In planning stages of my garden railway build, and luck enough to have over 50% of the track bed pre existing, by means of a ground level concrete block ‘wall’.

Sections I am building will have standard brickw laid flat, also.

This leaves me with a quandry of how to attach my flexi track to the base, as standard track pins will be useless, as well as the need to hold the flexi track in it’s position.

Any experience of different methods, successful or not?

I have thought about the smallest rawl plugs and small head screws to allow adjustment, rather than bonding with a Tiger Seal type product.

Any recommendations and / or links to products much appreciated

A smattering of images showing route testing and gauging works.

I've been lurking for some years now, with the intention of building a garden railway when the time was right.....that time is now.

I have 2 young children who enjoy trains and loved it when I've set up temporary track in the living room and run a few trains.

We moved house last year to a property with a much larger garden with usable space so the plan is taking shape.

Whilst browsing ideas about track bases, I thought of osb, plywood, decking boards but then thought of....Cable troughing found in warehouses etc. I have added a pic below.

There are lots of ways to attach together, wood can be added underneath and then felted over.

The only difficulty will likely lie in curves, but I'm sure a cutting disc with an angle grinder would solve this. Lots of add ons for them too for attaching items etc.

Any thoughts? Or is it a bit of a daft idea? They seem cheap enough.

Thanks in advance. 

Mark.

Now, I am trying to get mine as flat as possible as I don't want trains to look like they are bouncing about the place, I want everything to be as flat as possible. This means that progress on block laying is taking far longer than if I wasn't so bothered. I just thought it would look more real if the trackwork was dead flat.

So the question is, should I be as fastideous over this as I am being or should I worry less and accept more movement of the trains?

Before anybody suggests I'm criticising these layouts or their builders, that isn't the idea. It obviously works and the trains can cope even at speed. I've also seen much worse examples in the past but can't find them right now.
This one, I could tell the track level was going to be out before the blocks were even laid. https://youtu.be/VTMraT76PZw
A bit of a lump over the straight: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZchh_OWeHk
One from Daws Heath which could be down to the view along the track https://youtu.be/_RS9AXZ_p5k

Very new to this forum, is there such a thing as special rustproof outdoor track? If so, what should I get? I guess it would be best to lay it and keep it laid all year round.

Thanks!

https://www.filcris.co.uk/category/garden/garden-railway-products

Thanks for any advice.

Has this been tried before or am I looking at a non-starter?
 

I'm considering it as I can get it for £9.50 per 2.4mx1.2m sheet.

Obviously painting it and covering it with felt, and it will be mounted on posts, not at ground level.

I'd use marine ply but on a restricted budget its difficult to justify.

It's certainly tempting to be able to lay track and not have any problems with electrical continuity. For me, the worst part of track laying is electrical bonding so I'd be pleased to give that a miss. I'm not so sure about leaving the track loose in order for it to take up any expansion - you'd only need a cat to come along and there'd likely be track everywhere - or would there?

For instance, I've just installed baseboards along the bottom of the garden and the main run is dead straight at 16 feet or so in length. Could I solder all those joints and leave the track loose with just a single feed to each rail?

What's the rate of expansion for a one metre length of Peco track - anyone have any idea?

If that's not a good idea then how about soldering every other joint to make 2 metre long lengths of track that would halve the number of rail bonds required? Would that work okay on straight track do you think?

Part of me wants some semi ground running areas with natural rocks, so I am pondering how long a run I need to get down to a Raised Ground level.

I was thinking I could build some raised flower beds with rock and brick walls and run my trains along the edges of them. Us modelers are we're completely nuts I know.

So a two foot tall flower bed edging may be sort of nice if made from natural stone and that would leave me a small drop of a mere 8-10 inches! I am also willing to add some turn-back tracks for some over under curvy track. That way I can increase my runs for my grades.

Distances you would risk trying for that much of a drop?

Any thoughts on this? 

Possible discussion points...

• How to fix it in place
• Do you trim to the top, wrap round the side or wrap under the baseboard.
• When two sections meet is it best to overlap or line them up flush.
• With the benefit of hindsight...

Trib

hi everyone, new to this forum and glad i found it

so i have laid down my track base and its ready to have the actual railway fixed down. however, before i nail down the track i want to put over a cover of hornby gravel or something that looks like ballast because right now it looks ugly and unrealistic.

to give you an idea, its just wooden planks sitting on an embankment of dirt but i want it to look as nice and emmersive as possible. if anybody is familiar with the "great wakering" railway, it has a powder like layer over it that seems to do the trick. this is what i am after.

Z5IyLu7uSl4

does anybody know of anything that looks like ballast/gravel and also is guaranteed to survive outdoors?

thank you.

