Tuesday 11 October 2011

Hi Folks,

In the past couple of weeks that I have been absent I have managed to lay some cork roadbed, and lay the lower level loop of track:



The Three tracks around the peninsula
  I have used Midwest products cork roadbed, and my first attempt at laying it was with spray on contact adhesive, which worked well to start as it tacked the roadbed down instantly.


However returning the next morning the cork had fallen off, yet if I glued it again it would stay for a bit and then fall off again. My guess is because both materials are fairly porous, the spray was not terribly effective. So I opted for the ever reliable PVA glue instead.






After ordering some track from the UK on Tuesday, I had it in my hands by Saturday morning thanks to DHL, so that afternoon i began laying track:


First track goes down

into the first curve


The crossover at Theta
As I began to snake my way around the layout I used laminated strips of Masking tape to superelevate the curve on the main line:


On the left: the lower loop line. On the right: Superelevated main line.




The next major step will be the integration of the Right-Hand Side helix, which should be arriving in the next day or two. That will be this weekends project, I plan to have the helix table build and possibly some track laid on the helix.


Photos below where taken after I did a bit of a cleanup.


Staging



The approach into Theta (missing a crossover at the moment)
 

The curve out of staging


Snaking through theta loop towards the next town


The beginning of Theta Loop


Looking towards the branch line as the main snakes through below.





A Dead-Frogged crossover with feeders below. Each piece of track has its own set of track feeders, and there are isolated sections for block detection.