Curved track on a double-track railway

[Il Grifone]

Unfortunately despite their claim, the track isn't quite the same as the real thing. Respacing the sleepers (a bind, but worth the trouble IMHO) and ballasting does improve things considerably though. (18 sleepers per 44' 6"length - it should be bullhead and rather less than 7½" high though. The rail not having proper chairs and resting on the sleepers does mitigate this however.

[The Johnster]

The OP is new to the game, and at the bottom of a learning curve (sorry).  If he is using setrack, he should be prevented from getting into too much bother so long as he adheres to the setrack geometry and lays his track with care and smoothly at the joints, with no doglegs, but has to put up with the very poor appearance of the tight numbered radii.  I would actually prefer setrack for layouts where very sharp curvature is needed, such as dockside and some industrial setups, and it does save space, but I would not use it for a serious layout with 'main line' running lines.

 

The next development from setrack, following the realisation that such sharp radii have their limitations in terms of realism. and for most of us that means Peco Streamline code 100 or code 75. There is a set geometry to this system as well, enforced by the angles and sizes of the turnouts and crossings.  The point (sorry) to watch with this is that double track curves are not so tight or close together as to allow stock to collide with that on the other track.  The main culprits will be longer vehicles such as mk3s, 70 foot GW coaches, and most modern stock.  These will overhang at the ends and 'underhang' at the middle, more or less according to the positions of the bogie pivots.  Even 3 or 4 foot radius curves are very small in scale terms and would be subject to very severe speed restrictions in real life, but compromises have to be made in the interests of having a reasonable layout in most of the cellar, shed, attic, garage, or spare room locations most of us have.

 

Real track in the UK is laid to mimimum dimensions originally devised by the Father of Railways, George Stephenson, who reckoned that 6 feet minimum space should be allowed between tracks; this space is still called the 'Six Foot' on the real railway though it is usually much larger than that.  The OP's question relates to how to lay track so that the Six Foot is large enough to prevent stock on opposite tracks hitting each other, 

 

Tip, IIRC from Cyril Freezer in a 'Constructor' article back in the 60s, and it has served me well over many years:-

 

1) When the track is laid and lightly pinned down but before final fixing and ballasting, tape felt tip pens (Freezer used pencils but we can do better than that) of different colours and tape them to the corners and centre points of your longest vehicle, so that the tips rest on the baseboard.

 

2) Gently push the vehicle around the whole layout, keeping it upright,

 

3) You will now have 6 lines of different colours traced on the baseboard, 3 on each side of the track, and the two end corner colours should overlay each other.  If any of these lines intersect with the lines made when you pushed the long vehicle along any other track, there is a chance of stock fouling and hitting stock on the other track.  You have a safety margin of half the diameter of the pen body to allow for wobbling and swaying at speed.  You will now see where the Six Foot distance has to be eased for clearance, and the track can be adjusted before final fixing and balllasting.

 

4) As a bonus, you will also be able to determine the 'fouling points' where tracks converge approaching turnouts or crossing, behind which trains must stop so that others can safely pass, again with a safety margin of half a pen width. 

 

You will be able to avoid any potential problems using this method; it's pretty foolproof, and has proven even to be Johnster proof!  The only possibility of coming unstuck is if you introduce longer or wider stock at a later date.

 

Appearance is another issue.  Setrack and Streamline use sleeper spacing correct for European track in H0, and appearance will benefit from spacing the sleepers more correctly for UK prototypes, but before you do this, give some consideration to the linear compression that you will almost inevitably had to use to get your desired track layout into the space available for it.   On very small layouts, it may be beneficial to keep the H0 spacing as an optical illusion is created whereby, because of the close sleeper spacing, the track is made to look longer than it is in reality, especially if the viewpoint is partly or wholly along the track and not a full on side view.  I use Code 100 Streamline with ballast up to sleeper top level, and while I am aware of it's shortcomings am not 100% certain that replacing with Code 75 bullhead would be completely an improvement in a holistic sense, though I'm still intending to do it one day...

[Sir TophamHatt]

On 24/11/2021 at 22:18, APOLLO said:

I use Peco track.

 

When laying curves this Peco track gauge is very useful

 

https://peco-uk.com/products/6ft-way-gauge

You can also 3D print similar gauges:

 

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:173059

 

https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3744224