Last night I was drilling holes for feeder lines. I spent a lot of time first get the track lined up perfectly straight and getting the turns smooth.
Twice, not once, but twice, when the drill went through, the force of pushing the drill when it broke through the plywood caused me to drive forward and crush the track.
I had a couple of 4" sections left over from laying the track and I was able to patch the section, but the perfect smoothness is gone. It’s not horrible, but the cars all jerk a little at that place.
I know I will not be happy until I replace the track, but no one around me sells Atlas code 83 and if I want a section I have to order 10–at $4.84 a piece. And I have a moral objection to that.
It may be months before I get to a place that will sell a stick or two.
I have few qualms, compunction, or moral objection to replacing track sections that I feel are less than 100%. God knows I’ve done my share of rip up and replace. This hobby is about compromises, but there is no rule saying that one should compromise on having trains run on track laid the way you know it should be laid.
Don’t press so hard on the drill. Spring for a better bit, or get the right one.
Why not put a piece of tape around the bit just above the thickness of your plywood so when you drill down and the tape starts touching the top of the track you’ll know you’re about to break through ?
Sorry, I should have been more specific. If I could drive to a store or order online 2 sticks of track to replace the damage I would. But it seems I have to buy 30 feet of track to repair 4" of damage total.
The moral objection was spending over $50 to fix the problem.
I solved the problem a different way, but I had to do it twice to figure I had a problem I put a 5 pound dumbbell weight over the section and drilled through the hole in the center.
Okay, I understand, Chip. Very disappointing, but it is only a PITA kind of thing for now. You may do even a better job of that curve, if such a thing is possible, when you repair the section.
Put it this way; when I have repaired faulty sections, I always manage to achieve my aims, and I know you won’t do less. I would enjoy seeing an image of this section when you feel up to it.
the tape on the drill bit will tell you when you’re about there but the punch through can still happen. consider looking around for some 2 inch or so scraps of wood various thickness, stack them up to the proper height for a drill stop and drill a master hole on through and use that each time you drill up into the roadbed. also if you’ve got what looks like an upward kink, you might be able to spike down the track so it “looks” properly grounded. then if you have enough room you can use a long flat file to actually grind “file” the tops of the rails smooth as before, then polish until you’re satisfied. might work. I’ve done both. also I’ve punched through and done damage too! know how ya feel.
Try doing it the manly way. Just give your layourt a reach around and put your thumb where you’ll think it will come through. That’ll stop you quick enough! Har!
You know how when you sleep on things they don’t seem so bad the next day. I took the weights off the track this afternoon and ran my test G&D Cattle Drover’s Caboose over the joints and it didn’t blink or shimmy. I have a little excess glue to clean up, but without ripping up major sections of track, I erred on the side of excess last night.
They actually look worse in the photos than they are.
I am also putting in feeder wires at this time also, one about every four feet.I drill closer to my track than you seem to be, plus I drill at a slight angle.However I am using two inch foam, I just drill slow and easy, then use a piece of brass tube, sanded sharp on one end to do any fine work to enlarge the hole a bit, then run my wires down under the table, where they will attach to the main bus wires.
I don’t know how sharp your drill bit is though, but perhaps if it isn’t very ssharp, you have to put extra pressure on your drill, and so when your drill bbit breaks through the plywood, it tends to grab.You might use a small scrap piece of wood slighly larger than your work area, and lay it down over the track to protect it, and drill through it, somewhat like your using a dumbell weight now.
I’d consider using a longer drill bit also.
Sharp drill bits will help resolve that problem also.I do a lot of other woodworking, and so I bought a “Drill Doctor” sharpener, a very good investment!
I helped a buddy of mine work on his benchwork, and we did a LOT of DRILLING, and the Drill Doctor came in REAL HANDY, as bits will dull quickly depending on what types of wood, and how many holes your drilling.
It probably is the bit. I’m using a 1/4" paddle bit through 2" foam and 1/2" ply. I sharpened the bit on the grinder, but didn’t use the bit sharpening tool. The weight is doing the trick. I have a 3/8 " auger bit I should have used I guess. I’m not to worried about the size or location of the hole since I’m going to be covering it and I’ll be running all sorts of cabling for the the Hump Yard Switches.
Chip thanks for taking the time to image this and upload them to your host site for me.
Now, I have to confess…I laughed out loud when I looked at the first image. All I could see, my eyes wanting to linger indecently long, was the botched section you removed. Wow! [(-D]
Is your glue so hard that you can’t do a little adjustment to the repaired addtion? My eyes tell me that you need to anchor the two outer ends of that added section with nails, and then try, over a few long seconds, to force the middle of that addition outward by perhaps 3-5 mm to match the curve and tidy that up so you feel really good about the repair. I may be overstepping myself when I say this to you…if so, please accept my apologies for the intrusion and presumption…but I would do my damnedest to restore that curve to 98% of what it was. I have embedded track nails all over my layout (no exaggeration) that are hidden and crucial to maintaining curvatures or alignments so that my rolling stock show no signs of distress. So, I would shove a nail tight against the inside rail when I had forced a bit less of radius on it than it seems to have from the photo.
Believe it or not the outside rail is about 3/16 larger than the inside track, but it still looks like it is trying to straighten out. I tried forcing it our with pins, but forcing the track out like you said took more force than they could handle. I thing to “do it right” I need to replace a much larger section. I want to stress that if you watch a car take the patch you cannot see a flinch. The truck might be doing a dance we can’t see though.
Here they are from a better view. If it is 3mm they need that is the most. Boy they sure look ugly from the top. I’ll spend some time cleaning them up after I get the wiring done.
Maybe you should look at what’s causing the problem, to avoid it again in the future. For example, if you use less force on the drill, it won’t slam so hard into the track when the bit breaks through. If the bit doesn’t cut easily through the wood with only light to moderate force (thus allowing time to stop the drill before the chuck hits the track), then the bit is probably dull, and should be replaced or resharpened.
I don’t have a good sense of how far you have to drill, Chip, but I never use more than a 1/8", often a 3/32", bit that is about 2.5-3" long for my feeder holes. It is the odd time a bit of a fiddle to get the one end of the wire up/down through the hole, but that is a small price to pay for the effect on the track and scenery.
What are those manholes for? Feeder wires? My #22 solid wire feeders come up (or go down) through 1/16" holes drilled between the ties just outside the rails. Even drilling through steel (stud, not armor plate,) I need very little more than the weight of the drill to push the bit.
