00 gauge Standards

[Buhar]

"Negotiate" is a rather imprecise term.

 

They will certainly run through them if the back-to-back is adjusted accordingly. But in the process they will drop into the crossings (frogs) with a bump.

 

 

Thank you for that, Martin.  I wouldn't claim my two Gibson wheeled 0-6-0s were silky smooth through the pointwork, but the jolt, even at slow speeds, wasn't horrendous on the eye.

 

 

 

 

If you prefer wheels to remain fully supported on the rails when running through crossings, in the prototype fashion, you should go for 4-SF (00-SF). But in doing so you must be prepared to check back-to-backs for compliance (14.6mm for Alan Gibson/Ultrascale, 14.5mm for Romford/Markits, 14.4mm for RTR wheels). And not expect to use sharp train-set radii below about 750mm / 30" radius for the running lines.

 

 

If there is an option to go better, I'd be interested, and rechecking B2Bs is not an unreasonable task, but with yards of C+L and Peco in the fiddle yard, replacing all that to 16.2mm gauge is out of the question.  Is it the case then that the wheels Alan Gibson market as 00 will inevitably clunk through anything other than 00-SF?

 

Also, where could I get the 3 different B2B gauges?

 

Thanks for the K-crossing info, I end the day wiser than I was. 

[hayfield]

Alan

 

Martin prefers that you choose a gauge and stick to it, which is fine except foe 00sf (4sf) no one makes plain track. It is worth readong Gordon S ET (Eastwood Town ) thread he builds his turnouts and crossings to 00sf but uses 00 gauge plain track. Martin suggests that the transition from 00sf (16,2 mm) to 00 (16.5 mm) is done on the plain track where it connects to the crossing. Gordon builds the transition at the start and finish of the turnout.complex. We are currently building a small 00 gauge layout with 00sf crossings at our club and have chosen the route Gordon uses.

 

Both styles work fine and the important thing is that both common and K crossings are much improved visually, have the potential of working better coupled with most RTR stock and kit built stock with Markit/Romford wheels work without any adjustment

[Derekstuart]

Alan

 

Sorry to butt in with my tuppence worth (which is overpriced anyway)

 

Whatever you do or don't do in whatever gauge or scale you do or don't use, the 00sf/4sf discussion threads here and elsewhere are pretty much essential reading for anyone building turnouts. The in depth discussions about wheel/rail interaction is incredibly informative and I for one went from slight knocking as you described to silky-smooth where I could not feel the change of the rail under the wheel and whilst I did receive help and advice with construction, it was the understanding of what is actually happening as the wheel traverses the knuckle and check rails that made a huge difference.

 

I can highly recommend those threads, although there is a fair bit of nonsense from one or two nonsensical people.

Derek

[martin_wynne]

Martin prefers that you choose a gauge and stick to it, which is fine except for 00sf (4sf) no one makes plain track.

 

Hi John,

 

I don't have any preference for what other folks do with their own railway.

 

But it's silly to say no-one makes plain track. YOU can make plain track -- if you can build pointwork, building plain track is a doddle.

 

And by building it yourself you can have proper prototypical 60ft rail lengths, with varying sleeper spacings at the joints, properly keyed chairs with projecting keys, and fully detailed track. Certainly it is more work than buying flexi, but built on a template it is actually easier to lay than flexi, and on a small shunting layout it will lift the whole thing that little bit more and match in with your pointwork. With no arguments about the best way to transition to 16.5mm flexi because it will all be 16.2mm.

 

Obviously on a large main-line layout such as Gordon's  Eastwood Town it would be a lot of work, but I think it would still be worth doing in areas close to the viewer. Lots of layouts were once built with all handbuilt plain track -- including this one, because no-one was making 5ft-3in flexi track when we built it (and they still don't ): http://templot.com/GNRI/adavoyle.htm

 

Between them over the years the Scalefour Society and EM Gauge Society must have supplied many thousands of pre-cut plywood sleepers. Indeed the Scalefour Society have recently re-tooled their production to supply improved laser-cut sleepers. 

 

regards,

 

Martin.

[Derekstuart]

Go on! Somebody ask Martin which way around the keys should face. I dare someone...

 

I really cannot understand why some incredibly talented people make some beautiful point work and then attach it to yard lengths of plastic sleepered track. I would agree with Martin 100% on the look and options available on hand made track.

