Hayfields turnout workbench

[ikcdab]

If you have loads of stainless steel, why don't you build some points with functional chairs?

Ian

[down the sdjr]

Just now, ikcdab said:

If you have loads of stainless steel, why don't you build some points with functional chairs?

Ian

Have not heard of this but I think I know what you mean, as in brass chairs?

[ikcdab]

Just now, down the sdjr said:

Have not heard of this but I think I know what you mean, as in brass chairs?

Normally plastic ones (as per C&l) glued to wooden (thin ply) sleepers

[down the sdjr]

14 minutes ago, ikcdab said:

Normally plastic ones (as per C&l) glued to wooden (thin ply) sleepers

Ah I see. I do this already but hadn't thought about using the steel for outside rails/ check rails etc.

[hayfield]

Paul

 

Make sure you have the correct flux for steel, I use Carrs red for NS, but Green for steel or the 12% stuff from other brands, also ensure the first solder joint the rail must be vertical 

[martin_wynne]

If I had a lot of stainless steel rail to use up I would use it for plain track in the fiddle yard. Not by trying to solder it -- glue it down using a hot glue gun to a flat plywood base.

 

And never buy any more of it.

 

Glued with a hot glue gun, rail can be adjusted and repositioned if necessary by heating it with a soldering iron to soften the glue.  

 

Martin.

[hayfield]

13 hours ago, martin_wynne said:

If I had a lot of stainless steel rail to use up I would use it for plain track in the fiddle yard. Not by trying to solder it -- glue it down using a hot glue gun to a flat plywood base.

 

And never buy any more of it.

 

Glued with a hot glue gun, rail can be adjusted and repositioned if necessary by heating it with a soldering iron to soften the glue.  

 

Martin.

 

I would sell it off on eBay, likely to get a good price for them as other track building items seem to sell well, then buy something more appropriate 

[down the sdjr]

13 hours ago, martin_wynne said:

And never buy any more of it

I had thought that would be the answer.

[down the sdjr]

13 hours ago, hayfield said:

Paul

 

Make sure you have the correct flux for steel, I use Carrs red for NS, but Green for steel or the 12% stuff from other brands, also ensure the first solder joint the rail must be vertical 

When I have soldered steel before I used a plumbing flux called everflux. Its an acid flux for copper pipe, you need to wash it off with water in a spray bottle otherwise it would corrode the rail. I had pretty good results with my old 40w iron but now I have my circuit solutions 75w to have a try. Going to try and make a couple of common crossings using brass strip to hold them together.

I will use N/S for the copper clad turnout with Carrs flux, as you say vertical is key.

[down the sdjr]

The steel rail is not very nice to file and bends very easy when working on it but, managed to solder one together on some brass strip. Did not aim for any accuracy here, just to see if I could do it. Soldered the frog feed on, might give this a go on plastic chairs and sleepers.

 

[martin_wynne]

Hi John,

 

Can I use your topic to ask about 7mm/ft rail from C&L?

 

I notice from the C&L web site that Phil is now saying:

 

"I have taken the specification for the code 125 bullhead rail in house and from source original drawings produced scale 7mm drawing of  95LB bullhead rail and supplied this to our rail manufacture who in turn have created matching engineering drawings for new tooling to produce our own in house bullhead rail exclusively to C & L."

 

The point is -- I have mentioned this time and again with no explanation -- the correct scale size for BS-95R bullhead rail at 7mm/ft is CODE 131, not code 125.

 

Yet code 125 seems to be universally accepted as the scale size for 0 gauge rail. How did this come about?

 

So the question is, what size is this new C&L rail? It is still quoted as code 125 on the C&L ordering page.

 

Slaters used to supply Code 131 bullhead rail, and mention that size in their old trackbuilding manual. Unfortunately they now deny all knowledge of it -- even though I remember using it and have a bit left somewhere (I wish I could find it). Their 0 gauge rail is now code 125 the same as everyone else. It's all a bit of a mystery.

 

I could of course ask Phil, but he is known to be a bit hazy about numbers and dimensions, as his statement above shows. Perhaps someone who has recently purchased C&L 0 gauge rail could measure it accurately, and report back? And also the width (should be 1.6mm). Are current deliveries from the new tooling, or using up old stock?

 

thanks,

 

Martin.

