I'd be interested to see the foamboard option as an alternative to all the 3mm ply I cut for my baseboards. I believe you have to use a lot of bracing with either option to maintain stiffness without the prospects of warping once it's too late. The difference with the foamboard is that you won't need to watch the grain and I think it will be lighter than ply.

Either way I'm sure it will make a better layout than the string of boxfiles.

Perhaps also give some thought to removing/reducing the cutting at the front of the layout along some of the layout for viewers and photographs. 

Cheers guys -

A mountain of ironing led me to the same conclusions (not the ironing but the thinking-time!) - but Rich - thats a good idea about lowering the cutting a little at the front.

Mikkel - I'll definitely will be running a King one day! In the meantime I've (a) fallen into a well-known 2mm trap - its verrrry easy to convert to convert diseasels - and (b) the location actually had a lifespan well into the diesel era... (My excuse anyway - but you should see the gloat box full of Pannier/22xx/'Manor chassis waiting building)!

Off to the art shop to buy the foamboard....

Regs

Ian

The problem with foamboard is that it is fragile - when I tried building baseboards using it, I found I had to protect the corners with some plastic angle glued on (non-solvent adhesive). The other thing I found was that joining the baseboards is tricky. You really need the two mating surfaces to be solid (eg. timber/plywood) as the foamboard just isn't strong enough (even multiple layers laminated) when the boards are pulled tight by connectors. A friend got round that with his layout by building the entire thing in one piece (5ft x 1ft 6in) and commissioning a 'flight case' for it to go to exhibitions. I have vivid memories of carrying the thing down the stairs at the end of the York show one year!

Andy

Hi Andy

Thanks for that.  I'd given some consideration to the flimsiness and the ends will be faced (probably) with some of the afore-mentioned ply.  The baseboard will be well-supported with internal bracing - rightangularity (?) being maintained by triangular knees. Another solution for the corners may be to brace them with aluminium angle that I'm going to use for the cassettes, making up the thickness on the end with suitable-thickness ply or card.  I've got brass dowels for baseboard joiners & these will probably be recessed into 25mm square wood.

Best adhesive to use with foamboard is limonene-based - our aircraft-modeller friends use it with modern high-desity foams used for wings etc.  Smells like 'Evo' but isn't - and is about 4 times the price!

Regs

Ian

... I can see the reasoning with model aircraft which are going to be thrown off a hillside in the hope they will fly. I have at times felt like doing this with projects that haven't turned out as hoped but it's not part of the original design criteria!

 

If you are going to add ply internal bracing, extra thickness on the ends for joining the boards, 25mm square wood to recess the brass dowels into and aluminium angle to brace the corners etc wouldn't it be an awful lot simpler just to make some conventional baseboards in thin ply that will remain flat and be able to withstand the rigours of being moved about....or am I missing something.

 

Jerry

Hi Jerry -

Valid comment - I guess it's the old comment about climbing mountains - 'cos its there'.  I also wanted to stay with the 'boxfile' ethos of very light wieght.  Even with 25mm wood (mainly to take the locating dowels) and ply ends, the boards are still much lighter than conventional 6- or 9-ply.  I will however complete the construction of the boards before starting on tracklaying etc (seems a bit of a weird statement,that - but I think you know what I mean....)  That way, if it doesn't work I've only wasted a couple of days - and with the garage door currently u/s (which is where my ply is!) I'd not have made any progress anyway!

If all else fails I'll turn it into a box kite per your comment above!

Regs

Ian