chita marlith

Last weekend I purchased my 5 turnouts, as well as a 60 degree crossing from PM in Calgary, along with a bit more track and a few other items. I now have almost all of my track other then the turn table and a few pieces that aren�t part of the main lines. Now that I have my exact measurement and can see exactly how the track is going to sit, I completed the rest of the roadbed for the front staging area as well as the lead to the future turn table.

After a week, I finally completed my trestle. I built it using �� and 3/8� square doweling rod purchased from canadian tire. I first traced on a large sheet of paper the track curve, as well as the location of the tracks that would pass below. From this, I determined the measurements as well as the location of each pier. I built the deck of the trestle directly onto the drawing that I had made, using this as an exact guide for placing the pieces. This was, in my mind, the best way to keep everything accurate. The piers had to be on a sharp angle due to the two tracks passing below, so extra support had to be given to the trestle deck in some areas. I finished the piers with 1/16" cross supports, as well as a bed for the 18" radius track to sit on. Even thought this is not the most prototypical trestle, it still looks good on the layout and fits the track perfectly.

On my last day off, I added the trackbed for the upper mountain tunnel lines. The outer track is part of the main oval line, which will descend down to the front staging area, and the second climbs from the mid-section up to the raised area at the rear of the layout. This line and the main line descent run together in one tunnel portal. You can also notice that the track below these lines is now laid. I completed this so I wouldnt have to work arond the upper sections of track in the future.

On Saturday, the third day of my long weekend, I decided to tackle the bridge that will carry both the main line and figure-eight line of track in the rear section of the layout. For this, I purchased a set of pier girders, as well as a warren truss bridge kit. With a little modification, I attached two bridge girders together using a 3rd girder. When these were dry, I attached bridge sides of the warren truss kit to the girder deck. Once all together, I used a few scrap pieces of plastic to add a little support to the trusses. The final look and design looks pretty good. I then placed the bridge onto my layout and fit foam supports on each end. I then finished with butting road bed right up to the bridge deck.

The next section that I wanted to complete was the stretch of track that would travel down from the trestle, below the main line, and loop back into the front switching are. This section will be part of a tunnel in the future, so I decided to complete it now before I did too much work on the tracks above it. The foam roadbed was the first step after planning the track path. Once again, I used thumb tacks to hold the roadbed in place while the glue dried.

With July 1st this year being on a Thursday, my work decided to shut down for IT upgrades on Friday as well, giving me a nice, long 4 day long weekend � plenty of time to make some serious progress on my model.

I first fixed my original ramps on the left side of my layout which I shaved these down and placed different sized risers underneath to make them much more level and smooth. I also laid track bed down on the right side for the section leading up to the future trestle (below, right).

Over the last month or so I have been building the ramps to allow the tracks to go from one level to the next. I purchased some �� sheets of Styrofoam and used this for each of the ramps. It took several attempts to get a few of them right, as it is very difficult to get a perfectly even and level transition from one level, onto the Styrofoam, then onto the next level. I�m sure there are other techniques and products available to make this process much easier, but I�m determined to use what I have!

The first ramp completed successfully is the right curve of the main line oval. After hours of trying to get everything just right, it was time to lay down the very first section of track bed. I glued down one half at a time in about 20� lengths. I used WeldBond multi-purpose glue and thumb tacks to temporarily hold the track bed in place.

The main benchwork elevations are complete! To get the actual sections to match my original planned elevation sections (which I marked out earlier on the table), I first took large sheets of news print and laid them out to cover the entire sections. The paper was thin enough that I could see the lines I drew beneath it, and thus traced the sections onto the paper. I then cut the sections out and re-traced them onto a new sheet of plywood. Using a jigsaw, I cut the sections out, which all then matched perfectly on the table. I then attached the different elevation sections on top of scrap wood risers, which were cut to certain widths depending on the height I needed the section to be.

After clearing out a good portion of my tiny basement, I moved down my future table top, cut into 4 section (to fit down the stairs). I then copied and cut out Atlas track templates (extremely helpful) and laid them out on the plywood. With this, I could see almost exactly how the track would eventually lay out and knew that my computer-designed track layout would translate well to actual size (even though small adjustments did have to be made several months down the road).

Construction began back in February, so I have a little bit of catching up to do (about 6 months of it). Over the next several days I will post my progress from February 15th right up till now. After that, I will post often so things are always recent. I have already updated my pages listed above, so please check them out for a bit of background information.