Making the Elevated Track Sections

Our latest work session, which was a long day of working, was to lay out the track locations on the plywood base and then cut the plywood in the "hill" section of the layout so we can elevate the track.

Here we are, ready for a work session in Jeff's shop; that's Norm on the left, Jeff on the right

We began by positioning the full scale pages on the plywood base until we got them into final position.

OK, so we had a little help getting the patterns into position on the plywood base

 The next task was to transfer the pattern to the plywood underneath.  To do this, we used a dressmaker's pattern tool called a pounce.  A pounce is a wheeled device with sharp spokes that poke through the pattern to the material underneath, in this case the plywood.

A dressmaker's pounce, also sometimes used to simulate rivets and nail holes in scale models

The recommended practice was to trace the pounce marks with a Sharpie, which was supposed to bleed through the holes left by the pounce and leave a trail on the plywood.  This, we found, was only partially successful, and we ended up re-tracing the pounce marks with marking pens so we would have lines we could follow when cutting out the plywood.

Here Norm is tracing the pounce wheel marks with a Sharpie; while some of the ink flowed through the holes, it did not leave the expected clear line for the saw to follow

We retraced the pounce marks, often better visible by the dents left in the plywood, so we would have clear lines to follow when we cut out the patterns with the jig saw

Next, we propped the plywood on 2X4s so we could cut out the patterns with a jig saw.

Jeff is cutting along the cut lines that mark the edge of the roadbed sections; in all cases we also marked the planned centerline for the track itself so that remains visible on the roadbed

Once we had the plywood cut, we clamped it into position at varying heights to plan the elevations we want to have for the final layout.  This is a critical phase, since it affects the rate of elevation and the difficulty trains will have climbing the ascents.  So, we only temporarily clamped the plywood into place to give ourselves plenty of time to think about things before we finalize them.

The layout with the plywood cut to shape for the roadbed and clamped into rough position to simulate elevations.  The plywood bent smoothly without kinks and it looks like this method will be successful in making a smooth-operating layout

The Grandkids do some work and run some trains!

Just a quick update.....the grandkids, Anthony and Aiden were visiting today and got to help out on the benchwork.  Aiden (age 7) drilled the pilot holes while Anthony (age 10) put the screws in.  They really enjoyed getting on top of the bench and helping out!

My wife Ellen had a surprise for them.  She bought each of them an engineer's cap and red neckerchief!!  They even had their names on them..."Aiden" and "Tito" (Anthony in Spanish)  Of course, they had to wear the neckerchiefs around their faces like bandits!

After doing some work I put out a few straight pieces of track and let them have some fun running a couple of trains!!

Here are a few pictures that captured the fun we had today!!

Getting ready to work

Aiden would drill the pilot holes and Anthony would put the screw in

Aiden looking cute!

You can probably tell who is the clown in the family!!

Anthony went to town and had a good time

He loves to work in the shop

We even got underneath and drilled a few holes for future wires

running some trains

Aiden's turn

They are ready to run trains!!

Using Templates to Plan the Track Locations

The AnyRail program we used to plan the location for the Atlas FlexTrack we'll be using lets you print out full size patterns for the track and turnouts from the plan you've developed.  Jeff, who designed the layout using AnyRail, printed out 97 pages of full size layout patterns!  Our next task, which we undertook yesterday, was to piece together all those sheets and tape them so they would remain in place.  It was a job that took several hours to accomplish.  But, we can now see in realistic size just where the track will be placed and whether we want to make any adjustments to track location before we start laying roadbed and track.

Jeff is piecing together the pages for the yard

The yard completed, it's on to the loops serving the "town" area of the layout

A portion of the "town" area, showing the passing track that will allow mainline trains to bypass local freight trains

A view of the whole layout, with the yard in the foreground

What will be a mountainous area, with logging camp, elevated outer loop and a tunnel (indicated by the solid blocks); the log pond and sawmill are at the right rear

The completed "town" area, with the mountainous area in the background

For now, the patterns are laid out in their approximate final locations.  We still need to screw down the plywood so it's fully secure--we only tacked it in a few places so it wouldn't more around while we were testing the track locations.  Once that's finished, we'll position the patterns in their final locations.  Then we'll use a pounce--like seamstresses use to make patterns on cloth--to trace the centerline of the track.  And we'll use an awl to mark the location of the turnout throws so we can drill the holes for the Tortoise machines with accuracy.  That will then let us lay down the cork roadbed and prepare to lay track.

