Folks this is hard, I’m dismantling my layout for a move to Montana from San Francisco. I’ve done the easy part by removing trees and structures…now the track and turnouts. I used a thin layer of liquid nails to attach the track work to blue foam and diluted white glue for the ballast…any ideas on how to save the track? Particularly the turnouts?
Someone told us that the winter temperatures might be colder in Montana than San Francisco but the only difference I can see in the temperature readings is just have a silly minus sign in front. I figure a long sleeve shirt and maybe a jacket is all I’ll need to keep warm. [*-)]
Do you need to remove the track, or can you just transport the layout as as, possibly by cutting it in a few places? With a little protection, the blue foam should hold up pretty well to a move.
You get a hearty “HE-HE-HE-HE-HE” outta me on this one. San Francisco has an absolutely salubrious climate compared to Montana particlularly out on the plains where minus 40 degree temps ain’t unusual.
All those northern plains states are cold–remember there ain’t nuttin’ between you and the North Pole but a barbed wire fence–but Montana might just be the coldest of the bunch; when I worked up there in the '50s one of my chores was to get up in the morning and make sure that the ice was broken up on the watering troughs . . . . . . . . . . in the middle of July! Please advise me just where you are moving to; people who ignore that “silly minus sign” usually wind up freezing their patootie off!; it’s a lotta fun to watch!
I have no idea what is prompting you to move from Taxifornia to Montana–I don’t wanna go feedin’ off my range–but let me be perfectly honest: I hail from eastern Idaho and I’d sure rather live in Montana than in the Golden State! I’d also sure rather live in Montana than Arizona. COME ON LOTTERY!
If you used white glue to secure your ballast then you MIGHT just be able to salvage your track by soaking your ballast in water which should loosen the ballast. Try soaking a towel, wring the dripping water out of it, and lay it atop your track. Then set something heavy atop the towels to instill squeezing the water out. It may take more than one application but it should work.
On my last layout I white glued the ballast around my scratchbuilt Code 55 switches and I did manage to get them up . . . . . . . . . . I don’t remember h
If you mounted it directly to foam, you might just be able to use a sharp knife like a razor knife and cut the tracks right out of and off the foam with a thin strip of foam underneath the tracks and all…then soak the track to loosen any adhesives and remaining foam bits as suggested above.
when i moved from Illinois to Arizona i tried removing the switches by doing as already said by soaking them with water. was only sorta successful , so after a bit just gave up. funny thing also the ones i saved proved to be problems later anyway.
We’re moving to Red Lodge. Was just there the other day and asked someone what the electrical plug sticking out of radiator was for? He looked at me and said: “Where are you from?” San Francisco says I. He rolls his eyes and said son (I’m 65) you got a lot to learn…the plug is used to heat the engine so it might start in the morning. Guess this will be an interesting winter for us.
How many turnouts are you talking about? I have limited experience with removing track, confined to small re-configurations on the same layout. I found that the flex track I put down wasn’t likely to flex as well after I took it up again. Salvage would not have been worth the effort, although I’ll probably remove the ties and rust up the rail sections as pieces of scenery to place alongside the right-of-way.
If you’ve got a dozen or more high-end turnouts, it’s going to be worth developing a technique to get them up. Unfortunately, Liquid Nails is pretty unforgiving stuff. Of course, if you’ve followed most of the advice I’ve heard here, you’ve got very little adhesive under the working parts of the turnout, so that should work to your advantage. On the other hand, if you’ve got a half-dozen snap switches, the effort involved in getting them up might not be worth price of replacement.
I have 6 Walther/Shinohara code 83 turnouts and one wye. However, when laying the turnouts I was very stingy with the adhesive in the event it had to be moved one day. I’ll try the soaking for a few days and see what happens.
I spent a short time at the Air Force base in Thule, Greenland. While I was there, the annual memo came out stating that as of that date it was mandatory for all vehicles to be plugged in when they were left not running, even for only a short time. The date was September 1st. The last sunset would come a month or so later, and it would be dark for the rest of the long winter.
