Friday, July 04, 2014

Rebuilding tracks to staging

Feeling productive...

Before: M-Track down the ramp. Curved crossover at the top of the ramp.
The inside of the curve at the top is normally occupied by the locomotive servicing area.
After: Replacement track geometry worked out using K-Track and crossover moved down the ramp.
The ramp to staging has a couple problems: Some locos like to derail on the curved crossover at the top of the ramp, and some locos like to get stuck on bad track halfway down the ramp.

Of course, either location is in very hard to reach corners of the underground trackage.

Close-up of the dreaded curved crossover.
One can see the little styrene guide I installed to guide the locomotive pickup shoes.
Yesterday, I removed the Betriebswerk and replaced the curved M-Track turnouts with K-Track, as well as rebuilt the crossover with K-Track turnouts in the middle of the ramp.
A tricky bit here was to cut and replace the transition track from K-Track to M-Track, because in my infinite wisdom I soldered the feeders to the transition track and while at it, also soldered the joiners to the transition track, and the flextrack section right next to it, making a very solid bond, which is basically impossible to remove without substantial damage to another very hard to reach area. I ended up cutting the transition track in the middle, keep the soldered bits in place, and replace the other half with a regular 180mm sectional track piece cut in half.

Gapped transition tracks cut through all the way. The cut is on the left. The gap and connection to M-Track is on the right.
Today, I replaced M-Track further down the ramp just short of a common track feeder location and fitted appropriate K-Track. On to soldering feeders and test runs before mounting the track in place...

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