Now I’m stuck, staring into space. Ella Varner once said, “I'm a big believer in putting things off, In fact, I even put off procrastinating.” Well I must be a true believer as I keep coming up with reasons not to start laying track.
My last layout had track issues, all caused by me rushing in just so I could watch trains running around. I made several errors which I’m sure many of us have, corners that were too tight, points that had little humps at the entry, flex track joined at the same point on both rails in a curve and many more.
I’m determined not to repeat the same…but…I have long sweeping curves at entry and exit to the station and I have to join the flextrack at some point in a curve. As a test on a couple of pieces I’ve spaced the joins about 50mm apart on each rail and soldered the rail joiners. It looks fine when I then bend it into position but here is where the nasty little voice in my head takes over.
To use block detection I must cut one of the rails to create the block and where I want to cut the rail is on the curve. My fear is that the rail will spring outwards so I’m going to glue the track down at the cut points with Weldbond, apparently it glues anything to anything…we will see. Then I’ll ballast the track and hopefully that will keep it all aligned.
The problem is I don’t want to ballast now in case of changes. I want to test thoroughly, with block detection running, so the Dremel is going to have to come out. If the rail springs out I may have to use set track and rethink.
I know! Make some tea, have a nice stare, and do a blog entry. The voice in my head loves that idea.
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