 

One tip I would give anyone though- using a sacrificial inch or two at the end, file a taper similarly to how you would file a switch blade; you will waste a couple of inches of rail but you will save countless broken chairs and also without putting stress on the rail, you won't bend it where you don't want it bent. Thread all the chairs on the whole yard length, facing appropriate directions and then if you need to chop it into the appropriate lengths after threading on the chairs.

 

 

PS Martin- I've been looking for information on which way keys should face on plain track....

[AndyID]

Go on! Somebody ask Martin which way around the keys should face. I dare someone...

 

A bit like asking Tony Wright if it's OK to run without head codes.

[martin_wynne]

PS Martin- I've been looking for information on which way keys should face on plain track....

 

Hi Derek,

 

We have been over that many times, on here and on the Scalefour forum.

 

The answer is that the tapered keys are driven into the chairs in the direction of traffic on double track. With the result that they remain projecting from the chairs in the opposite direction. On single track they are driven "towards the joint, towards the station, towards the river".

 

It's not an idle matter, it is the difference between killing passengers and not killing them. The purpose is to prevent rail creep under traffic, which can cause the essential expansion gaps at the joints to close up, leading to track buckles in hot weather. Driven the wrong way the keys will come loose and fall out under traffic, with similar dire results. Driven the right way means that rail creep tightens the keys.

 

Rails tend to creep in the direction of traffic under load. Rather like pastry pushing ahead under a rolling-pin.

 

regards,

 

Martin.

[Derekstuart]

Hello Martin

 

I thought you would realise I was joking. Sorry- I know you have explained that countless times to countless people.

 

BTW Have you seen my recently released book? "1001 1002 ways to p155 people off in easy steps." I am releasing volume 2 next month.

[hayfield]

Martin

 

I must have misunderstood one of the replies you wrote during one of the discussion of using 00sf in conjunction with 00 gauge plain track

 

Yes plain track does look much better using hand built track with chairs having keys and should not be that hard to build the main problem I can see is cost. with appx 130 sleepers per yard you are looking at the best part of £10 worth of chairs plus rails and ply. At the other end of the scale Peco flexi track is £3 a yard with both C&L & Exactoscale somewhere between the two. This is the case of balancing various factors one of which is cost

 

But for small layouts and where there is a visually important area it may well be appearance out weighs cost 

[Junctionmad]

I'm will be mixing flexi and hand built turnouts. It's simple , too much plain track to build. But yet I need the geometry advantages that hand built turnouts provide. Track like all other aspects of modelling is a compromise.

 

I suspect many are in the same position

[Izzy]

 

I think the advantage of hand built plain track besides the factors mentioned by Martin is that the sleeper material can match the pointwork, that gauge widening can be employed, but also that the track will stay where it's put rather than having a mind of it's own, which all the flexitrack I have meet has had!

 

Izzy

[roythebus]

I really don't see a problem using 16.2mm on pointwork and 16.5mm on plain track. There's been so much waffle about putting gauge widening on Templot; FFS, what's the problem of adjusting things by eye on the end of your pointwork? I intend to continue using the already laid and ballasted C&L and SMP flexi track on my layout, rebuilding the slips and double junction to 16.2, and adjusting the DOOGAF pointwork back-to-back/checkrails to suit  the narrower gauge. It isn't rocket science. 

[hayfield]

roythebus

 

The one good thing about 00sf is that there are the correct gauges available to build track to the correct gauge as there are in EM & P4 gauges

 

Certainly the suppliers of what I would group into the 00 universal gauge (to coin a phrase used by Peco) have been sadly lacking in range and choice

 

The method you are going to use Gordon of ET has proved to work very well

[Clive Mortimore]

roythebus

 

The one good thing about 00sf is that there are the correct gauges available to build track to the correct gauge as there are in EM & P4 gauges

 

Certainly the suppliers of what I would group into the 00 universal gauge (to coin a phrase used by Peco) have been sadly lacking in range and choice

 

The method you are going to use Gordon of ET has proved to work very well

 

 

Hi John

 

Peco have not used the term Universal for many years after they dropped their Universal range of Streamlined points.

 

Which manufacturers gauges can I use for 00 flat bottom tack? Is there a difference between Peco code 82 or C&L code 83 rail, can they be used together? As I model the early 1960s I know that the pandrol clips are not suitable so which of the myriad of track fixings should I be using and where can I get them? Does 00sf work out for flat bottom track as well?

[Grovenor]

Does 00sf work out for flat bottom track as well?

