Nice looking railroad so far Nicolas. As fast as you move in these videos, you can come over to my house and work anytime.
I have a ‘dinosaur’ egg in my layout. I was looking for red rocks and saw a 4" circle of red and started picking at it. It’s 24" tall and 18" in diameter and covered in red gravel. Has the vague egg shape … I found a true fossil on this land: a whale vertebrae in grey sandstone. Kinda gives the egg, leg… lol
Have fun with your digs, I couldn’t believe it kept growing as I dug! Then I crossed the line and had to know! Took a dolly to move to the layout, being a lot older it’s staying.(http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-wink.gif)
John
Made a post jig to hold posts vertically for me. Its made of a bigger PVC pipe with some weather stripping to hold the smaller PVC. 2 cinder blocks filled mostly with concrete but some Styrofoam as filler. The base has 4 feet that can be adjusted to level it.
Made a post jig to hold posts vertically for me. Its made of a bigger PVC pipe with some weather stripping to hold the smaller PVC. 2 cinder blocks filled mostly with concrete but some Styrofoam as filler. The base has 4 feet that can be adjusted to level it.
Day 5 - Finally using the jig I made.
Nicolas, you are a layout-building machine!
Who’s the guy in the red shirt “helping” you?
Greg
First priority should be to contact Dave Goodson, and attend his operating sessions…I wish I lived around the corner from him…I have to content myself with email and telephone calls with him…
Fred Mills
Nice progress Nicolas. Looks like your post holding jig worked out well.
Chris
Greg Elmassian said:
Nicolas, you are a layout-building machine!
Who’s the guy in the red shirt “helping” you?
Greg
He was a friend who dropped by to hang.
Chris Kieffer said:
Nice progress Nicolas. Looks like your post holding jig worked out well.
Chris
It was until I got to the part I am at now with the three tracks. I twas really slow going and was starting to no longer work. PVC pipes will divert due to rocks regardless of the jig.
A trip to the Home Depot and I have a new faster plan that is working well. A 1 inch diameter 10 inch masonry bit on my cordless hammer drill. I drill in, then feed the pipe by hand til it is vertical and then use the post driver to hammer it into the ground.
Also, to remove a crooked PVC pipe I now use vice grips and twisting action. In the past I either pulled with all my strength, or I dug. The vice grips work great. I should get a second pair so I can have some cross bar action going on.
Its interesting what you will do once you start running out of strength.
There are at least 5 or 6 more videos to make. 5 of which are me fixing the drainage pipe I punctured near my house without realizing it.
I use big a** pliers, channellocks…
https://www.channellock.com/480-bigazz-straight-jaw-plier.aspx?
That’s really their name, 20" long… you want leverage?
Naw get a full on: Pipe wrench, the jaw rolls and locks as you move the handle. You don’t get as tired, no handle to squeeze. I have both kinds…
John
My most unusual tool is my metric adjustable wrench, and yes they do make one!!
If you look at the design of the channellocks, in the picture above, pulling down applies pressure to tighten the jaws too… not the same as a pipe wrench, but very versatile, I just thought the name was funny!
Greg
Dan Pierce said:
My most unusual tool is my metric adjustable wrench, and yes they do make one!!
If its adjustable, then what part is metric? I am cornfused
Greg, my dad reminded me quite often, to the point of nauseam, that Channellock pliers were made in Meadville PA. Like being from the next town over, Conneaut Lake, made the 2 somehow related and somehow it was like a feather in his cap. I never understood the connection.
Probably proud that they were made in the US, just like WD-40 being made right here in Sandy Eggo (although you should not use the stuff ha ha).
Greg
Greg Elmassian said:
If you look at the design of the channellocks, in the picture above, pulling down applies pressure to tighten the jaws too… not the same as a pipe wrench, but very versatile, I just thought the name was funny!
Greg
Put one in your hand and if you are not mindful of your grip, you’ll be rounding off bolt heads.
Channel locks are slip adjust, not self locking like a Monkey wrench.
I have 2 well used C-Ls, but we wuz talking torque …
John
Yep, as I said, not the same locking action… I’m old school, go for a correctly sized wrench first, preferable a hex end, then box end, then open end in order of preference.
Greg
I have many videos to post still. I am down to the last phase of the project. I have to anchor the pipes into cinder blocks along my rain garden as it runs right along the stones so nothing to go into. I also found a nice solution (that hopefully works) for in the rain garden it self.
Hopefully I finish all that tomorrow. This means that on Tuesday I am potentially raising all the rail bed up and screwing it in.
When I screw the curved pieces in, should I keep them level or try to bank the curves a bit? Keep in mind I am using preformed curves/sectional track so it might not flex as nicely.
better to keep dead level Nicolas.
One reason is to be able to check you track for “cross level” easily by putting a short level crossways on the rails", if you had to test at an angle it could be much tougher to maintain smooth trackwork. You will have transition issues too from level to superelevated.
Another reason is very few G scale locos really do well with crosslevel, their chassis are not sprung in a way that works as well as the prototype even though they may have springs on axles.
New track may take a while to “settle” so give it a while, even a few months. One thing you can do is after laying the track, use a dual rail bender set “lightly”, i.e. to follow the curves without making them larger or smaller.
Rolling the bender over the track will help smooth out curves and take out tension and stress.
Greg