Ed, the funny thing is, those articulated locos with the “diesel like” swivel, don’t look like both engines are swiveling by the time you get up to 40" or 48" radius…
Because they swivel at the middle of each wheelbase, the lead truck and platform swing out way more than any movement in the rear, so on large curves they look pretty natural and apparent movement of the rear engine is not noticeable - unless you are really searching for it.
Yeah, I agree they generally look less-worse on wider curves. But the other irritating thing is that they have also removed the steam supply pipes for the rear engine.
Agreed, some are better than others in that regard. I must admit I have a small fleet of them, never could justify the cost of brass in my own mind - or I simply decided it was more fun to have more locos, so $1200 buys four rather than one…
Actually if I dollar cost average my fleet of eleven plastic/diecast articulated locos, my average price is only $190 (picked up several at some super bargain prices), and they all run good and look good, for that I will accept a few compromises. Of course I have had some of them for more than a decade, and they are all DC without sound.
And thinking about the fact that I have eleven of them, I’m thinking eleven is enough…well, maybe one more, so the lone EM-1 can have mate…
Superelevation, is an engineering term, used by railroad, and highway civil engineering people. The PRR CE 78 is also the only PRR document that referrs to a switch as a turnout. All the operating manuals (CT400 Book of Rules, for instance), refer to switches at switches. [As you can see, I’m an operating guy, not an engineering guy [:)]]
Back to the topic, superelevation, is a two edged sword, both on the prototype and the model railroad. The higher the passenger train speed is , the higher the superelevation. On slow speed rail, that is 30MPH or less, there is little or no superelevation.
Model railroad application is actually similar. My current layout is an urban industrial railroad representing two parallel branches both maxing out at 15MPH. While my main line curves are 30" and 32" radius, there is no reason to superelevate these curves for switchers and road switchers, and '60s era freight cars running at 10 scale MPH. However, if you are modeling main line operation, then superelevation is a useful tool.
I use the same method of superelevation, except I use 0.040" thick strips of styrene. I place approx. 1" strips, spaced approx. 7-8" apart along the outside edge of the ties on my flex track. leaving about 10-12" of a 0" superelevation at the end of the curve for the easement transition. I’ve found that if you don’t have this transition far enough from the end of the curve it will cause derailments on some, but not all pieces of equipment. That said, I don’t glue these shims down so that I can adjust the placement of them after test running. Mine is a branch line, so superelevation of the curves is minimal. Needless to say, I don’t use any type of adhesive to fasten my track to the roadbed, only track nails.
I would just like to say thanks to both Howard and Tom as I have recently relaid the outer curves on my 4x8 with set track of compounding radii to replace the Peco flex that finally started to show its age.
Following your examples, I cut some strips of .030" and there is a marked difference in the appearance of the trains going around the curves before I paint the track sides and ballast the area! Some extensive testing is being done when I can venture down the shed as it is pretty hot here at the moment!
I’ve done the exact same thing on my layout, except I do N scale and use .020" styrene strips. I use a mix of .015" and .010" styrene strips, and thin strips of masking tape to do my transitions.
