Central Valley Ties strips - with N scale icon!

[peteski]

How about this elaboration: The notch in the tie plate of your tie strips is not wide enouhg to properly accept the only code 55 rail available on the market today.  Your product is unusable without making some modifications to either the rail or the tie strip. This is not acceptable.

3 sentences (but you could get away just using the 1st sentence).   

[coosvalley]

So far nobody has mentioned that ME code 55 was made for the HO market, and was made to be wide enough in that scale...That is why is has a wider top(head?) than Atlas N code 55.....

Before we say say it's a flawed and unusable product, will somebody please see if Atlas code 55 rail fits?..I know, It isn't available separately, but it IS available in the form of flextrack...Not as cheap as plain rail, to be sure...

[wcfn100]

So far nobody has mentioned that ME code 55 was made for the HO market, and was made to be wide enough in that scale...That is why is has a wider top(head?) than Atlas N code 55.....

Before we say say it's a flawed and unusable product, will somebody please see if Atlas code 55 rail fits?..I know, It isn't available separately, but it IS available in the form of flextrack...Not as cheap as plain rail, to be sure...

So if this product is made for rail you can't get, it's no longer flawed? 

My Atlas rail measures even wider than the ME rail at the base, so, no.

On an very interesting side discovery, I found an old piece of unweathered ME c55.  And what's interesting is that it measures .053" consistently across the base where my (purchased) newer piece of weather rail is .055". 

When I look at the older piece under the optivisor it looks like the rail base 'edges' have been finished because they are more blunt and nice and smooth (definitely a different finish than the bottom of the rail) where-as the newer piece the edge is more pointed and jagged.

So the two questions I have are - has ME changed any finishing they do on their rail over the years, or are weathered and unweathered rail finished differently?  Maybe the weathering takes better if it's not smooth?

Of course all of this goes right to the solution which is take a file to the base.

Anyone have a stash of c55 unweathered that can measure the base?


edit:  That same parts box just yielded a piece of c40 that measures .041"! 

Jason

[Chris333]

All my rail is un-weathered. I get ~.056" norm.

[wcfn100]

All my rail is un-weathered. I get ~.056" norm.

Okay, thanks.  If I get a chance, I'll grab the 60mm macro and try and show this other piece of rail and how the base looks more finished.


Any chance you remember how long ago you bought that rail? 

Jason

[Chris333]

I would guess about a year ago from MBK. I have another pack of rail that isn't opened as well.

I do draw the bottom of the rail along sand paper to rough it up for soldering, but just 2-3 pulls. So I don't think I narrowed the base much.

[peteski]

One would think that in this day and age of easy and instant communication, if a manufacturer develops a product (tie strips) which depends on a single available product (rail) from another manufacturer, they would have some sort of communication which would assure perfect fit between the products. Thing like production tolerances could be discussed.  It appears like this important step might have been missed.

[wcfn100]

I'm going to drop a line to ME about what's going on to see if they have anything to say about it.

I''m basically passed the rail issue. I just need to ballast my test section to see what the ties look like when the bottom half should be out of view.


Jason

[wcfn100]

So I heard back from Jeff at CV.

I designed the rail to fit tight using a Formica roller from Ace Hardware (1” wide plastic roller) to press the rail down into the tie plates to help eliminate the need for gluing the rail in. This method along with the bend over spikes is working very well here. Also the parting line works to hold the glue from wicking over the ties during the ballast process. The ties are 1:160 scale to the prototype in size and spacing. The HO CVT is the same to 1:87 scale.

He also said to buy the c55 rail from Proto87.  Are there two suppliers for c55 rail (besides what Atlas is using)?  If so, maybe that's what I found today.  I know I was ordering stuff from them.

I did take some issue with the tie spacing as the HO stuff is spaced at 21-23" and the N scale is 19".  It'right the website and I measured it.   I'll see if that's any sort of issue when ballasting.  I have a minor concern about the over-sized ballast not filling the space between the ties if it's on the narrow side.

Anyways, that's were this stands.  If anyone has some Proto87 c55 rail, please speak up.

Jason

[Chris333]

Also the parting line works to hold the glue from wicking over the ties during the ballast process

 

[GaryHinshaw]

I thought I had some un-weathered rail from the proto:87 store, but I can't find it...   

I do, however, have some (un-weathered) code 55 point rails from them and they last few inches are not milled, so I tried that in the tie strips and it fit like a glove.  FWIW, I can get a comparably short piece of weathered rail to set properly as well, but with greater force than was needed with the un-weathered rail.  Both rail samples have the same dimensions, to the accuracy I am able to measure them, so I can't really predict if a full length piece of un-weathered rail would be fine or not.  Jeff's experience would seem to indicate yes.

If I find my stash (or any Atlas rail), I'll report back.

[GaryHinshaw]

Curiosity got the best of me, so I decided to scavenge some Atlas rail from one of my broken #10 Atlas turnouts.  Lo and behold, a full length piece of Atlas rail fits perfectly in the CVP tie strips.  The base of the Atlas rail measures between .053 and .054 with my calipers: a mere .001-.002" narrower than the weathered ME rail I have, but that seems to be enough to make a difference.  Here is crappy shot comparing the two rail cross sections (Atlas on top, ME on the bottom):



The Atlas appears to be ever so slightly narrower.  Here is an end view of the two rail samples embedded in the CVP ties (ME on the left, Atlas on the right):



Note how both ME rails are canted to the left while the Atlas rails sit true in the ties.  It remains to be seen how full-length pieces of ME un-weathered rail will fare, but at least Atlas rail presents another option.

[wcfn100]

but at least Atlas rail presents another option.

Maybe.  I'll go remeasure, but mine came in at .056".

Jason

[Dave V]

Maybe.  I'll go remeasure, but mine came in at .056".

Jason

[Cajonpassfan]

Well, all my ME Code 55 is from several years back, but it comes in consistently at .053/.054" wide (and .054/.055" tall). So perhaps it's the manufacturing tolerances at play here?
Hope my phrasing is okay...
Otto K.