Monotonous boring jobs

Sleepers are not a fun job. Its a long repetitive job, which never looks quite right after you have done it. Once I'm into the rhythm it goes quite quickly though. I had left the sleepers I cut last week soaking in dilute black paint for 4 days, then took them out to dry last night. Spending an hour I managed to do an entire 4' length.

Spacing is done by the mk1 eyeball and the sleepers are lined up on one side with a ruler edge. No skill just plodding on.
The other line I have managed to save for tomorrow night. Can't have too much excitement can I.
Update 2/5/2013
And the second track is done.

Tonights work brought to you by Palmerston pale ale

Lean on in

Moving along a bit, after the hill went in I've been looking at developing the track at the north end. Before adding sleepers and ballast I wondered about adding in some super elevation to the curves. Now this subject doesn't tend to be covered too much in the mainstream press, and if it does, it quickly descends into an intellectual discussion with plenty of engineering diagrams. Now I've never been one for engineering as my tool collection will attest. I do tend to zone out when its mentioned, even at work, though I can at least read a chemical engineering diagram.
I did use super elevation quite successfully at the top of the Cass bank. Watching a long train start to lean into a curve looked really spectacular.Well, I liked it, and that was all that counted. I am somewhats surprised that trains never fell over when going round the curve though.

So, how do we replicate this without a civil engineering degree? By using the time honoured method 'have a go ya mug'.

To start, here we have 1410 sitting on the curve just north of the loco depot.

 So, how much super elevation do we need? About a piece of cardboard's thickness.

To my eye this looks about right (maybe a wee bit far, but the glue is in). If I had gone with a scale engineering drawing I would have arrived at an angle of about a third of this, and it just would not look right to the eye.
To glue it down, I have glued the higher outside sleepers down first, and next time I'll glue down the inner rails. then it will be time to do some ballasting.

I must admit I thought that the first bit of ballasting I would do would be at the Wellington end of the station. To be at the other end is a bit of a surprise.

Yay holidays

Well, with the country's national day off, along with the national prescribed indifferent weather, I managed to get a couple of hours in the man-sion.
And what did I achieve in this time?

Pretty much sod all.

'This took 90 minutes?'

-And I have no idea why. I had a piece of stripwood cut to get the gaps between sleepers right. Maybe it was the 'doing sleepers one at a time' rather than placing them on double sided tape as I normally do.

The other 4 joining tracks will have to wait until I get the turntable done so that the tracks line up correctly. I guess that that job leaps further up the que than it has been previously.

Saturday Morning

Haven't done one of these for a while. The unseasonably (unPalmerstony?) weather has meant that not much time has been spent in the shed, or indeed thinking about railways much at all.

One thing that has come across the desk (well through the mail box, though its a good question how much longer that will happen) is the trackmaking tome from the 2mm society.

 Its well illustrated all the way through its 138 page.I only tend to read it in small bursts as there is a lot of information to digest, and it is scary. Its shown me that despite me building 35 odd points, there is still a lot I need to learn. I would recommend it only if you were very very keen to make your own track to finescale standards. Having said that, I'm glad I did pick it up. I can use it to frighten small modelers with late night horror story's round the soldering iron.

Must get out into the shed at some point this week, but the electrics beckon, which enthuses me about as much as trotting up to a dentist and saying 'I'd like a root canal please, possibly 2'.

Better the second time around?

I didn't make it to paekakariki. a few too many other things to do

I did make it out to the shed for a bit. More fixing the track between the module joins.
I swapped from PVA to No more nails. This is very messy, but sets quicker in cold temperatures and should provide a stronger bond to the track.

It looks like a dogs dinner but it should hold.

And just as a addition to the scenes. I can't find photos taken from close to this spot, but there must be some out there. Probably buried in an NZRLS box.


I'm now looking at the track and thinking just how huge code 55 looks. Still, I'm not tempted to change things now.

A week of it

Well, I've done some bits and pieces this week, but a few other things have got in the way (curse you ratio with your freely available kit sets!).
I have managed a stint putting sleepers in on Paekakariki, and I'll organise some pictures of this in the not too distant future.

Today I got a chance to get out Waihao Forks and start to fix the track work. There was a lot of track regauging, which tends to suggest that what works with code 50 rail doesn't seem to work with code 40. Not a huge crisis as code 40 is a pain to work with. Possibly more terminal is that the clearances around the frogs are not great. Well, more accurately would be too great. the 2mm FS wheels drop into the gap quite noticeably, and about the only way to fix this is to remake the switch blades/check rails. Not a quick job by any stretch of the imagination, and I think an excellent show demo job.

