Peco Bullhead Points: in the flesh

[Mike Storey]

I see the Home(made)Boy Massive has pierced the wagon circle......

 

All power to your tweezers, but we is lazy/incompetent/uncertain/doneitgivenuptrying g1ts wiv a bit more dosh than time, or we would rather get our trains actually running before we die, innit? Meanwhile, mere mortals will be abuying and alaying the Peco stuff with all due suspension of disbelief, although with these points and track, rather less suspension than we needed before. If we can tweak it a bit by some judicious bending, great, but my soldering iron will stay firmly in its holder until used to completely f8ck it up with the dropper wires.....

 

If we weren't, shirley we would be making P4/EM track along with converting all our stock? 

 

Self-build is a wonderful, admirable combination of skill, determination and not a little knowledge, but I would not want to marry one. I beliebe you have your own, many and interesting threads?

[JeremyC]

......

 

Again, the Peco BH rail examined from the side and from the end appears to have a foot (almost?) as heavy as the head.

 

 

According to a Peco representative I spoke to just after the BH track was introduced the Peco rail is not a true bullhead but is symmetrical top and bottom. My understanding was this has been done for production reasons to make it impossible for the assembler/ machine operators to fit the rail upside down.

[tomparryharry]

It's true in real life as well. It's a real PITA to get it in upside down, as the 'head' is mostly slightly wider than the lower part. If it goes in 'ar$e up' it should cant over, and trying to get the keys in normally gives the game away.

 

Ian.

[gr.king]

But this is RTR 00 not P4 so who cares about the exact dimensions.

As long as it works and is compatible with the other makes that's good enough for me.

Bernard

 

I fully agree, but the figures do suggest that it is unreliable to scale up from Peco's published artwork.

[hayfield]

Measuring with a digital Vernier just now, comparing a Peco BH turnout and a piece of plastic base stripped from a modified code 75 FB Peco large radius example, I've found the following, although I wouldn't want to claim that any individual figure is more accurate than "to the nearest 0.05mm" at best:

 

BH rail height 1.9mm, total track height 3.9mm, sleeper / timber thickness 1.65mm. By implication, chair base thickness approx. 0.35mm +/-

 

FB rail height 1.9mm, thickness of sleeper / timber mid-way across, clear of any moulded plates / chairs 1.42mm, thickness of moulded base where rail foot sits 2.1mm.

 

Obviously these suggest a 0.1mm discrepancy in total track heights, which could be entirely due to measuring errors, individual or cumulative.

 

Again, the Peco BH rail examined from the side and from the end appears to have a foot (almost?) as heavy as the head.

 

 

If these figures really matter to some users, perhaps one of those with a more accurate measuring device would care to measure up some track as I have done and give us the results?

 

For all but the most hardened finescale modeller, the exact measurement is neither here or there, but thanks for taking the time to confirm they are the same size. The important fact is that it matches their existing track both in size and more importantly geometry. As the vast majority of users will use it straight out of the box

 

In one of the next replies there was an interesting answer to why its not quite bullhead, again does it matter, from normal viewing distances it looks right and I would guess most would not notice the difference anyway.

 

I do have a couple of other thoughts but they can wait 

[tomparryharry]

To be perfectly honest, rail weight per yard varies across the range, so you can have 75, 80, 85, 90 & 95 lbs per yard. Great Western switches were a nominal 100 lbs per yard. If you can determine that to a finite degree of accuracy, you're doing very well indeed. I guess what your trying to achieve, is to 'capture the feel' of the track; how it looks, how it interacts with the rest of the layout, or diorama. 10 microns (look it up) over a metre viewing distance is quite small, and your ballast is probably 3-4 times thicker than the actual material.

 

Cheers,

 

Ian.

[Captain Kernow]

Soldered/copper-clad is suitable for flat-bottom construction but not too easy to accomplish for chaired BH track.

Not a problem if you insert a sliver of brass or N/S strip under the rail and on top of each sleeper. That way you get the rail above the top of the sleeper, thus making it easier to glue the plastic half-chairs on afterwards, together with the strength of soldered construction. Grain can be added to the surface of the copper clad sleeper to taste.

[Jeff Smith]

Sounds very fiddly

[Vistisen]

And verylittle to do with Peco bullhead points

[Jeff Smith]

Actually it was related - the discussion was about making other crossings etc not yet available from Peco to match the currently available large radius points and track.  Has to be BH of course!

[Bernard Lamb]

Sounds very fiddly

 

But not as fiddly as sanding down the bottom of each chair, which would be the logical alternative.

Bernard

[hayfield]

But not as fiddly as sanding down the bottom of each chair, which would be the logical alternative.

