Started building the 1st helix


irocinblue89

irocinblue89

Member
Hello everyone! I started building the 1st of 2 helix today and figured I would show some pics. This pic is of the luan cut and on the floor being glued together. It's 2 layers thick making it a total of 1/4". The over all diameter is 77" with radii 36" and 33 1/2". I am climbing 19" with 5 loops which should give me roughly a 1.7% grade on the outer and a 1.9% on the inner track. Double check my math please because I make mistakes alot! I got the idea of overlapping the luan from somewhere online but cannot find it in my favorites bar.

IMG_20120827_170515.jpg
 
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Looks like it could work really well. How do you plan to support the individual loops?
 
I started building a hexadecagon to support the helix. I chose this for 2 reasons. First, I thought about doing an octagon but I figured it would create to many points on the circle that stuck out past the edge. If I would have made the octagon the same size diameter as the helix it would have left allot of un supported luan. Second, and this is kind of stupid, but I wanted to see if I could build one. I wanted the challenge. :D

IMG_20120827_170456.jpg
 
LoudMusic said:
You could check your browser history if the old link is important to you.
Click to expand...

I was thinking it would be nice for others. I will look and see if I can find it.

LoudMusic said:
Looks like it could work really well. How do you plan to support the individual loops?
Click to expand...

Thanks. I haven't decided if I'm going to use all-thread or 1"x2"'s. The website used 1"x2"s but I can get all-thread easy and it is infinitely adjustable.
 
Not much progress. Got some road bed down on the first loop and a few more pieces laid out and cut. Here's a couple of pics.

IMG_20120829_123701.jpg


IMG_20120829_123710.jpg
 
Looking good so far. Good job adding the roadbed before you start building up. Are you going to add the track also and wire it up? The helix loops do not give a person much room at all to lay track and wire it up if you get to far ahead of yourself, but im pretty sure you know what your doing.

Keep the updates coming.
 
joed2323 said:
Looking good so far. Good job adding the roadbed before you start building up. Are you going to add the track also and wire it up? The helix loops do not give a person much room at all to lay track and wire it up if you get to far ahead of yourself, but im pretty sure you know what your doing.

Keep the updates coming.
Click to expand...

Yeah I definatly want to add the track and wires. I haven't decided if I am going to solder 2 or 3 pieces of track together with 1 feeder or just put a feeder on each and every piece of track. I know there are a few schools of thought on the matter. I am just rying to figure out what will be best for me. I only know enough to get into trouble! It is taking allot more time than I thought it would though.
 
You sir are doing a great job with this helix.
Ive been deciding on building a helix on my layout and building a second deck to my layout. I actually was thinking of maybe making 2 helix on each end of layout but I cant make up my decision if i want a second deck because my layout height is about 50 inches in height and if i went up to a second deck it would be on the tall side. Im a tall person so it wouldnt be too bad for me but others visiting my layout might not like the second deck. So this is whats stopping me from building a helix.

Honestly if this was my helix, I would definitely solder the flextrack sections together with feeders going to each section of flextrack, if anything every other one. You can never over do it with feeders in my opinion, less problems and headaches makes for more fun and more running trains:D
 
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