this is acceptable to me.
I do have a complete F7 A B C and D set. I am very curious to see how many cars that will pull on my 2.08% grades when I get my bridges done and I finally get my track laid.
PS. I forgot to mention the radius on that 2.6 grade was 21. The Traction Tire locomotive pulled them up no problem. The F7 spun its Wheels but got the job done.
Thanks TF
Track fiddler CTConrail... thanks for the compliment. I see where you got your 2.08 from. I never did divide 100 by 48 before when I mentioned 1/48 is close enough to 1/50, it is 2.08 To be honest with you the second picture of the lowest level was an after-thought. It's a spur that will go down to a lumber mill built over a lake with logs floating around. This grade is a 2.6 before figuring in radius drag. 5/16 rise per foot. It's amazing what an added 1/16 can do. The reason I'm bringing this up is because I ran some tests on that grade. My SW 1500 switcher with traction Wheels could pull 15 cars up that grade. My F 7 with no traction wheels could pull 13. These were kind of junk cars that did not have Micro trains trucks on them. Some of them didn't even roll on their own. I don't see the need to pull or back down more cars than that to a lumber yard, so I guess this is acceptable to me. I do have a complete F7 A B C and D set. I am very curious to see how many cars that will pull on my 2.08% grades when I get my bridges done and I finally get my track laid. PS. I forgot to mention the radius on that 2.6 grade was 21. The Traction Tire locomotive pulled them up no problem. The F7 spun its Wheels but got the job done. Thanks TF
Nice! I wish I could fit a radius that big but this is designed as a shelf layout and as it sits I expanded the plan out to 3 feet in width at the ends which is really pushing it for 20" shelf brackets. I am going to have to add extensions on them for support. If I had the room I would love to model a section like yours with a lot of grades and a mountainous region. Keeping it open to a helix to drop down to a bottom shelf in the future so maybe.