Let's see your Corona projects

[x600]

Nice. Mike,
I agree that the ME switches can be a rpita* sometime. I had a **** of a time with some of the ones on my modules. I had a few of the old ones that were crappy to start with. A real case for hand laying after the time spent on them. Once I got them right, they work well, which is the  goal anyway.
 Too late, not ever going to use Atlas 55 on our oNetrak, because pizza cutters.
Let me know when you're ready for legs, if you want to use my design. There is no club standard, though, so anything works.

Greg O.

*ROYAL Pain in the A$$

[Guilford Guy]

great work all around boys!

i started in on another bethlehem car works kit, this time a st johnsbury & lamoille county rpo-baggage-coach. also been tinkering away with finishing touches on the bcw boston & maine commuter cars pre-painting. i'm not thankful for the virus, but the downtime has really rekindled my model railroad motivation.

[dem34]

Well, oNe Trak Modules have roadbeds and track now.

A few observations about Micro Engineering Code 55....

First, Working with the flex track is difficult, but extremely satisfying once you get it to the place where you are happy with it. I am going to take the advice of several of you guys from the Video chat the other day, and get some sweep sticks. Overall. I'm happy with what I have so far.

On to the turnouts. I'm not impressed. Right out of the box, the overcenter spring was not placed correctly, and it was glued into the strait through position. the points were uneven, and, once I freed it up, The points were not shaped well, and didn't line up well when thrown. I had to do a ton of filing, and a ton of reshaping, to get it to work. The "hinge" Jointers were totally in the wrong position, and were too loose to keep everything aligned.
In the end, I had to do a ton of filing to both the running rail, and the moving rails. I also had to build a new switch rod out of PC board, because the original one broke in the process of disassembling. Overall, I'm not real happy with the turnout overall, Now after all my work, it's smooth, and I'm using it. But in the future, I'm going to get permission from the oNe Trak board of my club to use Atlas Code 55 turnouts from here on out.


Overall, so far, I am happy with how the trackwork, and suck is going. I need to start working scenery out. I have some ideas, I just need to play with it.

Just be aware that almost every brand of turnout has their own brand of oddities. In my experience the Atlas C55 turnouts are very fragile and have tight tolerances. Theirs been quite a few times where I've been working with Atlas turnouts and had the frog rails pop out of their ties.

[John]

Did NTRAK change the rules .. I thought code 55 was verboten?

[MK]

Did NTRAK change the rules .. I thought code 55 was verboten?

Correct.  Code 80 is still the standard.  I don't know about oNe Trak though.

[C855B]

Did NTRAK change the rules .. I thought code 55 was verboten?

C55 has been OK in N-Trak for... gosh... at least 15 years. The catch is each end must terminate in C80 for connection.

However, there's no getting around the "club restriction" in a lot of cases. We have a couple of guys in our club who are married to pizza cutters, soliciting my castoffs every time I mention replacing wheelsets. There are expressions of mock (and sometimes real) horror if I talk about doing one in C55.

[thomasjmdavis]

We have a couple of guys in our club who are married to pizza cutters, soliciting my castoffs every time I mention replacing wheelsets.

They should join The Railwire and put an ad in Trading Post.  Between all of us, I am sure we could provide several tons.

[johnb]

They should join The Railwire and put an ad in Trading Post.  Between all of us, I am sure we could provide several tons.

I have a lot of metal pizza cutters

[C855B]

They should join The Railwire and put an ad in Trading Post.  Between all of us, I am sure we could provide several tons.

I'm sure we could. However, I am trying my damnedest to yank them into the 21st century by not encouraging it. Pizza cutters around here are relegated to the round file, 'cept the few I keep around to clear flangeways in pavement modeling.

Which brings to mind an unpleasant surprise with recent Atlas loco production - flanges chatter on ME C40, and bump the flangeways on Atlas crossings. I need to restock Kato wheelsets again.

[diezmon]

I'm trying to get a little something started. 

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[delamaize]

Did NTRAK change the rules .. I thought code 55 was verboten?

For MRNS:
NTRAK is Atlas Code 80 flex, with Peco turnouts. No exceptions on new modules.
For oNe Track, we are using Micro Engineering Code 55 across the board. And with what Greg said earlier, I guess I'm not going to get away with Atlas Code 55 turnouts! haha

I'm not sure what the other clubs around here are doing...

[Frank Amato]

Which brings to mind an unpleasant surprise with recent Atlas loco production - flanges chatter on ME C40, and bump the flangeways on Atlas crossings.

True story, a little time with the needle file and/or sandpaper is enough to tame those pesky code 40 spike heads.  I can't comment on the effort to re-wheel a loco fleet.

  Frank

[CRL]

True story, a little time with the needle file and/or sandpaper is enough to tame those pesky code 40 spike heads.  I can't comment on the effort to re-wheel a loco fleet.

  Frank

I agree it would work, but wouldn’t it make the track even more fragile than it is already?

[C855B]

True story, a little time with the needle file and/or sandpaper is enough to tame those pesky code 40 spike heads.  I can't comment on the effort to re-wheel a loco fleet.

It takes 10-15 minutes per loco. The "surprise" is just the six new units acquired in the past year, having done most of the running fleet already. I thought we were past those issues.

Filing/sanding spike heads? You jest, of course. Checking inventory here of C40 (mostly not installed yet), there are 360 feet where this would need to happen.    So it's gotta be the fleet.

[Frank Amato]

Nah @C855B not joking, but my small shelf layout is puny in comparison to your layout trackage.  Replacing wheels makes much more sense at that scale, sir!

Are Kato wheelsets plug-and-play in Atlas locos?

  Frank