Hello all
I’m in the process of designing a layout for our new home. I want to hand lay all the turnouts and was wondering what the estimated cost per turnout would be.
Back when I was doing it regularly I estimated $1.25. But now with inflation assuming you already have all the tools - I would guess about $1.75 to two bucks. The expensive parts are the brass plate and screws to connect the throw bar to the points.
A lot would depend on whether you’re planning on making your own points and frogs or buy prefabricated ones. Making your own is cheaper, but much more labor intensive and requires skill and knowledge. If you’re making your own, then the price is just the cost of the raw rail. Some companies even offer prefabricated turnout kits. Just add the cost of the ties to that. The price of the ties and spikes will be the same no matter how you plan to go with the rails. And if you’re planning on doing a lot of hand laying, look into getting a Kadee Spiker on Ebay or somewhere else (Kadee doesn’t make them anymore, but may be considering doing them again).
I’ve been hand-laying all of my specialwork, and estimate the cost for a standard turnout as about the same as for one 36" length of equivalent-height flex track. By this, I mean the bargain lengths bought damaged for 40% of the price of new, not fresh out of the box.
I pivot my points by soldering their fixed ends to 1/2 inch wire nails that are a snug (but not tight) fit in the roadbed, and secure them to cut-from-PC-board throwbars with bent pins (Head under throwbar, pin bent to lay along base of point and soldered. Some which I built in 1980 and have used almost continuously since have never given me any problems.
The best part about building your own specialwork is that you get out of the box of pre-determined component footprints and angles determined by the available commercial products. If you find that you need a #5.54 double slip switch, satisfaction is just a few hours of filing, spiking and soldering away.
Chuck
Mstcls,
[#welcome] to the forum! Good to have you aboard! [:)]
If you are thinking that you want to use jigs and fixtures to fabricate your turnouts, check out Fast Tracks:
The upfront cost is the steepest part. BUT…after a few turnouts, it’s already paid for itself. That’s how I’d like to go eventually.
I’ve actually held a completed turnout (without the ties) in my hands. It’s beautiful craftsmanship and well constructed. When cars roll through one of these, if you closed your eyes and just listened, you wouldn’t even be able to tell that there was a turnout there.
Tom
Mstcls:
I’m just getting back in the hobby myself after a 35 year hiatus. I made all my own switches by hand using silver rail and sugar pine ties which I cut myself.
The question you have to ask yourself is are you a “builder” or a “runner”. If you’re a runner then building your own switches and track may seem tedious. If you’re a builder then it’ll just be fun. Oh, and by the way, you don’t need a $130 instruction kit either. Make yourself a switch template and buy a cheap track guage and go for it. The first one or two switches may be less than satisfactory but very soon you’ll be making switches for next to nothing.
As for track itself, before you start spending $ on factory made track, go down to any stretch of track and walk it. You’ll not see perfectly laid track with all ties at 90° to the rail. Most are, but some are rather higgilly-piggily. If you want realistic looking track start laying it yourself and “slip” every once and awhile. It’ll look real then.
You’ll soon be getting, “Gee, that track looks great, where did you get it.”
You then be able, in the most boastful voice, to say, “I laid it myself.”
To which the reply is usually, “Wow!”
To concur with a post above about the Fast Tracks fixtures: they work very well - rather buy a crossover kit - this way you get the cross-over (spectacular piece of work) as well as left and right turn-outs. Building frogs with their Point Form tool is a joy - it takes about 5 minutes to have a perfect frog - I am down to about an hour per turnout - filing notches in the stock rails take the longest. The turnouts are much better than any commercial ones (including Micro-Engineering) - if you are fussy about details, get the T/O detailing kits from Central Valley.
The turnouts are also super DCC friendly - live frogs (if you do not power them, it does not matter as the frog is kept super short), stock rails and closure rails match in polarity.
The closure rails are also “live” - you can actually paint the whole thing without worrying about getting paint between the stock and closure rails!
The best thing about the handlaid T/O’s are that you can actually fix them if something does go wrong - try that on Peco or Atlas T/O’s.
I would like to thank everyone for all the wonderful information. I have decied to hand laid the track and can now finalize the track plan or I should say the LDE’s. Once again thank you for all your help