I do like this angle though.

Mind numbing

Can anyone think of a task more mind numbing than cutting wood strip into18mm lengths. maybe turing a stack of driving wheels to the same profile might win.

'Not even started'

At least I could sit in front of the TV while doing it.

Fixing things

While some of us have been lucky enough to be doing 'sexy' model making, others have been back to basics.

I've been doing an hour here and there this week checking up on my early track building efforts. This involved the exciting task of going over everything with the NMRA track gauge (did I say buy one. Its a must have as far as I'm concerned now). Mostly I've found that the flange ways are either too tight or too loose, or the track is out of gauge. What i have found easier to do is to mark any areas that don't conform with a red marker pen. after I've done an area I can then go back with the soldering iron and do everything in one go, rather than a start/stop process.

Here is an example. The circles labeled 1 have flange ways that are too wide. I simply slip a 0.8mm sleeper into the gap and then carefully close it up with the application of heat. the area labeled 2 has the opposite problem, and the remedy is to slide the sleeper into the gap while applying heat to shift things out. again this works fine. Number 3 is where the gauge is too tight.

After fixing these I then remove the red marker. It has been making quite a difference to the smoothness of the running, though there is still quite a bit of clunking round in some areas. Still in terms of looks (and possibly running) it does beat the hell out of the Peco offerings. As an interesting aside I now find Peco points hideous to gauze upon. Its right up there with not painting the sides of the rails. maybe I'm just getting too snobby?

Fortunately I have been getting better at making points as I've gone along. Having now made about 30 I think I have got most of the 'kinks' out. At some point I will make some videos to show how I have done it. Maybe even the convention organisers might be interested?

There has also been a bit of work done with the paintbrush.

'I've got too many things that are red'

I've also added pickups to the rear wheels. I'm not sure if they are doing anything useful. The tensioning of these has been a bit problematic. Too little and there's no contact, too much and the wheels (and hence the whole thing) don't roll. Tests on the layout have it now moving quite well forwards under its own 'steam', but not at all in reverse. Not really a big problem.

You're not quite right

Looking at the calender reveals that Easter is the first week in April in 2012. This gives me sod all time to get Paekakariki up and running. Having a bit of a think about what needs to be done, vs what REALLY needs to be done I made a start on the jobs that need to get sorted.

The most important thing is that everything runs well, with no/few rough spots. Thus I've been putting some work in on identifying bad spots that need fixed. This has been a mixture of using rolling stock to identify bad spots and the NMRA track gauge to confirm them. As I wasn't planning to play with the soldering iron till later, I just marked them in red.

The more observant will note that the locations tend to be in the same areas and related to the point frogs. These early points appear to be worse than my later efforts once I had sorted out what I was doing. The check rails seem to be the most common fault. The one on the right seems to be from the really early period where I was trying to get Peco wheelsets through everything and has escaped alteration. The one on the left is too wide and allows the lead Ed bogie to pick the frog. A check with the track gauge shows that these can all be narrowed which should 'fix' the problems. I'll slowly work through the rest of the layout during the week, then have a soldering session to sort everything out.

Answering some questions.

My discussion on a new way (for me) to make throw bars ahs raised a few questions from the peanut galley. So, with teh aid of some terrible photographt I hope to clear (or muddy) a few things up.
Heres an earlier piece of trackwork from Grassmere. The filed heads of the peco track pins are clearly visible. They are countersunk 1/2 way through the throwbar so one can imagine how much weaker these are than normal.

The top side. the pin (with the chemical blackening layer removed) is soldered to teh inside of the point blade. A notch needs to be filed through the 'foot' of the rail to allow the pin through.
For some odd reason I find it very hard to get these notches lined up on each side. As you can imagine, this does take time. By the time I've stuffed up the throw bar once and buggered around with the notches, it can be 20 minutes to do the lot.

Ehibit B. Just soldering the point blades directly to the throwbar. Easy to line up. 2 minutes if I'm careful. Every bit of metal involved in this assembly has a bit of flex in it, so the weakest link is actually the chemical bonding of the copper layer to the resin PCB.

