Going back to code 80?!

[mmagliaro]

I have a question about Micro Engineering flex track. Is it hard to flex... like as in stiff as a board? I'd prefer to use it rather than Atlas code 55 flex.


Hmm... I'd prefer to be
in Borneo right now...

Not hard as a board, but it is fairly stiff.  To form a piece, say, into a 90-degree curve, you have to start at one end and inch
along with your hands, making the curve.  As you curve it to the left, the far end of it will keep tending to curve to the right,
so you have to keep inching along, curving and correcting, until you get the whole thing formed to the curve you want.
It takes some practice to get the hang of it, but it's not that bad, meaning that the first day I used it, it took me certainly less
than an hour to figure out how to work with it and make nice curves.

Like anything else, there are plusses and minuses.  But it's great track and not hard to deal with once you get the hang
of it.   

[DKS]

Not hard as a board, but it is fairly stiff.  To form a piece, say, into a 90-degree curve, you have to start at one end and inch
along with your hands, making the curve.  As you curve it to the left, the far end of it will keep tending to curve to the right,
so you have to keep inching along, curving and correcting, until you get the whole thing formed to the curve you want.
It takes some practice to get the hang of it, but it's not that bad, meaning that the first day I used it, it took me certainly less
than an hour to figure out how to work with it and make nice curves.

Like anything else, there are plusses and minuses.  But it's great track and not hard to deal with once you get the hang
of it.

It's a bit easier to start in the middle and work in both directions to make a continuous curve.

[CBQ Fan]

I think Model Power flex track is the way to go!!  Chunkie and flexes like cement.   

[LV LOU]

Not hard as a board, but it is fairly stiff.  To form a piece, say, into a 90-degree curve, you have to start at one end and inch
along with your hands, making the curve.  As you curve it to the left, the far end of it will keep tending to curve to the right,
so you have to keep inching along, curving and correcting, until you get the whole thing formed to the curve you want.
It takes some practice to get the hang of it, but it's not that bad, meaning that the first day I used it, it took me certainly less
than an hour to figure out how to work with it and make nice curves.

Like anything else, there are plusses and minuses.  But it's great track and not hard to deal with once you get the hang
of it.

Max,instead of working from one end to the other,START in the middle,and work out to the ends.This way,you're never moving more than half a rail length through the ties.And,oh yeah,if you hate doing trackwork,stay away from ME,LOL!! Everybody should be required to buy at least one piece of ME,and try to get a smooth bend in it,just so they can more appreciate the amount of time and work that ME equipped layout took..

[DKS]

Max,instead of working from one end to the other,START in the middle,and work out to the ends...

Interesting technique...

[ednadolski]

Max,instead of working from one end to the other,START in the middle,and work out to the ends.This way,you're never moving more than half a rail length through the ties.

The track does lose some of its initial stiffness once you start to work it for a bit.

Personally, I like that the ME track holds its shape once you curve it.  I find it easier to make precise joints this way, rather than trying to trim something that always wants to straighten out.   I think this also make it easier to glue the track to the roadbed, and still make adjustments as you go.

Just my $0.02 

Ed

[LV LOU]

Interesting technique...

I just love the wierd stuff it does.As you start to bend itin the middle,you bend the middle down,and the ends start to bend ..UP!!! Like a rock hard snake with a mind of it's own..

[peteski]

Lou, I think you missed the point. Look up at DKS' post, located two posts before your previous post (about the bending technique). 

[robert3985]

I just love the wierd stuff it does.As you start to bend itin the middle,you bend the middle down,and the ends start to bend ..UP!!! Like a rock hard snake with a mind of it's own..

Hahahaha....love that description!  Since I started out with the stuff back in the early 80's, none of its qualities seem odd to me.  What does seem odd is when I'm laying flex on someone else's layout and it's Atlas 55 and it won't stay in place!

[mmagliaro]

Heh, thanks David (and Lou).  It never occurred to me to start in the middle.  D'oh!
Yes, that does sound like a good idea.

I'll tell you one place on my current layout where I still used ME track.  The section across my long, curved, wooden trestle.
By using ME, I could shape the curves to the exact radius I needed on the workbench, using SweepSticks
to make sure the curves were dead smooth.   Then, since the ME holds its shape, I could epoxy the stringers to the underside,
and then place that whole, curved section in place on the layout, and install the bents under it, only having to worry about
checking the height and the side-to-side level.  This made it so much easier to construct a curved trestle with uniform curves.
Just get a height reference at each end, get bents in there, firmly glued, then get a height reference in the middle, put a bent
in there, and then just keep going with the divide-and-conquer, putting bents in between until they are all done.
But all the while, the curve stays in the exact shape it's supposed to.

[SkipGear]

ME track is wonderful for the situation Max describes. I did the same thing on an HO layout. The track was formed at the gentlemans layout. I then took it home and built the tressel. It was amazing how well it fit when I installed it. The track holds its shape remarkably.

[LV LOU]

Lou, I think you missed the point. Look up at DKS' post, located two posts before your previous post (about the bending technique). 

Actually,I saw Max's post at work,I wasn't signed on,I answered it when I got home before seeing DKS's post..

[randgust]

I'll throw another wrench in here..

Much of the 'newer' C80 and probably the Atlas C55 is very flexible, one friend calls it 'spaghetti'.   Nice to lay and not kink.

But after you put it down, that flexibility allows it to be subject to heat expansion/contraction that is DIRECTLY transferred to the gauge on curves.   I've certainly seen it.   You may never notice it go wide, but I bet you'll notice it tighten up when it squeezes Kato six-axles off of curves.   It will vary the gauge before it changes length at expansion/contraction joints, the gauge is the point of least resistance.

I'm a firm believer that you want that stiffness to keep your gauge.   That 'could' be a reason why someone would want to keep C80 over C55, just sayin'.   In theory there should be no difference, right?    I like the Peco C55, that stuff is the best of both worlds for me.  But I'm also fortunate that on my prototypes, the ties are either buried in the dirt or the ballast and tie color is nearly indistinguishable, so that european vs US tie size is somewhat irrelevant.

And if you REALLY want ugly flextrack, anybody else but me remember the original Trix C80 flex?   Made Atlas C80 look like C55!  I still have some of that stuff in staging yards.

[Kisatchie]

By using ME, I could shape the curves to the exact radius I needed on the workbench, using SweepSticks
to make sure the curves were dead smooth.

AHA! I knew HO scale had something (couldn't remember the name) for forming consistent curves, but I didn't know there were Sweepsticks for N scale. Now, I'm even more inclined to using ME flextrack.

One more question. Since ME makes only #6 turnouts, how troublesome would it be to use Atlas turnouts every now and then? Would they look out of place, etc.?


Hmm... Kiz is the only
person I know who can
make a 90 degree corner
in flex track...

[mionerr]

I simply started this as a question of why someone who build a nice layout using c55 track would wish that he used c80 instead. Honest!  That's all I was interested in. 

Peteski,
I tried to answer that for you. See my earlier response. Much of Steve's layout is code 80; the Mulford area and Jingletown. I'm not sure if he redid the yard in code 55. The staging yards are code 55. The folks that operate with him are HO and from my own experience they can be a bit heavy handed. He's had less problems with the code 80 than with the code 55. YMMV.