To all you folks out there who celebrate the holiday (and to those who don’t, as well) —
Happy Thanksgiving!!
My plans for the long weekend, beginning the day after Thanksgiving: A friend is coming over and we’re going to construct the helix on my layout - at least the “benchwork” for it.
The concept is to attach a framework made of 3/4" plywood to the ceiling above, and suspend the actual helix below on threaded rods. This will provide easy adjustment of grades by simply turning turning nuts on the rods to raise or lower the 1/2" plywood subroadbed. Cork will be glued to the plywood, and track attached to that.
When I started putting together the structural materials list, this is what I came up with:
3/4" Plywood sheets: 2
1/2" Plywood sheets: 10
5/16" X 4’ Long Threaded Rod: 36
5/16" Fender Washers: 288
5/16" Standard Washers: 252
5/16" Nuts: 1,008 (!)
Plus miscellaneous screws and scrap wood to attach the suspension frame to the joists above.
I’ll need so much hardware, particulary nuts, because I’ll be using jamb nuts at each support (above and below) rather than lock washers (Lock washers tend to shave tiny bits of metal off a nut whenever the connection is loosened, and I want to avoid any sort of metallic debris. Fender washers are used to provide more surface area for transferring load into the threaded rods at each support point.
Holy cow! Every now and then the scope of this project hits me! This is one big helix!
Happy Thanksgiving,to you too!!! Wish I had days off,I work today,off tomorrow,work
Friday and Saturday. Time and a half,$28 an hour,so I’ll be working for that Christmas cash. Sunday is my train day,that is if the wife doesn’t have a “honey do list”. No rest for the wicked,but the work must go on. Hope you lads have a rest-ful couple of days off.
I’ll be entertaining my kids this weekend, so I may actually get less than usual done on the layout. Got a hockey game Friday, have to see Harry Potter probably Saturday, and then there’s the long half mile drive to my sister’s house for dinner Thursday. By my standards a very busy week end. Yawn. Oh yeah, I’ll be here on the forums too.
Mark, that’s a lot of material. I didn’t use that much building this.
Since my son and his wife (the newlyweds) will be going to her “Grams” house for Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday (actually I’m going there too) Turkey Day will be celebrated on Friday for what is left of the Howard Clan at my house. Have to clean the house this morning so I can help a friend (fellow musician and model railroader) move this afternoon. Will probably help him on Saturday also. Thursday I will be again cleaning the house (hey, it only gets cleaned once every 6 months or so. What? I’m a widower so I can live like a slob if I want! MYOB) until I leave for “Grams” house. Doesn’t look like working on the Railroad is part of the mix for the next few days but I will pop in here to see what is going on.
Happy Thanksgiving to all of you who celebrate it!
Happy thanksgiving everyone…my wife and i don’t do turkey but gonna go fishing instead…you’ll catch me somewhere on the texas coast trying for the big one…then will come home if it rains and start working on the layout some more…bye!..chuck
Happy Thanxgiving to you and everybody else on this forum! Sounds like you have a pretty ambitious to-do list for your MRR over the holiday weekend. As for me, holidays and model trains are mutually exclusive (family gatherings, school pageants, etc.) but sometimes I can “steal” an hour or two…[;)]
