03-31-2009, 02:09 PM
Man o'man... my layout is a headache. It's really depressing and has caused me to avoid my train room for about two weeks now. I tried again last night and got so frustrated I had to pull the plug before I started throwing locos and rolling stock everywhere.
I've finsihed my main line, and I've tried running trains, but nothing can make it the full circuit without derailing... I know for sure that I gotta replace the Atlas turnouts with Pecos, the Peco turnouts I do have seem to be pretty much flawless....
but the rest of the layout is giving me strong issues. My locos (daylight and challenger) keeps skipping the rails and giving me shorts/SVDA errors on my MRC Express, my Consolidation can't make it anywhere without stalling out...yet works fine on my test oval of bachman eztrack.
It's quite upsetting....
I'm so close to tearing it all up again it's not even funny... I need some tips on how to lay track thats reliable. I solder feeders every foot or so, and in the yard every leg section has it's own set of feeders. I've cleaned all the tracks with a bright boy and then atlas track cleaner with a nice soft cloth. I've even went around it with my Aztec track cleaner a few times and I'm still getting tons of stalls on straight and level track with my smaller locos. (the challenger stalls quite often too, but the Daylight is awesome)
I've even done a good cleaning on the loco wheels, and they sparkle as if they are new... so I know theres electircal contact there.
I'm using Atlas code 80 and Woodland scenic road bed for my track work. I use white glue to keep it all down, and I usually weight the track into the glue using cans of food and let them sit for a minimum of 10 hours before I remove the cans.
My wire for my bus is slightly thicker than the stuff Atlas sells, and the feeders are all atlas feeder wires.
I don't solder my joints unless it's flex...because my last layout had lots of issues when I soldered every joint....
Even my diesels are giving me issues... My intermountains stall more than any of my other locos...and my Atlas GP9 can't make it through the yard smoothly either.
My top performers are my Kato Daylight, Bachmann Heavy Mountain, and Bachmann J-class. Those three do not stall out and hold the rails the best...but still skip every once in a while....
minimum radius is 11... so I'm thinking I'm going to redo @ 13 minimum if I tear it all up (which I most likley will....aside from the terminal where I'll just replace the atlas turnouts with peco)
I've finsihed my main line, and I've tried running trains, but nothing can make it the full circuit without derailing... I know for sure that I gotta replace the Atlas turnouts with Pecos, the Peco turnouts I do have seem to be pretty much flawless....
but the rest of the layout is giving me strong issues. My locos (daylight and challenger) keeps skipping the rails and giving me shorts/SVDA errors on my MRC Express, my Consolidation can't make it anywhere without stalling out...yet works fine on my test oval of bachman eztrack.
It's quite upsetting....
I'm so close to tearing it all up again it's not even funny... I need some tips on how to lay track thats reliable. I solder feeders every foot or so, and in the yard every leg section has it's own set of feeders. I've cleaned all the tracks with a bright boy and then atlas track cleaner with a nice soft cloth. I've even went around it with my Aztec track cleaner a few times and I'm still getting tons of stalls on straight and level track with my smaller locos. (the challenger stalls quite often too, but the Daylight is awesome)
I've even done a good cleaning on the loco wheels, and they sparkle as if they are new... so I know theres electircal contact there.
I'm using Atlas code 80 and Woodland scenic road bed for my track work. I use white glue to keep it all down, and I usually weight the track into the glue using cans of food and let them sit for a minimum of 10 hours before I remove the cans.
My wire for my bus is slightly thicker than the stuff Atlas sells, and the feeders are all atlas feeder wires.
I don't solder my joints unless it's flex...because my last layout had lots of issues when I soldered every joint....
Even my diesels are giving me issues... My intermountains stall more than any of my other locos...and my Atlas GP9 can't make it through the yard smoothly either.
My top performers are my Kato Daylight, Bachmann Heavy Mountain, and Bachmann J-class. Those three do not stall out and hold the rails the best...but still skip every once in a while....
minimum radius is 11... so I'm thinking I'm going to redo @ 13 minimum if I tear it all up (which I most likley will....aside from the terminal where I'll just replace the atlas turnouts with peco)
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-Luke
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-Luke
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