Playing Catch-Up

It's been a month since my last post, my how time flies.

I haven't really been doing much train related this month, family vacation was the first week of the month and a family tragedy the week after kept me out of the train room for another week again. For the past week I've been spending some time on my T-Trak modules, specifically another straight double that I am building a coal dock on.


The idea is the narrow gauge hoppers get spotted on the top of the trestle and the standard gauge hoppers underneath, the coal is then dumped out of the narrow gauge hoppers into the standard gauge ones below. The narrow gauge crosses over the standard gauge track on a plate girder bridge before reaching the wooden coal trestle. Initial tests were promising.

 Four narrow gauge hoppers approximately equaled the length of three standard gauge hoppers, so the wooden trestle was built to that length.

 Bracing was added and a dump funnel was made from styrene and hung below the trestle.

 Everything was mounted to the frame and then the first problem arose. There was not enough clearance as measured with an NMRA clearance gauge between the coal dock and the inner mainline track.

 So the dock was removed and about an eighth of an inch was trimmed from the inner side to tuck the trestle in closer to the wall. Unfortunately this meant the first post was in the way of the standard gauge hoppers as they entered the chute, so it had to be removed.

 This gave the necessary clearance between the inner mainline and the coal trestle structure.

Bracing was added to stiffen the structure where the post was removed and it all works pretty well.

With the track laid and debugged the only thing left is to add some walkway boards and railings to the top of the trestle and then finish the scenery on the rest of the module.

I've also finished building the frames and laying the track for the end modules, they are going to be single straights with the standard gauge mainlines running along the front as normal and the narrow gauge curving away to the back. This means the modules have to be full depth so the narrow gauge tracks can connect in the back.

I haven't decided if I am going to put skyboards on these modules and have the tracks tunnel through them or if I am just going to leave them open so that you can see straight across them. I could make some removable skyboards but with only 2mm spacing between the backs of the modules it doesn't leave much room to play with.

At any rate with those two modules mocked up I now have six total, enough for a full loop of narrow gauge track. Now I need to get the scenery done so I can get them certified to run in the next show. That will be a while though, my work schedule will prevent me from attending shows for the rest of the year.

Maybe I'll have them ready for the big show next spring.