Nothing between you and the Norh Pole but a barbed wire fence? Well, up there, there was no fence, just 400 more miles of ice.
Mr. B…my uncle was a former base commander at Thule: Col. Melvin R. Schultz. Curious if you knew him? He was also base commander at Castle AFB in California and one in Louisiana near Shreveport whose name escapes me at the moment.
I pulled into West Yellowstone at about 9 in the morning on New Years Day, 1958. Everyone was wearing ski masks except for us rookies from Eastern Idaho where the temps usually didn’t get below 35 below and all the vehicles in town were running to keep the coolant from freezing up… Unofficially the temp had gotten to minus 62 in the night . . . . . that is unofficial because the almanac says that the official low temp is minus 54. My boss out at Forsythe had purchased about eight WWII era jeeps which we used for various tasks around the spread; we kept anti-freeze to 35 below. When the weather forecast called for temps below 30 degrees we’d “fill-em and run-em” We could idle out almost a half a tank of gas between sundown and sunrise.
I was only there for a few weeks, working on the radar, and we didn’t interact with the Air Force guys much. So, unless he was there in September of 1986, we didn’t overlap.
Sorry to hear you are having to tear down a layout, but do hope your new improved one will be fun to build and give you much pleasure. (You will have plenty of time to work on it in the winters.)
If you layed your track directly on the foam, I have heard that a putty knife works well to seperate it, though as Mr B said Liquid Nails is rugged stuff. However, you could tear up the foam a little, then sand the foam off the bottom of the ties. If you want to reuse the foam either use the other side or fill the damage with your choice of filler, sculpta mold, spackle, etc.
I spent a year and a half in Montana in the AF, enjoyed it, but already knew what the little plug was for. From there I went to Thule where every building had a row of extension cords hanging in the parking spots. Sure wish I had been back in the hobby then. Lots of time to work on things when the horizon doesn’t even glow for several months.
take it from someone who has moved way too many times in the past 27 years, unless your track is Walthers/Shinohara or some other high dollar equivelint its not worth the time. If your like me and used flextrack on the last three that I did, I just pulled it up with a small flat prybar called a wonderbar and used new track the next time I was ready to “play”. However it is always possible to salvage anything if you work at it long enough and the above posts are very good advice. I’ve used the soak method on a few high end turnouts that I needed to save and it works pretty good. Goodd luck on your move to Montana and keep us posted on your new layout. Neil
You are in for a serious living and culture shock! Not bad, but you will find everything very different from what you are probably used to. I urge you to do your best to fit in, and refrain from using the phrase “In San Francisco, we did it …”. I guarantee you no one will care.
Regarding the railroad, I would get a good putty knife and scrape the track off the foam. It will probably be quite a while until you have time to put together a new layout, and you can deal with cleaning up the trackage - or dumping it - at that time.
By the way, I STRONGLY urge you to start using Mobil 1 in your autos (and all other motorized stuff like snowmobiles, snow throwers, etc. While you will still have the need for a block heater, it won’t be anywhere near as often as compared to using a petroleum based oil. Yes, I worked for Mobil (retired from ExxonMobil) and that may make me sound biased, but I was a witness to the Mobil 1 tests back in the early '70s at the research labs, and the results were amazing.
Thanks Mobileman…I plan on changing the oil before driving back and was wondering what to use. Your help is really appreciated.
We’ve spent some time there and it is fun watching people react when I say we’re from San Francisco…most are very nice and polite and we just sort of joke about it. They usually ask: “why are you moving here?” Peace, quiet, small town, friendly people, low cost of living, and we can actually afford to purchase a home. We’ve been there in the winter and have a rough idea of what we’re up against.
Thanks for all the help…so far the soaking technique with removing a thin layer of foam beneath the turnouts seems to be working. But the flex track is toast.
Fortunately the Sievers Benchwork will all be salvaged as it is just bolted and screwed together.