How many of you have a test track for your cars and engines? What does yours look like? How do you use it?
My test track is a figure eight on a 4x8 in my workroom. The thick plywood rests on a set of storage shelves in the center of the room. The 18inch radius is a great way to test the engines and cars’ coupler swing and truck pivot. There is a 15inch radius curve on the let spur used for testing tight turns similar to those in an industrial park. One spur (where the red caboose is parked) has a coupler height gauge.
When complete there will be an N gauge circle in the middle. All tracks will be DC or DCC at the flick of a switch.
Show us your test track? [8-|]
Not much to mine, about 4’ of flex track on a shelf. I have a Kadee gauge which can be set on the track when needed, and an old Scintilla power pack hooked to the track with jumpers. When repairing or re-building locomotives, I usually connect the jumpers directly to the motor, and don’t track test it until any binds or other problems are cleared up. Once a locomotive is running properly, it gets more testing on the layout, most specifically for pulling ability and clearance issues.
Wayne
Nothing too exotic here. My test track is in with my staging area. There’s a little bit of bench space in front of it. At the far end is my NCE PowerCab, which feeds the HO and HOn3 tracks. The piece of N gauge is from getting a recent conversion from HOn30 going before I started the mods to take it to HOn3. I used a set of test leads to get power to it, either DCC or DC. I have a DC pack that I hook up with test leads when I need it.
