a street track project

[michael mott]

This might take a while because I am basically going to be experimenting with some textures both horizontally and vertically.

I have been playing with some track and have a basic concept worked out to include a single blade switch.

Michael

[finescalerr]

Looks like fun. -- Russ

[Ray Dunakin]

Nice start, looks like it'll be an interesting project!

[Chuck Doan]

Nice job bending the flange rails against the grain!

[michael mott]

Thanks Russ, hopefully I will be able to add some new ideas to the pool. Ray your own work has given me a lot of ideas over the years, so perhaps I can bring something new to the table. Chuck, glad you like the rail bending, tomorrow I will post a picture of the bender that I made. Your own work has given me many moments of wow how did he achieve that ? finding new ideas for the members of this forum will certainly be a big challenge given all the talent here, one of the reasons that this might take a while.

regards Michael

[lab-dad]

Looking forward to this!
I need to build a rail bender (for code 250) so I am anxious to see yours.
-Marty

[Hauk]

Interesting project, but what scale is it?

[michael mott]

Marty here is a picture and drawing of the rail bender.

Hauk the scale is 1:22.6 which is the old gauge 3 which I understand is having a bit of a revival in England. the gauge will be 63.5mm the rails that I am using are code 210 for the running rail and code 100 for the guard rail. the combination gives me a width of scale 4 inches over the running and guard rails.

One of my goals is to do some tests with the infill materials and use real concrete powder to formulate concrete textures and use clay to make and bake real bricks, because we cannot scale molecules it will be interesting to see what challenges come to the surface.

Michael

[michael mott]

A little more work on the single blade. a scrap of .25 inch brass plate was first milled with a rebate .075 x .075 inch the the blade was sawn off with a jewelers saw with a #3 saw blade it took 45 minutes to cut.

Then it was filed to shape to fit the curved rail and the circular button.

After soldering them together the slot was milled into the button and the cleaned up a bit.

Michael

[Ray Dunakin]

Darn good work!

[michael mott]

Thanks Ray
I am doing some experiments with creosoted wood setts, first test is to get a sense of what they would look like and the proportions, these are still wet so the colour is still very black. the wood is very fine grained cedar. dropped into some dilute Tamiya black then immediately plucked out with some tweezers to drain off. I like the idea of the wood sets I looked for some standard dimensions but they seem to be all over the map.

Michael

[michael mott]

More work with the wood setts this picture from this website http://www.roadswerenotbuiltforcars.com/wood/is the direction that i am looking to follow.

Michael

[Ray Dunakin]

Very cool. I've never heard of wood being used as cobblestones -- quite interesting!

[Hydrostat]

Hi Michael,

good to see you back posting!
This is going to be an interesting thread. The wooden cobblestones are a quite unusual item. Good choice! I've seen that in rather modern railway or streetcar workshops but never outdoors. Any idea which kind of wood they used? I think your modeling approach is good, but maybe you could sand the surface a bit to reduce the grain/fibers.

Cheers,
Volker

[Bill Gill]

Very interesting wooden fill between the rails, a nice contrast in color and texture and an unexpected material and look. My initial thought when seeing the blocks in the first photo was they were short pieces you dyed just to economical test the coloring technique.