Bernard

 

 

And remove the bottom plate part of the chairs

Edited December 24, 2017 by hayfield

[gr.king]

Digression into the whole turbulent topic of hand-built track, and the seemingly inevitable accompanying views that seek only to pick fault with the latest Peco product or to sneer at those who are happy to use it, might not be a relevant or desirable part of this topic. Nonetheless, is there not a good case for suggesting that practical suggestions for the construction of robust and effective diamonds, slips, 3-ways etc to match the appearance of the Peco items are a fair aspect of this discussion, at least pending a decision from Peco on whether to offer us more options?

 

Soldered construction on PCB strip for strength, speedy construction and amenability to "tweaking" if necessary by simply re-heating joints, with packing pieces to lift the rail off the PCB and cosmetic half chairs stuck on once all is well, sounds like a reasonable approach - keeping the solder minimal otherwise the chairs won't fit without a lot of extra work. Tinning the contact areas of the PCB and the foot of the rail along its whole length before starting to fix the rail in place is something I've found helpful in the past, and the suggested packing pieces could also be from tinned strip. No need to introduce extra solder when making each joint, just apply a little flux and hot clean iron, then admire the way that all of the solder is in the joint rather than heaped up in blobs around it.

[The Stationmaster]

Digression into the whole turbulent topic of hand-built track, and the seemingly inevitable accompanying views that seek only to pick fault with the latest Peco product or to sneer at those who are happy to use it, might not be a relevant or desirable part of this topic. Nonetheless, is there not a good case for suggesting that practical suggestions for the construction of robust and effective diamonds, slips, 3-ways etc to match the appearance of the Peco items are a fair aspect of this discussion, at least pending a decision from Peco on whether to offer us more options?

 

Soldered construction on PCB strip for strength, speedy construction and amenability to "tweaking" if necessary by simply re-heating joints, with packing pieces to lift the rail off the PCB and cosmetic half chairs stuck on once all is well, sounds like a reasonable approach - keeping the solder minimal otherwise the chairs won't fit without a lot of extra work. Tinning the contact areas of the PCB and the foot of the rail along its whole length before starting to fix the rail in place is something I've found helpful in the past, and the suggested packing pieces could also be from tinned strip. No need to introduce extra solder when making each joint, just apply a little flux and hot clean iron, then admire the way that all of the solder is in the joint rather than heaped up in blobs around it.

 

Peco do seem to have been reasonably forthcoming (e.g to those of us who asked at Warley) about where their most immediate developments of the bullhead range are headed although there was, understandably, no mention of timescales or which items out of 'diamond crossings and slips' are likely to come first.

 

Which, of course, might not solve the situation for those constructing a layout in the next month or 6, or 12, or whenever. 

[hayfield]

Digression into the whole turbulent topic of hand-built track, and the seemingly inevitable accompanying views that seek only to pick fault with the latest Peco product or to sneer at those who are happy to use it, might not be a relevant or desirable part of this topic. Nonetheless, is there not a good case for suggesting that practical suggestions for the construction of robust and effective diamonds, slips, 3-ways etc to match the appearance of the Peco items are a fair aspect of this discussion, at least pending a decision from Peco on whether to offer us more options?

 

 

 

Well said, I understand from another reply that a double slip is next on the drawing board, so for the person requiring a diamond, hand built is the only option for something that will match this product. 

 

I accept there are those who have no interest in this subject which is fine, just ignore these replies. There are those like the poster Tender in #622 who is both a user of the said products and has a requirement for a item which is not available now, and apparently with no immediate plans for its introduction. The retrograde step is to say tough buy a flatbottom rail HO scale product, rather defeats the object of buying in scale bullhead turnouts.

[Merfyn Jones]

We are at the moment replacing all our Code 100 FB, on our club layout with Peco bullhead. However there are 2 single slips on the layout and when the first of the points arrived I made a replacement for one of the slips so as to form a crossover in the main line. This was a no frills copy of the Peco original using copper clad and bullhead rail. No cosmetic chairs as I was hoping it would be a temporary option.

Not the easiest of jobs due to the short nature of the Peco product.  So upon reading here of the future production of slips etc. I have given a second one a miss for now and will plain line the other one until I can buy one to match. It's not a much used crossover anyway and the prototype was taken out for that reason.

So plenty of further track to change, by which time the slips may be about, please.

[tender]

Well said, I understand from another reply that a double slip is next on the drawing board, so for the person requiring a diamond, hand built is the only option for something that will match this product.

 

I accept there are those who have no interest in this subject which is fine, just ignore these replies. There are those like the poster Tender in #622 who is both a user of the said products and has a requirement for a item which is not available now, and apparently with no immediate plans for its introduction. The retrograde step is to say tough buy a flatbottom rail HO scale product, rather defeats the object of buying in scale bullhead turnouts.

I now have some bullhead rail, chairs and some plastic timbers so will be making a start on a diamond crossing to go with the Peco bullhead turnouts I have after the Christmas festivities are out of the way. Will post progress on in the 'hand built and templot' section as and when.

