my first turnout #6 Y from fasttracks template
http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa26/thor14ed/Train%20Stuff/First6Y01.jpg
Congrats! [B]
Gonna try to make a clickable link, but not having much luck myself with that these days…
http://s202.photobucket.com/user/thor14ed/media/Train%20Stuff/First6Y01.jpg.html
And I’ll take the liberty of trying an image…
Well, that sorta worked[:)]
Congratulations. A whole new world and aspect of model railroad is opened up to you. I still remember my first hand built turnout (1984). It was for a siding track in a town called Fort Steele on the Platte Valley Club’s layout. Long gone now. I believe that town was rebuilt 3 times before the final razing last year.
Your next challenge is a crossing.
As I am considering hand laying track on planned layout. would like to see your picture of turnout but the address is chopped off in the posting. Could you post a link, instead of an address? Also, would you recommend the fasttracks fixtures?
LOL
Gotta love the new software.
The link worked, the phot didn’t.
Rich
It’s not the new software, the URL of the image on Photobucket is NOT the image link - you have to copy the DIRECT link on the right side of the image.
If the link does not end in something that is an image, like .jpg, it is NOT the correct one. Heck, Photobucket now even does the copy part and put it int he clipboard for you. Just click the DIRECT box, it will say “COPIED”. Come back here, click the insert image icon, or under the Insert menu, pick Insert Image, and then in the SOURCE box, right-click and hit Paste, or press Control-V. Works every time.
–Randy
Ah thanks for pointing that out i must have been half asleep
Also this seems to work, at least in IE: When viewing the page on Photobucket, right-click ont he picture itself and select Copy. Then come here and Paste, or Control-V. Without using the “Insert Image” option:
-
–Randy
Welcome to the dark side, Oddball.
Now that you’ve broken through the ice, it’s only a matter of time before you;ll find yourself designing puzzle palaces of single and double slip switches, just so you can have the fun of building them!
The Fasttracks fixtures can be very useful if all you want is standard, whole-number frogs. As a long-time fabricator of non-standard specialwork I would find them limiting, rather than helpful. I fabricated my first hand-laid turnout years before Fasttracks opened for business, determining track geometry with bent flex track and a pencil.
For a quick and dirty description of my methods, enter, “Chuck, we need a clinic” in the Search The Community box in the right margin. Once you replace the quotation marks in the box at the top of the search listings, that will lead you to my now five year old (but still valid) description.
The very best thing about rolling your own is that the one essential item of specialwork to finish a project will never be on backorder or out of stock.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - on Atlas flex with hand-laid specialwork)
Based on all the issues with various HOn3 turnouts of varying age from the latest to some of my oldest (bought in the 80’s), I decided to go fastracks and roll my own #6 turnouts and work them into my idea of DCC compatible. I bought their full featured kit with all the jigs and tools. I have only assembled 1 as a test and it came out great! A bit tedious, that first one, but it will ease up as I go, I am sure. I like the fact that there is no plastic anywhere in them.
Luckily, I only need about two dozen for my entire layout as there is no big yard scene anywhere on it.
Richard