A moment of clarity

I've been pondering getting further on with the Waihao forks layout in the last couple of weeks. I was up to adding the throw bars, and I had even got to the point of drilling out the throw bars (3 holes)and removing the copper clad. However I've always been a bit uneasy about using Peco track pins as it requires a fair bit of countersinking to get into the right place. This makes the throw bar quite weak and i suspect that the whole set up is just a wee bit over engineered. I also need to cut groves into the foot of the rail which for some odd reason are a complete pain to get opposite each other.

While thinking about something else the other day it suddenly hit me that the actual movement I was looking at was 1mm and there would not be that much strain on the joint. Why not just solder the throw bar to the point blades and be done with it? a WTF moment if you will.
so, 1 minute to drill the hole in the middle, 10 seconds to file a bit extra off the copper clad board, and a quick run with the soldering iron later and there we go. The NMRA track gauge even has a thingy to get the point blades the right distance apart.

'The old 3 hole with the new 1 hole (trust me as the photo is a bit crap)'

'2 minutes and we are done'

I assume it will last, and if it doesn't its not hard to replace. It might not work with the heavier code 55 rail, but should be fine with the wiggly code 40.

Sort of done

Well, after the weekends ramblings, back to something a bit more concrete. I got to sit down at the weekend and have a crack at the fiddly bits of scissors crossover for Waihao forks. This did take a bit of doing. Doing a normal crossover involves a bit of unsoldering and remeasuring, and when it comes to something like this its just a case of making it up as you go along. Along the way I had to reset several crossing frogs, redo the point blades, and shift other bits of rail back and forward to get the geometry roughly right. I still have to do the throwbars at the moment, but its essentially finished.


The end result is something that will accept both finescale and NMRA wheel sets. I'm not sure if I'd attempt another one though. However I've reached the point that working with code 40 rail no longer holds any fears.

Making rail at Railex

So, how did my demo session making track go?

The main question was, so why do you make your own track? the three answers were (in no particular order)
1) There's nothing that looks close to the local prototype (apparently micro engineering code 55 isn't too bad, on a dark night)
2) Its cheap, I can build 3 points and a scissors crossover for a total of $40. That's about a 3rd of the price of the scissors crossover.
3) I'm not limited by commercial track geometries. Trying to force a prototype track plan to fit the limited range of points is always a pain.

Most were impressed, Some asked when I was making track for them (and the answer, Mike, is still no, until you move to a decent scale). One guy claimed that he didn't have steady enough hands, till I demonstrated that mine were worse than his (early mornings will do that to you). The Journal editor expressed his approval in that I had moved on from Peco.

I hope that I managed to de-mystify the process for some. I have had an invite to do a talk (which I'll probably have to turn down due to transport problems),and will probably wind up being tapped to do something at the convention. and how far did I get?
well, starting from here
Doing the sleepers sped things up quite a lot on the day. Saturday night at home we have...

The lower track is straight, its just a optical delusion.

A bit of a closeup. I have not put the throw sleepers in yet. One thing I immediately thought after taking this was that it looks like S scale code 70, which it essentially is scale wise. However I have found that its right on the lower limit of what I can work with. Its getting hard to see just how far through I have filed things. And before anyone suggests it (as Teach did last night) I don't do magnification as I can't get it to work for me (maybe when I need glasses) and I have tried all sorts. It just annoys me.

Finally we get to tonight. with the lady of the house safely out of earshot in Melbourne the sounds of fret saws and files echo through the living room.

I'm 1/2 way through the scissors crossover, but for a variety of reasons its being a real pig. I've tossed the rule book out the window and I'm just winging it at the moment.

The delivery

An impromptu visit from Fetler d'Amateur and his family also brought gifts. Even reduced to a left hand hes still very useful (and we may expect more from him when he has 2 hands back).


The first parts for the turntable pit in 3mm acrylic sheet (he first attempt in plastic failed dismally). These were cleverly designed with a 3mm hole in each corner so that it was easier to line everything up. however I could not find a bit of 3mm brass rod. I also only had 1 3mm drill. Fortunately the 2 'good' files that I own had the right handle size.


Note the sleepers for the turntable track marked in position. I will make up a shaper to sculpt the sloping ground at the bottom of the pit. Acrylic is not the easiest material to glue together. However I did have some 5 year old glue from another project which says on the label that its thick acrylic cement. It was quite a bit gummier than I had remembered but seems to have done the job.

'In Position'

The pit is designed with a larger top so that I can let it into the module. It's the same thickness as the track base so I'll just be laying the track on top.