Cheers

S

I had a look at the review on you tube of Hornby Magazines use of the power base. What a complete waste of time. It isn't a review it's just a promo to buy a certain issue of their rag. There is no before and after running up gradients with and without power base fitted. I was very disappointed.

The whole point of this video is to show what the product achieves, BUT IT DOESN'T. They also don't say what the code of track is.

If this is their idea of demonstrating the benefits of DCC Concepts power base then I'm no wiser than I was before.

Here's the you tube video:

Roy.

Very early on in the project I had bought a second hand, electric builders concrete mixer. This had plenty of use and was a godsend. When I'd finished with it, I sold it on - at very little loss too. Concrete was poured into shuttering, which was constructed from hardboard sides with attached wooden stakes (could have done with more stakes - the weight of the concrete moved the shuttering a little). The shuttering was filled to within a couple of inches of the top. When the concrete was set, the 'rubbercrete' track base was used to fill up to the top. 'Rubbercrete', as it is known, featured in the construction of a garden railway in an early edition of "ModelRail" magazine. It is a mix of cement, granulated rubber, chipped cork, water and external grade pva glue. It sets hard but will take track pins by virtue of the cork and rubber content. Due to cost and the logistics of getting the chipped cork (I had already gone all the way to Northamptonshire to get the granulated rubber), I replaced this with gardeners vermiculite - cheap in comparison and very easy to get from garden centres and the high st. Once set, this is sealed with a wash of water / pva mix. If you wanted to, I suppose you could push the boat out and use a commercial brickwork / rendering sealer - you know the one! The attached photo shows part of the trackbed after completion - the construction technique can be easily seen. The Helipad is now in the loop of the 2 parts of trackbed seen (see photo of 4F hauled train in other forum). After the trackbed was completed all round, the gaps were filled with topsoil and planting out started. There are also a few concrete slabs set on blocks, throughout the planted area, where buildings and cameo scenes are situated.

After looking at the photo and thinking about how it was all done, I realise that the railway is far too over engineered and was built at a cost which was too high. I don't envy anyone who wanted to demolish it! Should I build another somewhere else, I would put a lot more time and thought into planning the construction so this didnt happen again, but as they say, that's the benefit of experience for you. I am still not a huge fan of wooden trackbases outside so would seriously consider using Mick's technique of using blocks laid end to end, but with the addition of a 'rubbercrete' trackbed on top.

1. Track nails. These work but I'm not sure what the exact tool is for setting these little nails.

2. Liquid nails glue. This works but it makes it harder to make modifications later on.

What has everyone experienced with this? What is good about how you did it, and what is bad?

Thanks, Gonna dive in sometime in the next 24 hours.

http://www.polycell.co.uk/products/polycell_expanding_foam_polyfilla.jsp" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I'm thinking mainly for embankments and cuttings. Although it's not beyond the realms... to use it to make a smooth top surface to lay tracks on.

Any thoughts on pro's and con's?

The example on the left is what I'd describe the normal way with the plywood overlapping the concrete base. On the right is the way I would prefer to do it so that it would be easier to bring the garden up to sleeper level to create an embankment type section. Which way do you think would afford better protection from the weather? Do you think cutting the edges of the plywood at an angle would be better than leaving it square? If using angled edges, should the final covering of roofing felt be just on the top face or extended down over the angled edges?

Whichever way I decide to go I intend to place a piece of roofing felt or similar between the concrete base and the plywood to help prevent damp rising from below.

A portion of my intended new layout will be at or very close to ground level and I'm concerned that any timber used in such close proximity to the ground would quickly succumb to the levels of damp and moisture found in that situation. Polystyrene appears to be pretty resilient when left outdoors. Does anyone have any ideas or thoughts on this?

Even if it was deemed suitable there would then be the problem of finding suitable adhesives for use on polystyrene outdoors so this is only a thought that came to mind after seeing the sheeting at my local builders yard. I'm open to any advice.

The common answer is "a bit"

Not a great answer so here goes.

Peco streamline code 100, which we all use, is nickel silver rail (nickel silver has nothing to do with silver, it is an alloy of copper) and it expands as it gets warmer, but how much?

Nickel Silver has a coefficient of thermal expansion of 16nm/m/K which I think means a 1 metre length grows 0.016mm for each degree celsius rise in temp. 0.016mm isn't very much.

Getting practical. If you lay track on a cool day at 10ºc but on a hot day in the sun the rail temp reached 60ºc you'd have a 50ºc rise in temp. Call Peco's yard a metre and multiply by a rounded up thermal expansion of 0.02 and you get 1mm of expansion.

I may have got this wrong, but gut feeling says it's right.

This suggests that a 1mm gap between lengths of flexi should be adequate.