The standard whether 00Bf, 00sf, EM, P4 etc is concerned only with the rail edges, whether flat bottom, bullhead or bridge rail, code 100 or code 40 matters not. Its helpful if the slots in your track gauge match the width of the rail head but so long as the rail goes in the slots you can deal with it being a loose fit. When I built in TT my gauge just has a 12mm centre then was stepped down at the ends, no slots as such, I built lots of track with it that worked well.

Colin Craig has lots of info on flat bottom track of the pre-pandrol era.

Regards

[hayfield]

Hi John

 

Peco have not used the term Universal for many years after they dropped their Universal range of Streamlined points.

 

Which manufacturers gauges can I use for 00 flat bottom tack? Is there a difference between Peco code 82 or C&L code 83 rail, can they be used together? As I model the early 1960s I know that the pandrol clips are not suitable so which of the myriad of track fixings should I be using and where can I get them? Does 00sf work out for flat bottom track as well?

 

 

Clive good evening

 

Flatbottom is a bit of a minefield, I think its the Manchester model railway club which have a detailed section on their website about flatbottom chairs and fixings

 

The C&L code 82 rail head is slightly narrower than code 75 bullhead rail, I have been told Peco's Pandrol clips are overscale, C&L do ST baseplates and don't forget in the early years of flatbottom plain track turnouts and crossings were bullhead in chairs on wooden sleepers. I also understand the GWR had concrete sleepers whilst still using bullhead rail and chairs. Whilst these points have nothing to do with your question it shows you the minefield track systems are

 

As for building flatbottom turnouts and crossings Peco also do clips with their concrete sleepers, which give you a third plastic option. Then you have the Colin Craig etched parts for copperclad timbers, I have spoken with Colin and seen his marvellous track system, I may be very mistaken but got the idea they were designed to be very prototypical thus suitable for large radius turnouts and crossings

 

I have in the past used the standard 00sf gauges with code 82 flatbotom rail and they seemed to work well, I also have a set of DC Concepts code 82 00sf roller gauges (they do not fit code 75 bullhead rail). They are fine for copperclad construction and from memory allow the rail head to rotate for use with C&L ST base plates.

 

Which should you use, well for ease of purchase I would go for the ST baseplates from C&L, much better than using either nothing or bullhead rail. If you have a digital calliper just check the 00sf roller gauges are keeping the exact gauge, which is far more important in 00sf than 00 gauge

 

As for Peco using the "universal" terminology, I thought I read it quite recently on their website, but quite often I am wrong. However it does group BF fine and DOGA intermediate together quite well leaving DOGA fine and 00sf to occupy the finer ends of the gauge (tin hat time again I think)

[Ravenser]

 

As for Peco using the "universal" terminology, I thought I read it quite recently on their website, but quite often I am wrong. However it does group BF fine and DOGA intermediate together quite well leaving DOGA fine and 00sf to occupy the finer ends of the gauge (tin hat time again I think)

 

Nope. There is no such thing as a "Universal" track standard. The endless chase for the delusory chimera of the magic "one size that fits every wildly different wheel" is a major factor at the route of the problem

 

For each track standard there is a matching wheel standard. The track standard and the wheel standard are the left hand and the right.

 

Be consistent in your choice of wheels. Stick to wheels of a more or less consistant standard, or those plus those wheels very closely akin.  Do NOT perpetrate a random mix of everything and anything in terms of wheelsets and expect the track standard to sort it all out by finding some Magic  Number

 

Intermediate is intermediate between Fine and the chaos of Coarse with Peco Streamline, Lima and old Hornby steamroller wheels, Hornby Dublo, and second hand Hornby points of uncertain vintage dug out of some trader's box for £1.50 a pop . None of it's the same , all of it's obsolete and there's no point whatsoever trying to draw up a "standard" to cover it. "Not heaven itself upon the past has power".

 

If there's one thing I'd like to do it's bury the term Universal at a crossroads with a stake through its heart

[hayfield]

Steven

 

Why do you not read others replies and accept them for what they are, and before you ask no we have not missed you. The trouble is that those who do not want to go into the finer aspects of track, want to go into a shop and buy a product which is universal and will accept stock from many eras. Many believe a well known manufacturers code 75 products as finescale where as the code 100 product is a part of a universal track system as previously stated by said company

 

Those of us who know slightly better understand the term intermediate, know the problems DOGA fine causes and actually build and run 00sf without having to alter much at all

 

Its a great pity that we do not have a group that speaks up for all who use 00 gauge and its derivatives to promote a constant set of standards from the differing manufacturers.