Putting it roughly into position has altered the order that I will be doing things. My initial plan was to position the pit and then lay the track up to it. I can see now that I will have to make the track first (with a 180mm straight piece in the correct spot)and then position the turntable and cut the track. Discussions have now turned to the turntable itself.


Powering the turntable will be one of the Switchmaster point motors that I've had for eons. its got a top speed of 4 RPM so will do a 1/2 rotation in about 7 seconds. this seems to be about right speed wise for me. lining up will be simplified as its a stall motor that will just run the turntable up to a block and stop.

Unfortunately I've run out of flux to solder the track up with, so it will have to wait till next week.

( Enquirys about avaliability are rather premature as theres still no ideas about the table mounting and if it will actually work like it says on the box. And speaking from personal experience, acrylic sheet really ain't cheap.)

Another day

Well, another session in the Man-sion tonight. This consisted of lifting all the track on the north end module to put in the point throws. These things would have been easier if I had thought of them beforehand, which is a statement I tend to make allot. I have wondered at times if the whole project would be easier if I had some help. Thinking about it tonight, I've decided that for the most part I'm a bit of a lone wolf when it comes to the day to day building stuff on the layout. I don't tend to be particularly organised, so I just pick up jobs when I feel like it, or if it has to be done before the next step. Hence tonight's taking up track so that I can fix track more permanently in this area. I also have to do something about this area in particular as I can't finish things up till its done.


This is one place where I've subcontracted out the work, and with luck the first iteration may be here at the weekend. After this is in and working (the most important bit) I can then sort out the positions for the rest of the track around it.

Things might change once its time to do the scenic work, but for the most part I'm happier doing the track and electrics on my own. Its easier to spot and fix mistakes on my own.

The otehr issue is that if I had guests I would have to clean up and locate all the tools, rather than spending the obligatory 5 minutes looking for then every time I need a new one.

Now with improved light

The photos of the layout re-taken during the day so you can actually see what is going on.




Thats a bit better

Trackmaking XXXV; Is that it?

Yesterday afternoon I sat down, added the tie bars and completed gaping the PCB sleepers. I then placed the points in place on the 3rd modules to see what they looked like.

Looking at the module I decided something was still missing. The space for the turntable will stay for a while, but the tracks through the loco shed are quite glaring in their absence. A quick 25 minutes with the tools and the problem was solved.


Apart from the turntable and some short pieces at the end of sidings, that's actually about it track wise. Not sure I'll be able to go cold turkey from it, so I may have to do some other small projects to wean myself off.

So, what does the layout look like at the moment. Here is the picture from the north end looking down the length of the station.

And looking from the south end.

'Yes, I have been playing trains'

Trackmaking XXXIV: Last lap bell

Well, this weekend (as well as being hijacked to do some gardening) I've started work on the last 2 points for the scenic part of Paekakariki. These are for the 2 points leading onto the turntable behind the loco depot. First up the ceremonial marking out and sleeper laying.

I've then got started on the rails. Here's the first curved rail in place.


After I finish these 2 then its just some straight bits of track and the turntable to do and that's it. I'll then have to start doing some real modeling. This worries me as I'm hopelessly out of practice making buildings.

Trackmaking XXXIII

Its always the little things isn't it.

A closer examination of the humble NZR point in a standard yard situation shows us that while the rest of the trackage is buried up to the railhead, there are 6 sleepers visible where the point blades move.

And I suppose I have to replicate this on the model, which does take a bit of time.


In retrospect I'll have to go back and fix these as the sleepers are too bunched. Unsoldering these is going to be fun. I also have to sleeper the mainlines as most of those sleepers can be seen as well. This is definitely not a fun job. Its slow and meticulous, which is something I normally associate with work.

(This is why I have not been making many new toys lately. There's still too much track to lay and tweek.)

Trackmaking XXXII; a bit of a milestone

At 3:10 this afternoon, Da 1431 traversed (almost) the entire 12' of baseboard. I had hooked up the 'Up' mainline for the occasion. This then lead to running Ed's from the Wellington end and 'reversing' through the crossover down to the electric storage siding. Da 1410 was then run onto the down main and reversed towards the loco depot while the electrics moved back out onto the main.


This play has revealed that I need to do a bit of work on the track and also wheel back-to-backs. The Ed's have developed a very nautical roll in some places.

Connecting the track up could also lead to a loss of productivity as its too tempting to run locos up and down rather than sitting down at the modeling desk.