Laying some track

It was time to lay some Gargraves track, which is my brand of preference. My end curves are 048 (48" diameter) which isn't considered "sharp" for 3-rail O scale trains (the standard 027 or 031 tubular track curves popularized by Lionel are sharp) but it isn't as broad as 072, which is what large steam engines like Big Boys require. And I have found that it is impossible to bend old or used Gargraves track into anything close to 048 without trouble. Over time, the wood ties swell and corrosion and rust form on the rails and lock the two components together so that you can only gently nudge them into curve shapes. Spraying the ties with WD40 helps but it makes it more difficult to paint and weather the ties, and building plywood jigs to help bend the curves evenly is a good solution but for two curves total it wasn't worth the effort or expense. 

So, I needed new Gargraves track, which is more flexible. And the best place to buy it is straight from the company. They are located about 30 minutes from my old hometown of Rochester, and about 3 hours from my current residence. I have been to their shop before but it was 20+ years ago, and I wasn't planning on driving through their town anytime soon. So I called them up and placed an order for delivery. The owner was extremely friendly and helpful, and he told me that the track I was ordering would be made to order as he currently had none in stock. He assured me it would bend just fine.

And when I arrived, I found out he was half correct. It does bend a bit easier than old track, but it still requires some force. I had to test bend one section at a time (not an easy thing to do) while maintaining the ends of the rails (which constantly shifted as it was bent) and also plan out the locations for the under-rail feeder wires.

When I finally had the first section ready, I attached it with some clear latex caulk.

To assist in holding it in place while the caulk cured, long screws and washers were driven through the 2" foam into the 1/4" plywood benchwork top. They just barely reached, and the washers barely straddled two rails. But it worked.

I decided to shim up the end of the track with a thin piece of balsa.

Once the first piece of track was good and solid (hours later), I gently used a block of wood to tap the rails along the now-secure ties so that they lined up with the edge of the benchwork. Then, I measured and bent and cut the second piece of track. This was dutifully attached to the layout. 

The track joint between sections on the curve was a little bit worrying. I did my best to make it smooth but I couldn't check to see how well it flowed until after I had pulled the screws out.

I needn't have worried. My young track tester pushed some trains back and forth over the joint (at speed!) and it was nice and smooth, with no derailments or bumps. However the real test will be my scale-length Amtrak coaches, which I will pull out and use before ballasting the track. 

The rail joints were later disguised with cut up pieces of ties. It takes four pieces of tie to hide the joint.

Like before, all three rails are wired and I used spade connectors at the ends of the wires which click right into the underside of the rail. It is super easy as long as you remember to wire them up before laying the track.

The wires were secured to the underside to keep them safe, and then the holes were filled with caulk to prevent leaks during later scenery work.

I also temporarily marked the locations of the feeders from above, but this step isn't as critical on a simple curve track. Later I marked them down on my wiring schematic.

The first end went fine, but the far end gave me a bit more trouble. No matter how hard I tried I had a few gentle kinks in the curve. Tests with long passenger cars showed it to be okay, but it looked a bit silly and it bothered me. After thinking about it for a day, I used my Dremel to cut the rails right before the offending area and then rip out the piece of track. And like that, $15 went down the drain as there was no way to reuse it. But, I was more careful to bend the replacement piece (especially the ends) and that went down perfectly. I was much happier after that.

The foam goes on...

During my vacation I decided to press on with my layout. I first had to clean off the ends of the layout which had done a good job of collecting non-layout stuff. 

Then, I balanced a piece of the 2x8' long 2" foam on the end (factory-straight edge facing the existing layout, parking lot cut edge away from the layout) and drew an outline of where to cut underneath the foam with a marker. Then, it was flipped over so that I would work from the top.

My hot wire foam tool made quick work of cutting outside the edge. I left extra material for now.

Then, the foam was glued in place. I used leftover latex caulk and foam-safe construction adhesive during the process as I had several half-full bottles on hand. My wife's weights held it in position to cure.

I then took some scraps and repeated the process to fill in the very end pieces. Note that there were sizeable gaps between the two because when I cut the foam in half in the parking lot I wasn't precise. It doesn't make a bit of difference in the end, but it looks a bit ugly. What did make a difference was finding out the thickness of the foam wasn't consistent across the entire 4x8' piece. The two sections I used for this end weren't the same thickness!

I later went back with my hot wire tool and cleaned up the edges. I didn't care if I took off too much, but I certainly didn't want to leave any protruding over the sides which will later cause problems when I finally add my fascia boards.

Finally, I used my modified wooden yardstick to draw in the O-48 (48" diameter) curves on the ends. I added about 2" of straight track at the joint before marking the curve, which should help prevent derailments at the joints.

Cork roadbed (I bought a box used several years ago and still have some left) was glued down with more latex caulk and held in place with pins. At the joints, I used thin wood and cardstock to build up shims to match the height of the existing sections (wouldn't you know that the new foam on the ends was thicker than the old foam? Grr).