 

Should add that it won't be a copy of the Peco FB crossing due to the more prototypical track spacing I'm using and that it and the turnouts are on a transition curve.

Edited December 24, 2017 by tender

[Tim Dubya]

Not a problem if you insert a sliver of brass or N/S strip under the rail and on top of each sleeper. That way you get the rail above the top of the sleeper, thus making it easier to glue the plastic half-chairs on afterwards, together with the strength of soldered construction. Grain can be added to the surface of the copper clad sleeper to taste.

Some folks use Vero Pins to do this, I've just ordered a pack from the eBay to assist me in the burning of my fingerprints.

 

http://www.verotl.com/en/category/solder-pins

 

Merry Christmas

[Junctionmad]

Personally , having made quite a few copperclad points in my time , I much prefer the ply sleeper and plastic chair approach.

[The Stationmaster]

Well said, I understand from another reply that a double slip is next on the drawing board, so for the person requiring a diamond, hand built is the only option for something that will match this product. 

 

I accept there are those who have no interest in this subject which is fine, just ignore these replies. There are those like the poster Tender in #622 who is both a user of the said products and has a requirement for a item which is not available now, and apparently with no immediate plans for its introduction. The retrograde step is to say tough buy a flatbottom rail HO scale product, rather defeats the object of buying in scale bullhead turnouts.

 

The only possible caveat - accepting the HO scale bit alas - is to say with a look of total innocence on one's face that such & such a part of one's layout matches a prototype where some pointwork had been renewed in flat bottom form.  The odd thing about this sort of excuse, apart from the HO scale bit, is that there were on the Western examples of flat bottom pointwork going in during the early 1960s on what by any measure were extremely secondary bits of railway while on main line routes on the same Region new bullhead pointwork was going in.

Edited December 24, 2017 by The Stationmaster

[Captain Kernow]

Sounds very fiddly

It certainly is!

Personally , having made quite a few copperclad points in my time , I much prefer the ply sleeper and plastic chair approach.

Fair enough. I've made a few of both in my time, and my preference is for the former, but with the addition of the high quality plastic moulded chairs that you can get from C&L as well.

[Pacific231G]

But this is RTR 00 not P4 so who cares about the exact dimensions.

As long as it works and is compatible with the other makes that's good enough for me.

Bernard

It was relevant to whether the Kadee above track magnets designed to sit on the sleepers with code 83 FB track would be at the appropriate height to do their work without having to adjust all the coupler pins  which is why I do care.

 

Kadee's products are very accurately made so, while I suspect that even the 8 thou. discrepancy between code 75 and code 83 in FB won't make a lot of difference to their operation, I wondered how they'd be with the new Code 75 bullhead track that I'm thinking of using.

 

Based on Martin's figures the magnets would be about 10 thou.low with Peco BH as opposed to 8 thou too high with code 75 FB which is probably better as magnets that are too proud of the rails tend to foul the pins. Based on G.R.King's measurements the discrepancy is more like 5 thou low so I feel pretty confident that the standard #322 code 83 magnets will work fine with the new bullhead track.

 

I'm only working this in thousandths of an inch because that's what the model rail codes (75,83 &100 etc.) are and Kadee's original spec, (upper surface of magnet 0.015 inch above rail height) is also imperial.    

Edited December 24, 2017 by Pacific231G

[Jeff Smith]

A few thou up or down is irrelevant in terms of operation as long as it is at or below rail top height the trip pins won't foul on it - assuming they are set at the correct height. As mentioned in an earlier post mine were 200thou below rail top and still worked satisfactorily.

[Pacific231G]

A few thou up or down is irrelevant in terms of operation as long as it is at or below rail top height the trip pins won't foul on it - assuming they are set at the correct height. As mentioned in an earlier post mine were 200thou below rail top and still worked satisfactorily.

Slightly OT. My experience is that though the upper surface of Kadee magnets are supposed to be 15 thou above rail height they work fine at rail height and are less likely to foul the pins but if they get too low uncoupling does become less reliable. Using the magnets designed for code 83 track which are actually 100 thou thick with code 75 rail would in theory place them at +25 thou. What I really dont want is to have to cut away sleepers to bed them in and fortunately with the bullhead track that shouldn't be necessary. 

[hayfield]

I now have some bullhead rail, chairs and some plastic timbers so will be making a start on a diamond crossing to go with the Peco bullhead turnouts I have after the Christmas festivities are out of the way. Will post progress on in the 'hand built and templot' section as and when.

 

Should add that it won't be a copy of the Peco FB crossing due to the more prototypical track spacing I'm using and that it and the turnouts are on a transition curve.

 

 

Tender

 

A good suggestion, that will please most. Do start the thread before commencing the build as there are several options in building even with chaired construction

 

As for track spacing, there are some who for years have adapted Peco turnouts and I guess will continue to do so