Please Help with expanding layout

Classic Toy Trains Forum
1

I am currently in the process of expanding my layout (@ 126 ft2) to accomidate 42 in radius turns. As posted elsewhere on this board, the current layout is strictly O-27. The new one will be a mix of lionel O-27, O 31 track, and a track I hope your input will help determine. I’m keeping the O-27 around because of cost. Most of it is used on a yard. My roster is somewhat small, but I hope to expand it with all era engines (exept pre-war). I currently have 3 Magne traction engines, which leads me to the following questions:

I have been looking most seriosly at adding GarGraves track, but a lot of what I have read strongly endorses the Atlas O track for its conductivity. How much of the pulling power of magne traction engines is lost on the Atlas O track, in terms of percentage?

Conversely how much of an advantage do the non magne traction engines have on Atlas O compared to tin plate?

I would really appreciate the input of those of you with 681 turbines, as that is one of my engines.

There is a certain degree of “kid-friendliness” I need with my layout, as my young neice and nephew will be playing with it over the next few years. Therefore, I neeed to have non-derailing switches. I have seen and been impressed with the Atlas O switches non-derailing feature I have no knowledge of Gargraves non-derailing, but have seen on their website that it can be set up to do that. How does Gargraves non-derailingt work, and how do you wire the Gargraves for non-derailing? How realiable is this feature.

Sorry about the length, and I appreciate your input. I was also curious as to what type of track CTT uses on their product reviews.

2

Hi,

There are several articals on track types on this site that you can search for. Here is one:

http://www.trains.com/Content/Dynamic/Articles/000/000/000/754qlznl.asp

I do not have any Atlas track but Atlas O does make a steel track version of their nickle-silver track that is designed to take advantage of locomotives with magnatraction. You can check it out on the Atlas O website and forums for more information.

Regards,

Tim Pignatari

3

I have a copy of the 2003 Atlas O catalog. While Atlas O does make a solid steel track line, not everything in their nickel silver line is available in solid steel. For example, the catalog shows #6078 O-72 / O-54 curved switch in nickel silver and a #6074 O-72 Wye Remote Switch, but there are no comparable switches available in solid steel.

Also, the solid steel line comes in 36, 54, and 72 inch diameter curves only.

Nickel silver is totally non-ferromagnetic. The magnetic field in a Magne-Traction axle has absolutely no effect on the track., so you get none of the traction benefits. Sorry, I have no data on what the difference is when you run such a locomotive on non-magnetic track.

It would seem to me, though, that non Magne-Traction locomotives have no significant advantage on nickel silver over steel. As far as the wheels on these locomotives are concerned, track is track. The determining factor is the coefficient of friction of the locomotive wheels on the rail, and the two track metals probably have similar coefficients.

From what I’ve read, the reason nickel-silver is popular is because it’s oxide is electrically conductive. Iron rust is an insulator, so maintenance is important if you want to keep train performance consistent. With nickel-silver, it’s less important because the locomotive doesn’t lose electrical contact when it rolls over a “rusty” spot.

Tony

I’m planning to use GarGraves track on a layout I’m planning to build

4

If you will be satisfied to be able to run stuff built for O31, I recommend Marx O34 track. It is the same profile as O27. It is of course no longer made, but not that hard to find. The Marx switches are very well designed and built, if you need any on your main lines.
You might consider using spiral curves, as I recommended on another thread the other day. This would be, for example, 22.5 degrees (1 section) of O72, 45 degrees of O34, then 22.5 more degrees of O72. It is almost as compact as all-O34, but looks bigger and allows you to put the tangents closer to the edge of the layout.
You will have to have steel track for magnetraction to do you any good.
I did a test a few years ago on about a dozen locomotives to see how much good magnetraction did. Generally, it increased tractive effort by 50 to 100 percent. I did the test with a spring balance and used a siding on which I had laid the last 30 inches with nickel-silver running rails.

5

If Tony is right about Atlas having a “stainless steel” line, that won’t help you, because stainless steel is non-magnetic. That is why Lionel used it for magnetraction axles. However, that might have been a slip of the finger.
But plain steel track would indeed be vulnerable to rust. Tinplate track does not rust until it is badly worn, because it is, of course, tin plated.

6

Hi Bob,

The term Tony used was “solid steel” so it will work with magnatraction. So what do you think of the new forum fomat? It seem like it is begining to draw more members and increasing activity. I hope it keeps up.

Tim

7

I just checked the Atlas on-line catalog; and indeed it is steel, claimed to work with magnetraction, although Tony did say “stainless steel” at the end of his first sentence.

