I built the roundhouse about a year ago and then got stuck with the best method of laying the track inside it. I also have constructed a motorized 90’ turntable. When I rough place track in the house it ends up with very short ends outside to properly align with the turntable. Am I missing something here?
First real question is the method of laying track. Looks like using cork roadbed shaved is the best answer but was wondering what others have done.
First off thats a great kit, I have one sitting in the work shop with 6 stalls completed and 14 more sitting in boxes to be added some day. Nope your not missing anything the lead in tracks between the doors and the t/t pit are fairly short.they are approx. 21/2" to 3" long. You didn’t mention who’s turntable your using but with a Walthers a piece of code.83 fits perfectly if you remove the last couple of ties and use C/A to fasten them to the pit. What you can try is what it did at the club put a sheet of 3/16 corks down before you cut the hole for the pit then sit the pit down through the hole after cutting out the hole in the cork. This makes for mush quieter running then mounting the track and round hose directly to plywood.
Hi,
If it’s the new Walthers roundhouse and the turntable, I beleive, you get a plan mockup whith it to lay the track.
When I had layed my turntable and roundhouse (not a new Walthers!) I aligned the bridge to the direction I need following this process…
I cut the adjoining track to lenght following a paper mockup; a few millimeters shorter don’t affect the track look but allow you some adjustements.
If you can, draw the mockup on the roadbed and lay the track to fit the roundhouse stall.
Fille well all the cutting ends of the track and be sure the one coming on the pit is very square, check both rails.
Now take your time, don’t work in a hurry it’s important for the future use of your turntable.
I blocked the bridge and using a steel rule against one bridge rails I carefuly align the adjacent track where it need to go ( an roundhouse stall by example).
I use a small plastic shim to give the very small space between the bridge and the adjoining track. I reuse this same spacer whith all the tracks to be constant.
I lay and spike temporaly my track whith T pins.
Second I checked the level of the adjoining track and the track bridge by again putting the rule on the top of one rail.; both track need to be perfectly on the same level. Trim some ties or file them to get the level.
If you use cork as subroadbed you can sand it carefuly to get the level.
Take an old car truck and roll it from the bridge to the adjacent track and try to not feel through your finger any dump as far as possible.
When everything is checked and rechecked I spike down the track definitively and add the feeder wires if necessary.
Some modelers add gardrails on the brid
Thx for the information. FYI it is the Walther turntable, motorized. I had cut Atlas Code 100 flex track ties roughly longer than necessary and was going to attach them to the bridge with CA. Your idea of using Code 83 complete with ties sounds better especially for accurate spacing. Will the code 83 mesh with the code 100 on the rest of my layout?
I probably should have copied the footprint before I built the roundhouse but at the time location was undecided, opps.
Do you have any photos of a a completed setup. Sometimes a picture helps.
Paul
I’ll take some pics tomorrow as I have to take it down off the shelf and set it up so that will take a little doing. I can email you of my Walthers Round house while under construction if your interested.
Well the Walthers T/T uses code 83 on the bridge so you really don’t have a choice. Depending on how many lead in tracks you have I would make them all code 83 as well
Here are a couple of pics of variuos Heljan Roundhouses just to illustrate how the track will sit in relation to the T/T pit etc.
You will notice on the last pic that the roundhouse sets further back then the others, if you have the room and want to do this the angel of the tracks will need to be less this guy used 7.5 deg. and the roundhouse is set back 7" from the pit. Most guys don’t have enough room to pull something like this off and often was the case with the prototype. If you look at any photographs of old and even modern engine servicing facilities they are very busy places with lots of activity and space is always at a premium
http://forum.atlasrr.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=56561
These last couple are of my Walthers T/T and the Walthers 6 stall roundhouse that is located at one end of the layout and the big Heljan one will be at the other.