Sure, we could have done all this by the seat of our pants, drawing the lines for the track directly on the plywood base.  But by using AnyRail, we took our planning through several iterations until we had all the features we wanted and fit everything into the space we've got.  The printouts are merely the culmination of that process and they are carrying us a very long way toward our ultimate goal--getting track down so we can run some trains!

AnyRail...a software tool to build a layout

At the end of my last entry I said I would discuss the modeling tool that I used to design our layout. I had an initial pencil sketch that was derived from looking at other layouts and then combined with the physical constraints of the space I had available in my workshop. However, I needed a way to formalize the drawing into something that could be implemented.

After looking at the various software programs available online I decided on a program called AnyRail. There were numerous tutorials on Youtube to help get started, it appeared to have a large library of track components from a variety of companies and it was free...well almost. There is a free version which lets you use up to 50 track pieces in a design. Surprisingly, this worked out quite well until we decided to add the switching yard which put me over the 50 piece limit. I could have split the layout into sections and kept them in different files but in the end I decided to purchase the program. You can do some interesting things with the program, like set track heights and compute slope percentages and it just seemed easier to do if I had the complete layout in one file. So....I paid the $60 for a license. It seemed a little steep but I think it was worth the cost.

Here is a screen capture of the AnyRail website.

AnyRail website

As you can see, you can produce a really nice layout that includes the track and structures/objects from libraries of manufacturers products. Now that we have our layout pretty well planned I'm going to start exploring some of the features to help plan our scenery. You can also look at layouts in 3D...here is another screen dump from their website.

3D view of a sample Layout from AnyRail

Here is the 'final' design of our layout.

Current design of our layout

There is a logging camp area, sawmill area, town area and switching yard area. We also have a small farming area if space permits. The left leg is about 8 feet long and the top leg is about 14 feet long.

AnyRail is very easy to use. As you can see in the image, you can define your layout bench shape and use that as a background. You can setup various settings to define things like layout size, grid spacing, alerts for minimum radius curves, snap to grid and snap to track endpoints, auto-connect, etc. You can see this in this image.

Setting Options along the top Ribbon

Then you can select track part libraries from various manufactures to use to build your layout. It is basically drag and drop. Once you've selected an object, like a piece of flex track, you can change it's shape using various menu selections. In the case of a flex track you can define it's length if straight, or curve length and radius if it is a curve or easement. You can move it, rotate it and move it next to another piece of track and have them connect together.

Menu Options for Piece of Atlas #500 Flex Track

One of the best features, and the most frustrating, is the alert when you create a curve that is less than the minimum curve radius you set in the settings. When creating a curve and trying to have it meet up with another piece of track coming from another direction you want them to meet up and connect together. It can become very frustrating to have them very close but when they auto-connect one piece has to change shape a little so that it connects squarely into the other track piece. In the image the track marked with a red line shows that the minimum radius of that part of the track has fallen below 18” which is my minimum radius setting. What's a little 6” radius curve among friends.

Red Highlight for Tight Curve

The feature we are playing with now is the capability to set a track section height and then the slope 

of adjoining track to go up to and back down from that height. For example, you can set a piece of track to be a bridge at four inches high and then compute a 3 percent slope in each direction. This will help us determine the heights we can achieve for the track heights in the logging area around the mountains we have planned. Here is an example.

Heights and Slopes

The final feature I'll mention is that you can create various sections within your layout. Our layout has four major sections....the outer track, the switching yard, the reverse loop in the logging area and the reverse loop in the town area. This will help in our DCC wiring planning.

Track Sections Highlighted in Different Colors

Now that our benchwork is pretty complete we need to transfer our track plan to the benchtop. We are going to use the cookie cutter approach to track layout. AnyRail can print a full size printout. When I did the print dialog box said 208 pages!! Luckily it went down to 97 when I clicked on the suppress blank page option!

One page of 97 to Print

Next step....tape all those pages together!

More Progress on the NF & CR Railway

Yesterday, Jeff and I put in another session on building the benchwork that will support the North Fork & Crooked Run Railway, our new HO railroad line.  We had previously built the supporting benchwork from 1X4s, with 2X2s for legs.  Yesterday's session was spent first of all stabilizing the structure by attaching 1X2 furring strips between each parallel pair of legs to add rigidity to the overall structure and reduce the chances of vibration.