Edited December 10, 2020 by martin_wynne

[hayfield]

No idea about why code 125 was chosen, ask the question in the 7 mm section 

 

C&L has always owned their own dies for drawing the rail through, I know Peter had to repair them from time to time as they wear down through use

 

During the development of the new C&L product range it was found that not only were the dies were very worn, but the profiles could be better, new dies have been made for both code 75 and 125, (other rail makes may now not work as well with C&L products now). Also it seems their code 82 is the only rail that works in a competitors alternative range of flatbottom track. Plus I am finding the EMGS code 83 is a very tight fit into Peco's Pandrol clips, which were designed for Peco's code 82 rail (now discontinued) 

 

 Someone said rail is just rail !!!

 

As an aside I wonder what make of rail Finetrax new offerings are designed to use ?  and does it matter ?

[martin_wynne]

22 minutes ago, hayfield said:

As an aside I wonder what make of rail Finetrax new offerings are designed to use ?  and does it matter ?

 

Thanks John.

 

Wayne has said that he is using SMP Scaleway rail for the Finetrax 00 kits, and has had good support from Marc Weaver at Marcway.

 

Unfortunately as we know, the SMP rail is well under scale width, and always has been (40+ years). Fortunately in building the Finetrax kits no gauges are needed to fit it. For the EM kits he has said he will look at a more correct rail section, such as C&L/EMGS.

 

cheers,

 

Martin.

[hayfield]

3 hours ago, martin_wynne said:

 

Thanks John.

 

Wayne has said that he is using SMP Scaleway rail for the Finetrax 00 kits, and has had good support from Marc Weaver at Marcway.

 

Unfortunately as we know, the SMP rail is well under scale width, and always has been (40+ years). Fortunately in building the Finetrax kits no gauges are needed to fit it. For the EM kits he has said he will look at a more correct rail section, such as C&L/EMGS.

 

cheers,

 

Martin.

 

 

 He should be careful he uses the new rail specification and not older rail.

 

It was quite amusing being at a societies own show and their rail not fitting a commercial track base they were selling

[hayfield]

On 10/12/2020 at 10:21, martin_wynne said:

Hi John,

 

Can I use your topic to ask about 7mm/ft rail from C&L?

 

I notice from the C&L web site that Phil is now saying:

 

"I have taken the specification for the code 125 bullhead rail in house and from source original drawings produced scale 7mm drawing of  95LB bullhead rail and supplied this to our rail manufacture who in turn have created matching engineering drawings for new tooling to produce our own in house bullhead rail exclusively to C & L."

 

The point is -- I have mentioned this time and again with no explanation -- the correct scale size for BS-95R bullhead rail at 7mm/ft is CODE 131, not code 125.

 

Yet code 125 seems to be universally accepted as the scale size for 0 gauge rail. How did this come about?

 

So the question is, what size is this new C&L rail? It is still quoted as code 125 on the C&L ordering page.

 

Slaters used to supply Code 131 bullhead rail, and mention that size in their old trackbuilding manual. Unfortunately they now deny all knowledge of it -- even though I remember using it and have a bit left somewhere (I wish I could find it). Their 0 gauge rail is now code 125 the same as everyone else. It's all a bit of a mystery.

 

I could of course ask Phil, but he is known to be a bit hazy about numbers and dimensions, as his statement above shows. Perhaps someone who has recently purchased C&L 0 gauge rail could measure it accurately, and report back? And also the width (should be 1.6mm). Are current deliveries from the new tooling, or using up old stock?

 

thanks,

 

Martin.

 

Martin

 

I have finally spoken with Phil over this issue, firstly what I was told previously was either wrong or I misunderstood, up till now the tools were owned by the engineering company, but C&L had to bear some / all the repair costs. That was up till now, the new 7 mm tool is owned by C&L and they have exclusive use of it.

 

As for the code, the rail is a 7mm scale model (within normal manufacturing tolerances) of 95lb bullhead rail, so is code 131. It fits both the new and earlier versions of the 7mm products (Phil says its a better fit than the older rail) so is code 131. He has kept the code information the same so as not to confuse existing users

 

The new 7mm flexi track is now available along with the new 3 bolt 7mm chairs, 2 bolt GWR chair sprues will be available soon

 

Look out for some new exciting products for 2021, cannot say too much as it all depends on both finance and design work which will dictate progress

 

I hope this clarifies the situation.

[Donw]

That is good news. The bad news is I have a lot of the old rail in stock still as a pre-group modeller (choice of subject is pre-group not me) there would have been some lighter rail around I think.

 

Don

[Dominion]

I have a question about modelling the A timber supporting the nose of the common crossings. On each Exactoscale timber sprue there is one timber wider than the others, and I believe that is for the A timber location.

