Laying soldered track

[Wyvern]

Hello fellow 2millers. I am about to do some alterations to my work in progress layout which was built using PCB sleepers and bullhead rail. Before I had built track sections separately and assembled them in situ but these were mostly straight sections from the track jig.

 

I am installing some curves and wanted to know if it is better to build the curve on a template and then install it on the track base ( balsa ) with PVA and pin it down. Or glue the herringbone track section down ( glue or d/s tape ) then solder on the second rail? Any advice great fully received.

 

My next layout will be in easitrac!

 

Guy

[Wyvern]

Hello fellow 2millers. I am about to do some alterations to my work in progress layout which was built using PCB sleepers and bullhead rail. Before I had built track sections separately and assembled them in situ but these were mostly straight sections from the track jig.

 

I am installing some curves and wanted to know if it is better to build the curve on a template and then install it on the track base ( balsa ) with PVA and pin it down. Or glue the herringbone track section down ( glue or d/s tape ) then solder on the second rail? Any advice great fully received.

 

My next layout will be in easitrac!

 

Guy

[Wyvern]

Mods please delete duplicate topic

[Caley Jim]

It's easier to lay the herringbone first and then fit the second rail. That way you can make the track 'flow' better and it will hold the curvature once the second rail is fitted. If you make it on a template first, it's more like laying proprietary track.

Jim

[nick_bastable]

lay the herringbone in situ and then add the second rail with the soldered rail on the inside is my recommendation

 

Nick

[Izzy]

Having just completed and laid the soldered trackwork for my new circular layout, all curved of course, both pointwork and plain track, I do find that building it in sections on a template on the workbench and then laying down on the baseboard like set-track much easier. Perhaps this is because I have always built track this way whatever the scale and construction method, chairs glued to sleepers or soldered copperclad and it's what you get used to.

 

Izzy

[Echo]

I find that rail expansion and contraction during soldering can subtly alter the alignment of track. Building it on the baseboard guarantees that the track keeps the correct alignment.

[Richard Hall]

Not exactly the answer to the question asked but possibly useful / relevant - I have been laying code 40 flexi track and pointwork over the weekend and discovered Evostik Timebond.  It's a very viscous contact adhesive (comes out of the tin the consistency of margarine), spreads nice and thin, and allows a certain amount of repositioning and shuffling around before the track is pressed firmly into place. I definitely prefer it to PVA and fiddling about with pins and weights. It will however tend to make you very high unless you work with all the windows open.

[Caley Jim]

I find that rail expansion and contraction during soldering can subtly alter the alignment of track. Building it on the baseboard guarantees that the track keeps the correct alignment.

The trick to avoid this is not to fix the second rail by starting at one end and working to the other, but to tack it every 10th sleeper or so and then solder the rest in a totally random fashion, avoiding doing any two in succession close to one another. This prevents any heat building up in any localised place in the rail.

 

Jim

[Echo]

I agree this would reduce the problem, but hesitate to accept that it would eliminate the problem altogether - particularly with long sections of rail where there would be many multiples of 'every 10th sleeper'.

[Caley Jim]

I agree this would reduce the problem, but hesitate to accept that it would eliminate the problem altogether - particularly with long sections of rail where there would be many multiples of 'every 10th sleeper'.

So don't lay the 'herringbone' in long sections!

 

Jim

[Richard Hall]

So don't lay the 'herringbone' in long sections!

 

Jim

But then you get rail joints, which are the work of the Devil. Out of curiosity, what do people (especially using Easitrac) do about these?  Soldered, or free-floating?

[Caley Jim]

But then you get rail joints, which are the work of the Devil. Out of curiosity, what do people (especially using Easitrac) do about these? Soldered, or free-floating?

Never found rail joints a problem. Solder a dropper wire to the bottom of each rail right at the end, pass them through a hole in the trackbed and baseboard and then twist then together and solder underneath. It also provides a simple way of connecting feeds etc.

 

Jim

[Yorkshire Square]

But then you get rail joints, which are the work of the Devil. Out of curiosity, what do people (especially using Easitrac) do about these?  Soldered, or free-floating?

 

When I first started using Easitrac I soldered a pcb sleeper (with etched chairs). This caused problems due to expansion as it had nowhere to go. This manifested itself particularly scarily at the Association Golden Jubilee bash at Oxford where the hall was like a sauna.

 

I now solder one sleeper in the centre of a panel (typically up to 18") principally for electrical connection and rely on the Easitrac to align the rails at each end. So long as you don't use N Gauge style curves and you affix the Easitrac with the proper Easitrac glue, I've found no issues with this.