Jeff is using drywall screws to attach 1X2s as cross members to stabilize the legs

Here you can see some of the cross members in place along the rear of the layout, as Jeff attaches more

The cross members are now pretty much in place; they made the whole structure much more rigid and stable

After adding the cross bracing to the underside of the benchwork, we added uprights at the top to support the eventual backdrop.  Our plan is to use panorama photographs printed to a height of about 20 inches.  These will be supported by Masonite attached to the uprights.  The uprights were cut to 20 inches each.  When screwed to the 1X4s, they extended a little over 17 inches above the height of the layout bed, more than enough to support the Masonite and photographs.

Here you can see the benchwork with upright backdrop supports in place around the outer edges of the layout

Our plan is to use 1/2 inch plywood as a base for the track.  We purchased some good quality plywood at Lowe's.  Two 4X8 inch sheets was all we needed for the entire layout, though we had to piece together a few small areas using offcuts.  We cut the plywood to fit the shape of the layout and rested it in place.  We'll screw it to the supporting benchwork in the next work session and add stabilizing supports underneath all places where we joined plywood sections to assure trouble-free joints.

Here's a view of the main sections of the layout with plywood in position

This view, taken from the end of the eventual yard, shows most of the layout with plywood in position

At the moment, the whole layout has been pulled away from the wall.  This lets us get behind it, which we'll need to do to add layout lines for the track--a job for the next work session--and lay the cork roadbed and track.  After we've got the rear portions in place, we'll slide the layout against the wall and then screw it to the wall for added stability.  But that's for the future.

Anticipating the long reach needed to get to the back of the layout from the front and aisle, we ordered a mechanic's topside creeper from Amazon, the kind used to lean out to work on engine compartments.  It arrived yesterday.  We'll be needing it!

Norm

Benchwork Completed!

Yesterday, Jeff and I scheduled a long work session to complete installation of the benchwork for the North Fork & Crooked Run Railway, our HO version of a rural railroad fantasy.  It was a hard day, but we'd learned a lot from the first day's work and we were a lot more efficient in cutting and assembling the 1X4s.  As before, we cut them to precise lengths using a miter saw, then glued them and attached them with drywall screws, two screws to a joint.  The photos show our progress during the day.

 The first section we tackled will be a hilly area that will include elevated track, a tunnel and a logging camp area serviced by a Shay.  As the photo shows, when we bolted the new section to the existing sections (using lag bolts), some adjustments were needed.  We clamped each new section in place to hold it securely while we drilled holes for the bolts and then tightened them in position.

The first section we completed will be the hilly area with elevated track, tunnel and logging camp

 A surprising outcome was that each new section we bolted into place was dead level without any need to make adjustments to the legs.  We could hardly have anticipated that development!  The floor must be quite level.

We were surprised to find each new section to be dead level after we installed it, which will make laying trackwork easier!

The legs were equipped with leveling glides.  These are installed by drilling a hole in the bottom of the leg, then tapping in a plastic sleeve that's threaded to accept the metal glide.  This will allow us to make subtle adjustments to the leveling of the benchwork, should they be needed.

We attached leveling glides to the bottom of each 2X2 leg to make adjustments to their height possible later if needed

 Following installation of the hill area, we turned to the yard area, which will have several stub end tracks and a runaround to enable incoming trains to deposit their cars.

The yard won't be large, but it will have several tracks to accommodate waiting engines and cars to be made up into trains

The main loop, with a town and passing track, will be level in the final model.  We assembled it next from two sections that were bolted to the section against the wall.

Here's the layout with the first of the "town" sections added; one final section to go!

By the time we got to the final section, I was dragging, but we really wanted to get this phase of the construction wrapped up so--water bottles in hand--we pressed on.  It was a great feeling to finally see the whole benchwork in place!

This is a view of the completed benchwork.  The aisle that provides access to the two main segments is just visible in front of the level.  A portion of the yard area is at right.

So what's next?   We'll have the gandy dancers out on the right of way soon, installing roadbed and preparing to lay track and attach wiring for the NCE DCC system.  When we do, we'll share our progress with you here.

Norm