Del Mar - Lemon Grove Eastern (First Stupid Question(s) )

[jweir43]

Track.

I've got a few pieces of Kato track-roadbed (Unitrack) and they don't look too bad. I'm not a serious modeler, I just want something about one or two steps above the plywood under the Christmas Tree gig.

Is Kato acceptable in the Unitrack thing? Seems to work pretty well for me. If Kato is an OK brand, is there one place or another that has a good price on the stuff? I'm not going wild with switching yards and all that, just a couple of ovals with little dipsy doodles to make life interesting. And a single switch crossover to let one train run on the other track.

The passenger is the Con-Cor set and pulled by a Santa Fe warbonnet diesel. Four passenger cars. Do you have to solder the track together for this short a train? Or do separate wires every so often to keep the IR loss down? Pretty much the same thing for the Lemon Grove freight line. Half a dozen cars at the most.

The Del Mar passenger line has a relatively long trestle where a slough off of the ocean passes under the tracks. Do I have to elevate the track to simulate what is in effect a very small dirty salt water lake?

Before I lay the track on the wood laminate, should I paint it a neutral color to hide the wood grain, and what is generally used as the base material on which you build the rest of the scenery?

I'm sure that somewhere there is a complete newbies resource for a lot of these questions, so if any of you can recommend some reading, that would be great.

Thanks,

Jim

 

[logandsawman]

I will answer a couple of questions, I would paint the wood before putting down the track.

As far as I am concerned, your train will probably run just fine on the Kato track as long as the rails are clean and there are good connections at the track joints. There is no reason to solder this type of track, unless you want to make it permanent.

Hope this helps

 

[tootnkumin]

If you intend to place the majority of the track flat on the baseboard, this makes streams, ponds and the like especially difficult because they are all below that level. One thing that surprises me is that in HO Unitrack there are no bridges or incline supports available. N scale, yes.

 

[Rico]

If you don't want to, or can't elevate the track I wonder how it would look if you painted the slough then drew a trestle along side the track with a felt marker?
If you're just going for the effect I don't see why not.

 

[jweir43]

I will answer a couple of questions, I would paint the wood before putting down the track.

As far as I am concerned, your train will probably run just fine on the Kato track as long as the rails are clean and there are good connections at the track joints. There is no reason to solder this type of track, unless you want to make it permanent.

Hope this helps

Thanks for the answer.

Is there some sort of "furry paint" or something I can scatter on the paint while it is drying to simulate bare dirt ground? With that as a substrate, I can build the rest of the stuff around it using the usual trees, grass, etc.

 

[jweir43]

If you don't want to, or can't elevate the track I wonder how it would look if you painted the slough then drew a trestle along side the track with a felt marker?
If you're just going for the effect I don't see why not.

How do you get the glassy effect on the slough with paint? I s'pose I could give the felt marker thing a try and if it didn't work, felt marker ink is soluble in isopropyl alcohol.

Thanks for the answer.

Jim

 

[logandsawman]

Thanks for the answer.

Is there some sort of "furry paint" or something I can scatter on the paint while it is drying to simulate bare dirt ground? With that as a substrate, I can build the rest of the stuff around it using the usual trees, grass, etc.

There is all sorts of stuff you can do here. You can mix some dry sand or dirt with the paint or rub it in to wet paint to get texture. You can sprinkle very fine pulverized clay where you want dirt roads. Some of the paint may color the dirt. This would add texture.

You can sprinkle the Woodlands Scenics ground cover products onto the wet paint to get a nice effect. Or, you can apply the products right over the paint and secure with watered down white glue.

Another clever technique for the grassy areas is to slightly mix two different greens and paint that on, you will get some more realistic coloring.

Another way to get dirt roads is put down some watered down white glue then sprinkle the fine clay where the road goes then apply some more glue. The commercial product is Scenic Cement or Matte Medium.

There is lots of stuff you can do, also lots of youtube videos on putting down terrain.

Here is one video that gives a couple tips:

[video=youtube;GYOkJwyPeQg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYOkJwyPeQg[/video]

hope this helps, Dave

 

[Iron Horseman]

Track. Is Kato acceptable in the Unitrack thing? Seems to work pretty well for me. If Kato is an OK brand, is there one place or another that has a good price on the stuff? ..Do you have to solder the track together for this short a train?... Or do separate wires every so often to keep the IR loss down?

1. Yes, Kato track is probably the best of that type with the ballast pre-attached.
2. Sorry don't know about prices.
3. No, Unitrack does not need to be soldered (btw - train length is irrelevant).
4. It never hurts to add additional feeders. I believe the Kato track system has a special part for this. Yes, they call it a "terminal unijoiner" http://www.katousa.com/images/unitrack/24-818.jpg
5. IR loss?

The Del Mar passenger line has a relatively long trestle where a slough off of the ocean passes under the tracks. Do I have to elevate the track to simulate what is in effect a very small dirty salt water lake?

No, as someone else mentioned previously you could mount the whole thing on 2" foam and cut the lake/ocean down below the track level instead of raising the track.

Before I lay the track on the wood laminate, should I paint it a neutral color to hide the wood grain, and what is generally used as the base material on which you build the rest of the scenery?

Yes, paint if you are going to lay the track directly on wood, but I am a big proponent of foam. This is HO but the same concept. There is no sheet of wood under this. Just 2" of foam on 1"x4" cross braces.

 

[jweir43]

5. IR loss?

Sorry. Engineerspeak for voltage loss as a function of engine current and rail resistance.



No, as someone else mentioned previously you could mount the whole thing on 2" foam and cut the lake/ocean down below the track level instead of raising the track.

Or as I think more about it, I could just rout out the laminate and a bit into the plywood underlayment to achieve depth, then sink the trestle piers into the cutout.

Yes, paint if you are going to lay the track directly on wood, but I am a big proponent of foam. This is HO but the same concept. There is no sheet of wood under this. Just 2" of foam on 1"x4" cross braces.

Thanks for the answers.

Jim