We decided on N scale
In XtrkCad when you are working with sectional track it will connect easily. With flex, it’s a bit different, but not that bad. Just practice a bit.
Oh, So you’re bailing out on us HO scalers Huh??? That’s okay, Both have thier advantages…
With respect to cad programs, if Dad wants to spend some money you might try Cadrail… I doubt it’s a lot different though. OR you could just use good old fasioned pencil and paper… It’s actually pretty simple that way and can be somewhat scaled without doing a lot of measuring… One of the books I suggested was John Armstrong’s Track Planning for Realistic Operation… I’m sure others have suggested it by now as well.
The method you use is called Drawing by the squares… What a square is defined as is an area (in HO) R+2… That is, your Minimum radius plus 2 inches. So (yea, I know you said N scale) in HO if your min radius were 22" (quarter circle), a square would be 24"… A 4x8 sheet of plywood would be 2x4 squares… I guess in N scale, a square might be R+1 (12 inches if you go with 11 inch min radius)… Get the picture?.. The idea is to get a representational space of what will fit your space as far as loops. When drawing turnouts, scale doesn’t matter because the angles do not scale. It won’t be exact but you can get pretty close as long as you don’t go way too wide or narrow with the angles.
A turnout is defined by Frog number… They are usualy 4 or 6 in most prepackaged stuff but can be any number… I’ll use 4 for my description of how to draw one… What the frog number means is the amount of run per rise (to keep it simple). Rise is always 1 unit. It doesn’t matter what that unit is, just pick something, 1 inch for example. Now, what the frog number Tells you is that the tracks will diverge (seperate) by 1 inch in 4 inches. So pick a point on your track line and from there, mark off 4 units (graph paper works great for this). At the 4th unit, go left or right 1 unit. Draw a line from your start point to the point where you marked off the 1 unit…