 

At baseboard joints, I've use shorter panels soldered to three or four sleepers at the baseboard edge and floating in Easitrac for the remainder.

[queensquare]

I pretty much follow the method Jim uses. The only variation, mainly because I like to clean and paint the track before laying, is that I lay the herringbone on a series of small squares of double sided tape, solder in the second rail ensuring all aligns well, then lift, solder on droppers, clean and spray.

 

For Easitrac I do pretty much what Yorkshire Square does but use normal PVA. Tucking Mill has been down for several years now with no sign of movement.

 

Jerry 

[Crosland]

The trick to avoid this is not to fix the second rail by starting at one end and working to the other, but to tack it every 10th sleeper or so and then solder the rest in a totally random fashion, avoiding doing any two in succession close to one another. This prevents any heat building up in any localised place in the rail.

 

Jim

 

It also depends on how you secure the work. I see no reason why doing it on the layout is better or worse than doing it on the bench, other things being equal.

 

Andrew

[Caley Jim]

It's the usual story. Everyone has their own ways of doing things which they find easiest and suits them best. Ask 5 people the best way to do something and you will get 6, or more, different answers!

 

Jim

[Richard Hall]

When I first started using Easitrac I soldered a pcb sleeper (with etched chairs). This caused problems due to expansion as it had nowhere to go. This manifested itself particularly scarily at the Association Golden Jubilee bash at Oxford where the hall was like a sauna.

 

I now solder one sleeper in the centre of a panel (typically up to 18") principally for electrical connection and rely on the Easitrac to align the rails at each end. So long as you don't use N Gauge style curves and you affix the Easitrac with the proper Easitrac glue, I've found no issues with this.

 

At baseboard joints, I've use shorter panels soldered to three or four sleepers at the baseboard edge and floating in Easitrac for the remainder.

Oh dear. I've just finished tracklaying ("narrow gauge" Finetrax I'm afraid, still hovering on the fringes of 2mm) and soldered thin copper wire across all my rail joints.  I wasn't convinced that the rather flimsy plastic base would hold the rails in accurate alignment, but it did cross my mind that temperature changes might be a problem.  Apparently Wayne Kinney of Finetrax is looking at getting some code 40 BH fishplates made, which will be handy but too late for this particular layout.

[nick_bastable]

Oh dear. I've just finished tracklaying ("narrow gauge" Finetrax I'm afraid, still hovering on the fringes of 2mm) and soldered thin copper wire across all my rail joints.  I wasn't convinced that the rather flimsy plastic base would hold the rails in accurate alignment, but it did cross my mind that temperature changes might be a problem.  Apparently Wayne Kinney of Finetrax is looking at getting some code 40 BH fishplates made, which will be handy but too late for this particular layout.

I suspect at best the fishplates would be cosmetic, who as yet to in-counter a problem with non fishplated track both easitrac and soldered 

 

NIck

[Caley Jim]

I suspect at best the fishplates would be cosmetic, who as yet to in-counter a problem with non fishplated track both easitrac and soldered

 

NIck

Connerburn, built over 45 years ago with soldered track, had no fishplates and gave no problems either at home or exhibitions and Kirkallanmuir, Easitrac, likewise,though it's never been exhibited. I don't know of any 2FS layout which has functional fishplates.

 

Jim

[2mmMark]

Connerburn, built over 45 years ago with soldered track, had no fishplates and gave no problems either at home or exhibitions and Kirkallanmuir, Easitrac, likewise,though it's never been exhibited. I don't know of any 2FS layout which has functional fishplates.

 

Jim

 

Likewise, both in std & narrow gauge, I don't use fishplates. If the Finetrax base is anything like Easitrac (and I believe it is), it's far from being flimsy.  If in doubt, the rail ends could be soldered to pins pushed into the trackbase. The pins can then be used as power feeds.

 

Fishplates are available for code 40 flat bottom rail from Micro Engineering.

 

 

Mark

[Ian Morgan]

Once the track has been ballasted, using PVA glue, it is like being set in concrete. I have been involved in five 2mm finescale layouts with no fishplates at rail joints. The only problem we had was with the first of these, Alresford. This used the first type of 2mm plastic sleepering where the rail was dropped into a wide slot in the chairs, and fixed with epoxy resin glue. Some long lengths of rail were laid in the winter when we had to wear coats in the clubrooms. When the weather warmed up, the rail popped up out of the chairs and looked like a roller coaster.