12-19-2010, 09:59 AM
Green_Elite_Cab Wrote:Whats the advantage to hand laid track? other than looks and bragging rights?
That question is a good one, and like so many little things about the hobby, and big ones, it depends entirely on the orientation of the person doing it. If you disdain or simply loath hand laying track, it really should only be done out of dire necessity. Or a weird sense of duty.
On the other hand, at least one gentleman's needs were handily met by hand laying a turnout, and another said it was stress-busting for him at the end of a work day. If that is all laying track by hand offers any one of us, should that not be sufficient?
Mechanically, and speaking only with experience and knowledge of the Fast Tracks version of turnouts, the tolerances and construction are such that standard RP-25 conforming wheels run through the guards and frogs as if they were solid rail anywhere else on the system that is not a frog. They are that smooth. You don't have idlers on leading trucks and the smaller freight wheels dipping and jumping as they do on so many plastic and filled frogs in commercial turnouts. For some of us, it is worth the effort to get that benefit. Also worth it for me was learning that I could build my own turnouts for custom applications. Even though my jig was for a standard Code 100 #8, I learned that I could construct turnouts of various kinds due to transferability of techniques. And I did just that...twice on my current layout.
Crandell