Another Saturday, and another few feet of layout progress. I spent a nice lazy day doing odds and ends around the house, and rewarding myself for getting chores and cleaning done with breaks in the layout room to work on the layout.
Before (left) and after of today’s progress on laying track.
Today saw me prepare and install another switch, a siding, some more of my main and the second non active north-south cross track which cross Liberty Street at the north-south streets in the village. This was all pretty straightforward trackwork. Mark and drill the holes for the frog wire and throwbar for the turnout, cut the rails to length and file the ends, install rail joiners, test fit everything, and lift to put down the Alex Clear silicone caulk to glue it down. Once the track is down, I did some sighting to check I was happy with the alignment, pulled some freight cars down to check that they rolled through OK and didn’t look obviously wonky rolling down the newly laid track. Once I was happy with the alignment and the quick rolling check, out came the weights to hold the track down while the glue sets.
Highly scientific technique for holding track in place while the Alex Clear Silicone Caulk cures. A full tub of ballast and a heritage brick!
In one of my earlier breaks, when I had the power drill out to drill the frog wire and throwbar holes for the switch I was planning to install, I also drilled feeder wire drops for the track I installed last week coming out of the closet. With the holes drilled and wire cut and in place, the next step will be to come along and solder all the feeders to the track in advance of the next big work session where the plan will be to connect the feeders to the bus, which means I’ll be able to test equipment under power on all the track.
No, its not something growing out the foam, its feeder wires for power/control. Black at the back to make sure I wire everything the same way using a handy mnemonic.
So with that, the gap in the two ends of the mainline that are installed is down to 40″. Its a complicated 40″ as there are three switches in that space that lead to two crossovers for the three spurs on the peninsula. Getting all this track aligned right will be tricky, and I won’t be progressing on that until I have a day with 2 or 3 friends over to get many hands to keep things in place and aligned as its installed.
Musings on my Model Railroading Addiction 