Tuesday, January 5, 2021

Custom Turnout Build

 As I am following the prototype track layouts and industries, trying to fit what happens over miles and miles of real world into 20' to 40' blocks of space is a bit of a challenge, as you can imagine.

Coming into the Greendale area, I had a couple of spurs to fit in; complicated by where I had placed the Chickahominy River crossing.

I decided to scratchbuild two curved turnouts, one left and one right, each of them on the 40" radius inside curve.

To the immediate left, just out of frame in this picture is the river crossing so not a bunch of room to work in.


The closest to the camera is a number 10 frog, while the one in the back ended up as a number 8, after I realized that a 10 wouldn't have the departure angle I needed to fit it without significantly changing the track layout.

I used my ME track gauges to keep the rails in gauge as I soldered, as there wasn't a jig or other template that I could crib from. Of course, I was able to use the point and frog forming tools from my Fast Tracks stuff to help me along.

These turnouts have been installed with the rest of the track in this area, so keep your eyes peeled for an update later on to show the finished product.

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