 

I have used most of mine up but the sprues each provide enough timber’s for  2 to 3 turnouts, and I have several more to build. 
 

What do others do once you have run out of the extra wide timber’s ? Should I just use a regular timber as not so noticeable when ballasted ? 
Tom

[martin_wynne]

13 minutes ago, Dominion said:

I have used most of mine up but the sprues each provide enough timber’s for  2 to 3 turnouts, and I have several more to build.

 

Hi Tom,

 

Everything depends on your prototype.

 

14" timbers were used by the GWR and some pre-group companies both for the A timber under the crossing nose and the first slide chair timber at the switch, and some other locations within some turnouts. There is a whole page of explanation of where 14" timbers were used by the GWR and for which dates, on page 81 of David Smith's GWR track book. However, the general rule is that the use of 14" timbers for renewals had ceased on the GWR and BR(W) by the mid-1950s. Of course that still left a lot of existing 14" timbers in use for many years into the later 1950s and 60s.

 

Other post-grouping companies used the common REA designs, where all timbers are 12" except in special circumstances where a wider timber is needed to fit the chairs, for example the centre timber at a switch-diamond.

 

Generally speaking if you are modelling non-GWR post-grouping you should stick to all 12" timbers, unless you have specific prototype information to the contrary, or you are modelling track which has not been renewed for many years in yards and sidings for example, or lightly-used branch lines.

 

For pre-grouping companies, you need the specific prototype data for each one to know which ones used 14" timbers and where.

 

cheers,

 

Martin.

[Dominion]

Thank you Martin, that is very helpful. 
I am modelling the LNER, ex GNR, so it sounds as though I should not have used the ones I already used. Never mind. Thank you for the info.

[hayfield]

Seasons greetings to all and please stay safe

 

 

Should have started this at the beginning of the month, not much left to do now and seems we will have plenty of spare time. Initially it was getting our bedroom finished, then was just not in the building mood. Still an enjoyable few hours putting this together and used up my stock of EMGS code 83 rail

[hayfield]

 

Something I have been working on which made a nice change, as I had to think a bit about what chairs went where. Rather than using a standard REA its a GWR 12' switch with a 7.7 crossing. its still a best effort as some of the non standard chairs are just not available built to EM gauge. Its a bit multi company 

The grey timbers are Exactoscale

The dark brown chairs are the new C&L GWR 2 bolt standard and L1 chairs (J chairs not used as this is a GWR rather than BR western region)

Light brown chairs are Exactoscale

Rust coloured slide chairs are Modelu

Fishplates are a mixture of New C&L and EMGS etched as both stock and switch rails are notched at the rail joins

 

As I said not an exact scale replica but the best with the parts available, a bit multi coloured before painting

 

The copperclad timber is the tiebar, it has 2 bolt brass chair halves soldered to the stock rails, a modified 4 bold slide chair slide plates soldered to the copperclad timber and the switch blades are soldered to them. Dumy plastic tierods can be attached later if required. The other experiment was the check rails, 2 outer 2 bolt chair halves with Exactoscale P4 center parts of the check rails, a bit wasteful, but either using 4 bolt check chairs or chopping up two 2 bolt chairs would just not look the same

 

Still quite pleased with the end result

[hayfield]

 

A couple of items I have been working on, an 00 gauge trailing crossing using the new C&L 3 bolt chairs

 

 

Left s shot showing the bridge chairs and the Exactoscale block chairs.  Right the J chairs extreme right, the copperclad timber is the tiebar

 

Two shots showing how the timber tiebar works. The cast brass slide chairs are cut in two. The outer parts of the chairs are soldered to the stock rails, the slide plates are soldered to the PCB timber and switch blades are soldered to the plates. As the tiebar moves so does the switch blades, but the outer parts of the slide chair remain against the rails. 

 

 

Next up an old fashioned copperclad diamond crossing 

[hayfield]

The diamond is progressing well, starting to make the K (obtuse) crossings, tacked in place for testing. All was OK, just need to solder it up and make and fit the check rails

[hayfield]

 

Diamond finished

[St Enodoc]

John (and other readers), I need to build a 1 in 5 double slip in 00 for a particular location on my layout. I'm thinking of using the SMP "template" as a starting point. To a first approximation, the slip roads are about 30" radius. I'm looking at flexible switches rather than jointed.

 

Have you or anyone else built such a beast and, if so, have you any comments or suggestions (apart from "don't")?

 

Thanks.

Edited February 10, 2021 by St Enodoc
To specify gauge