I later used a Stanley Surform tool (essentially a metal grater blade) to build a ramp in the cork roadbeds at the ends of the curve to lower them down to the existing layout's roadbed height. 

Finally, the foam got a coat of brown paint. Later, the roadbed got a coat of gray paint which isn't entirely necessary but it makes everything look nicer until the track is installed.

Now, I just need to buy some track!

Railroad Crossing Flashers

I have always liked the look of crossing flashers on model railroads, and I knew I wanted to incorporate some into my own layout. There is something special about when the red lights start flashing and you eagerly wait with anticipation for a train to arrive.

However, most of the commercial offerings by Lionel, MTH and Menards sacrifice scale fidelity for durability and simplicity. And many of them are permanently integrated into the sectional track. (Yes... "Wehonest" has some for sale on Ebay that look good for under $20, and had no other options been available I would have gone with those).

I wanted a nice look set of crossing signals that would flash as long as a button was pushed on the fascia of my layout. Harrison would get a kick out of that, as would I. I didn't want to have them triggered via optical detection (such as when a train broke a beam of light) or via electronic detection (which would require dividing the track into circuits). I also didn't want gates to come up and down, because to me they never look good scaled down.

So, at the 2025 Springfield train show I talked with some companies and found out that Tomar Industries made really nice looking crossing flashers (#862). Tomar wasn't at the train show, and I could not find any vendors selling them. A call the following week to Tomar confirmed that they did make them, but they were currently out of stock. I ordered two pairs (4 signals total... always order more than you need in case they become unobtainable in the future) and was put on a waiting list. A year passed and I happened to talk to Tomar regarding something else entirely and I reminded them of the order. They were very apologetic and said they would push them through. A few weeks after the 2026 Springfield show and I had them in my hand. They are lovely and delicate, and I can't wait to use them. 

But I have no real idea how to wire them up. You need to purchase third-party software to work with the signals and a power source to make them flash on and off, and alternate left and right. So, I called Logic Rail Technologies, who also were at Springfield. Chuck helped me select the right product to make the flashers activate at the push of the button.

The crossing signals use 2.4 volt LEDs, and if you put 12v of power to them they will blow up! So, you need to install resistors (which Tomar provided) in line. The LRT boards can operate between 7-12 volts so any DC power pack like I use to run my building lights would work. But I wanted a stand-alone power source, and I always have lots of 9v batteries lying around. Chuck said 9v would be fine, and the 300-ohm resistors Tomar provided would be good. He also explained where I had to cut in the momentary on/off toggle switch into the circuit to make it operate.

All was fine and good until I went to give him my credit card info. Then I saw that there are separate boards to control bell sounds. They offer them with "classic" bell sounds, modern bell sounds, and electronic bell sounds. I wanted the classic sounds, so I ordered that board plus a speaker too. All told it was a lot less than I expected.

The instructions are multiple pages with lots of great diagrams, and they cover nearly every possible way to trigger them and wire them up (with options for flashing rates and other such stuff). It was all a bit confusing for me, so I cut/pasted only the relevant portions I needed into one diagram. The green control button wire was added to the schematic after confirming with Chuck that it was correct.

To wire it up, I decided to mount everything on a offcut of plywood so that I could work on at my workbench. I could test it there, and if it operated correctly I could attach it to the bottom of the layout. I glued some small pieces of wood where the circuit board mounting screws would go to elevate it from the plywood and protect the component solder joints underneath. 

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The speaker was an 80 ohm speaker that I purchased from LRT. It didn't come with an enclosure, and I couldn't find one online for a 2" speaker, so I made one from some sheet styrene and a PVC pipe coupling that I had lying around. To get the larger hole, I chain drilled a bunch of smaller holes and connected them with my chisel knife blade. Then, files brought it to final size. I soldered on some wires to the back of the speaker, and then used clear caulk to attach it to the styrene frame I made.

The base is more laminated styrene, to which I first attached the PVC coupling with MEK solvent. Then, I ran a thick bead around the inside to further seal it up.

I couldn't wait to test the sound so I hooked it up with a temporary on/off button wired in, but it didn't work. So, I reached out to L.R.T. who looked at what I did and quickly noticed one switch was set the wrong way. Then, it worked great. So much so that Harrison could hear it upstairs. Yes!

I haven't hooked up the lights yet because they look fragile and I don't want to damage them. I can't install these on the layout until I have built the road that they are to protect, and I can't do that until I figure out exactly what industry is going on the rear siding (freight station? Agway? Etc.) 

So, into storage they go...

Foam for the layout curves

After waiting for ages to take the next step, I finally had a time when my vehicle's child safety seat was out and the seats were folded down. This gave me the space required to purchase a 4'x8'x2" sheet of green foam board. I cut it in half lengthwise in the store and then managed to get it into my car... barely... with 1" to spare. But at least I could bring it home and start on the next phase of the layout.

My annual vacation is next week, so I hope to make more progress on the layout in the next few days. First, though, I will need to start cleaning up the Lego projects Harrison and I have been working on which are currently residing on the ends of the benchwork.