As for the forum, I do like it. It seems that I must have signed up two years ago; but either because the experience was not memorable or from advancing senility, I don’t remember it at all.

8

Guys, thanks for the feedback, I really didn’t expect this much this soon. Now to respond to some of the above:

Vitabile, you said above in relation to the nickle silver that :
“It would seem to me, though, that non Magne-Traction locomotives have no significant advantage on nickel silver over steel. As far as the wheels on these locomotives are concerned, track is track. The determining factor is the coefficient of friction of the locomotive wheels on the rail, and the two track metals probably have similar coefficients.”

Some of the people I have talked to have said that the Atlas O (& similar track) is a much better conductor than tinplate. Wouldn’t that greater conductiviity also lead to greater pulling power? So does the greater conductivity do little to nothing for traction? Vitabile, I know nothing of physics so please take no offense to the above question. You are talking to someone who barely passed High school algebra, and resorted to the fetal position after an advisor suggested physics.

I would also love to hear from those on the nonderailing wiring of the GarGraves switch. That is a big issue because of the probability of youngsters running my trains in the near future.

Again, thanks for all of the above replies.

9

Thank you for the input. All of the work I have been doing is on RR track, and its funny that I wanted to use some Marx track to make a section fit. However, because of my realtionship with a local hobby dealer I intend to do business with, marx track just can’t work. In any event, I’m trying to plan the expansion so that everything is O-42 in the (distant) future. We’ll see.

Again, thanks for your input.

10

Bob:

When I started typing that post, I used “stainless steel” without thinking about it. Then I checked the catalog & saw it said “solid steel”. I went back & edited “stainless” to “solid,” but I missed that one reference. Mea culpa.

LNOwensboro:

Regarding physics, it just so happens I have a bachelor’s degree in physics, earned 21 years ago. Professionally, I’m not doing anything remotely related to it, but a few things stick. Mind you, I’m not saying I’m an expert on the laws of physics! I can attest to the truth of the statement “What goes up must come down,” but only from personal experience! ( Ouch!)

Regarding conductivity & pulling power:

Electric motors spin faster when you increase the voltage you put across their commutators. At a given speed, with a fixed load, a motor will always draw the same amount of current. If you go up a steeper grade or go around a tight curve, a motor may draw more current to keep up the same speed, but then you’ve increased the load.

THe higher conductivity of nickel silver means that the metal has less resistance to the flow of electricity. This means that if you take a piece of nickel silver & another piece of steel the same size, then put identical voltages across them, the nickel silver will conduct a greater current. The material of the track has no other electrical effect.

Looking at it another way, if you have a piece of nickel silver and another piece of steel & you apply the same voltage across both, the nickel silver must be longer than the steel to get the same current to flow in both.

The only thing that would be affected by nickel silver’s greater conductivity, it seems to me, would be the wiring of a layout. You could make your blocks longer and still keep a consistent voltage across the whole length of the block.

When you’re talking about pulling, you’re talking about tractive effort. By my understanding, the t

11

Actually, steel and nickel silver are in the same ballpark when it comes to conductivity. Although there is a lot of variation, depending on the alloy used, they are both roughly at 5 percent of copper’s conductivity. See http://www.amm.com/index2.htm?/ref/conduct.HTM for a comparison among numerous metals.

If nickel silver has a conductance advantage, it is probably due to a larger cross-sectional area of the solid rail, as compared to tubular rail. However, my experience is that the rail joints are the main contributor to track resistance. I use the longest tubular-track sections available (K-line’s 36-inch straights–Lionel makes 35-inch sections) and solder all the joints. I have never had to use feeders.

12

Bob:

An interesting factor is that while DC current flows through the entire volume of a conductor, AC current only flows on the surface. It’s been so long since I took the class that I can’t tell you why, but I remember that fact.

The advantage of nickel silver, as I understand it, is just that it’s oxide is about as electrically conductive as the metal itself. If you don’t like cleaning track, and you don’t have any magne-traction locomotives, this is the stuff for you.

Tony

13

Tony, what you’re remembering is the skin effect. The skin depth, the layer where most of the current flows, is about 1/3 inch for copper at 60 hertz; and it is greater for poorer conductors like nickel silver. So, for all practical purposes the current flows uniformly throughout the rails.

Tin oxide can’t be too bad a conductor–Tin is often used instead of gold for plating connector pins.

14

Bob:

Thanks!

Good point about the tin oxide. Of course, I’m not an EE, so I really have no idea why nickel silver would be more desirable a metal than tin plate. All I know is what I’ve read in the model RR mags about nickel silver.