 

And I guess for the 50 th time it would be nice if you could show the members of RMweb the courtesy of answering the many requests to state your position/previous associations with the DOGA 

[martin_wynne]

For each track standard there is a matching wheel standard. The track standard and the wheel standard are the left hand and the right.

 

Indeed. You keep saying that. But "one matching standard" does not necessarily mean only one size or make of wheel. It depends on the numbers in the standard.

 

For example 4-SF (00-SF) will accept ANY wheels which fall within the following standard limits:

 

1. wheel-width 2.3mm MINIMUM. They can be as wide as you like, although if too wide they would look a bit daft. About 3.5mm wide is probably a sensible top limit.

 

2. flange-thickness 0.8mm MAXIMUM. The flange can be as thin as you like, although if too thin it would not be possible to profile them to run smoothly against the rail head or make them deep enough. About 0.4mm is probably a sensible bottom limit.

 

3. back-to-back 14.3mm MINIMUM. They can be wider on back-to-back, but only up to the limit of:

 

4. back-to-flange 15.2mm MAXIMUM.

 

Now lots of wheels fall within that standard if they are set to an appropriate back-to-back -- including modern RTR wheels, Romford/Markits wheels, Alan Gibson wheels, Ultrascale wheels.

 

More about 4-SF dimensions here: http://4-sf.uk

 

Martin.

[polybear]

And I guess for the 50 th time it would be nice if you could show the members of RMweb the courtesy of answering the many requests to state your position/previous associations with the DOGA 

Hi John,

 

I have it on impeccable authority that Steven Siddle ("Ravenser") is the current DOGA Treasurer.

 

Brian

[hayfield]

Brian

 

Thank you, I may well email the chairman of said society to ask why they are not willing to welcome us mere mortals into the society which is for all 00 gauge modellers, but then am I bothered, answers on a post card please     

[polybear]

Hi All,

 

 

For each track standard there is a matching wheel standard. The track standard and the wheel standard are the left hand and the right.

 

Be consistent in your choice of wheels. Stick to wheels of a more or less consistant standard, or those plus those wheels very closely akin.  Do NOT perpetrate a random mix of everything and anything in terms of wheelsets and expect the track standard to sort it all out by finding some Magic  Number

 

 

I wonder how the 00 wheel standards (profiles) compare amongst Bachmann, Hornby, Heljan, Markits, Alan Gibson, Ultrascale ......

My guess is there are quite a few variations, but the chances of actually obtaining the relevant data may well be pretty slim.  As for being consistent with wheel choice - it's often easier said than done, as a particular manufacturer may not offer the spoke configuration/crankpin position option that you require.

 

If it works - use it.

 

Brian

[polybear]

Brian

 

Thank you, I may well email the chairman of said society to ask why they are not willing to welcome us mere mortals into the society which is for all 00 gauge modellers, but then am I bothered, answers on a post card please     

 

Hi John,

 

The DOGA website states:

As well as our quarterly magazine, joining DOGA gives you access to a member-only, SPAM free e-mail discussion forum. We occasionally publish the results of some of our chats but most of the time you don't know what fun and assistance you are missing out on until you join...

Personally, for the £16 yearly cost I think I'd buy four copies of MRJ instead (It is fair to say that I have seen back-issues of the DOGA Magazine though, and it does feature some interesting info).

 

As for a Model Railway Discussion Forum, I do know of a pretty reasonable one that's free of charge

 

Brian

[Derekstuart]

I think I'd rather stab my legs with forks

but most of the time you don't know what fun and assistance you are missing out on until you join...

 

 

Excellent. Which is it?

As for a Model Railway Discussion Forum, I do know of a pretty reasonable one that's free of charge

[nswgr1855]

Hi All,

 

 

I wonder how the 00 wheel standards (profiles) compare amongst Bachmann, Hornby, Heljan, Markits, Alan Gibson, Ultrascale ......

My guess is there are quite a few variations, but the chances of actually obtaining the relevant data may well be pretty slim.  As for being consistent with wheel choice - it's often easier said than done, as a particular manufacturer may not offer the spoke configuration/crankpin position option that you require.

 

If it works - use it.

 

Brian

 

 

Most have different flange profiles. Lots of different profiles work OK, some track better than others. The critical limits are for  00-SF crossing K,s are minimum wheel back to back 14.35mm (scale curves) and 14.4mm for typical model railway curves  and a wheel check gauge( front of flange to back of opposite wheel) 15.2mm. Minimum wheel width can be as small as 2.1mm without noticeable wheel drop. 

 

Cheers,

 

Terry Flynn.