Tony

15

I did some further research with my CTT back issues and found an article from when Atlas O track came out (March 1998 - “Locomotive showdown” cover, Bob Keller wrote the review on page 114). They were reviewing the Atals O track. The numbers on magne traction engines they tested were:

681 1.03 lb of drawbar on inplate vs. 0.85 lb on nickle silver
8477 MPC GP9: 0.35 vs 0.14
18365 Lionel LLC Dash 9: 1.8 lb vs. 1.4

Upon further consideration, I have decided to stay with tinplate track. It wasn’t so much the pulling power as much as it was the "staying on the track power. I remeber how with my current O27 set up the engines do a great job of staying on the track. In my new setup the outside is going to all 42 inch radius. I figure if I made a switch to a non-magne traction track, and my engine fly’s off the track and becomes damaged, I would never forgive myself.

Thanks everyone for their input.

16

RE: Your question on switches. With the Gargraves, and Ross, prewired switches the instructions that came with the DZ1000 switch machines give instructions on wiring the non-derailing feature. It intails cutting in a section of insulated rail before the switch.

17

No, Bob, it doesn’t. Not exactly, anyway.

I edited my post with the word “Stainless steel” & changed it to “solid steel” last night. So, yes, I did make the last post, but it wasn’t in response to Roger Bielen’s post

Perhaps the forum software should distinguish between the two types of posts & report only when a new post is added to a thread?

In any event, there’s an old programmer’s maxim I like to quote:

The last bug in a system disappears when the last user stops using it.

Tony

18

I am currently in the process of expanding my layout (@ 126 ft2) to accomidate 42 in radius turns. As posted elsewhere on this board, the current layout is strictly O-27. The new one will be a mix of lionel O-27, O 31 track, and a track I hope your input will help determine. I’m keeping the O-27 around because of cost. Most of it is used on a yard. My roster is somewhat small, but I hope to expand it with all era engines (exept pre-war). I currently have 3 Magne traction engines, which leads me to the following questions:

I have been looking most seriosly at adding GarGraves track, but a lot of what I have read strongly endorses the Atlas O track for its conductivity. How much of the pulling power of magne traction engines is lost on the Atlas O track, in terms of percentage?

Conversely how much of an advantage do the non magne traction engines have on Atlas O compared to tin plate?

I would really appreciate the input of those of you with 681 turbines, as that is one of my engines.

There is a certain degree of “kid-friendliness” I need with my layout, as my young neice and nephew will be playing with it over the next few years. Therefore, I neeed to have non-derailing switches. I have seen and been impressed with the Atlas O switches non-derailing feature I have no knowledge of Gargraves non-derailing, but have seen on their website that it can be set up to do that. How does Gargraves non-derailingt work, and how do you wire the Gargraves for non-derailing? How realiable is this feature.

Sorry about the length, and I appreciate your input. I was also curious as to what type of track CTT uses on their product reviews.

19

Hi,

There are several articals on track types on this site that you can search for. Here is one:

http://www.trains.com/Content/Dynamic/Articles/000/000/000/754qlznl.asp

I do not have any Atlas track but Atlas O does make a steel track version of their nickle-silver track that is designed to take advantage of locomotives with magnatraction. You can check it out on the Atlas O website and forums for more information.

Regards,

Tim Pignatari

20

I have a copy of the 2003 Atlas O catalog. While Atlas O does make a solid steel track line, not everything in their nickel silver line is available in solid steel. For example, the catalog shows #6078 O-72 / O-54 curved switch in nickel silver and a #6074 O-72 Wye Remote Switch, but there are no comparable switches available in solid steel.

Also, the solid steel line comes in 36, 54, and 72 inch diameter curves only.

Nickel silver is totally non-ferromagnetic. The magnetic field in a Magne-Traction axle has absolutely no effect on the track., so you get none of the traction benefits. Sorry, I have no data on what the difference is when you run such a locomotive on non-magnetic track.

It would seem to me, though, that non Magne-Traction locomotives have no significant advantage on nickel silver over steel. As far as the wheels on these locomotives are concerned, track is track. The determining factor is the coefficient of friction of the locomotive wheels on the rail, and the two track metals probably have similar coefficients.

From what I’ve read, the reason nickel-silver is popular is because it’s oxide is electrically conductive. Iron rust is an insulator, so maintenance is important if you want to keep train performance consistent. With nickel-silver, it’s less important because the locomotive doesn’t lose electrical contact when it rolls over a “rusty” spot.

Tony

I’m planning to use GarGraves track on a layout I’m planning to build