Hello gents.

I've been mulling over the idea of gluing the rail to the wood deck on my pier instead of spiking it down. I decided that this might be a better idea aesthetically speaking just because I did not like how my turnout for the float bridge looked after I had spiked in place.

A couple of ideas I found searching on line in other web resources;

1) Suggests hot gluing the rail letting it dry, then placing the rail on the deck and reactivate the glue with a soldering gun.
2) Using Barge cement thinned with Acetone (2:1) mix letting it dry and again reactivating it with a soldering iron when placed on the deck.
3) Using AC to glue the rail in place.

I am not a fan of the latter idea, as I tend to have accidents when I use AC. I like the first one, because it seems the less "caustic" of the three. However, from what I have been able to glean by reading on line the thinned barge cement is hands down the winner and will hold the rail to the decking until the cows come home. The thinned Barge technique seems to be commonly used by people who have scratch built wood trestles and need to affix the rail in place.

I wonder if anyone here has any experience with this and can perhaps post up some more info?

S.

I can only echo what I've read...

Go with using the Barges Cement.

I haven't tried Barge cement with rail, but have used in extensively in leather work and it works great there. If it holds the rail to the wood as well as it bonds leather, it will be great!

I would avoid CA as the bond never seems permanent. After awhile, the rail will come loose.

Unfortunately, my only experience with rails on piers, was with a concrete pier, not a wood one.
That said, I would venture a guess that a wood pier that carried rails, would have been designed more like a wood trestle. Stringers on the pier bents, ties on the stringers, and track spiked to the ties.....then, the "walk" surfaces ( wood plank ) would have been added. My guess would be additional stringers on the bents, for the walkways.
In other words.......the rails weren't fastened to the deck, the deck was fastened around the rails.....and you could use flex track, and contact cement that to the stringers, and add the "deck" after.
It's a thought.

The rails on the Pacific Coast Railway pier at Harford's wharf in Port San Luis were on top of the deck.

Have used Pliobond to attach rails to wood ties. Coat the bottom of the rails. Put them in place and warm the rails until the Pliobond melts. That method goes back to the '50's and was used for code 40 in n scale before PC ties in the '70's.

Harold

hminky Wrote:The rails on the Pacific Coast Railway pier at Harford's wharf in Port San Luis were on top of the deck.
Have used Pliobond to attach rails to wood ties. Coat the bottom of the rails. Put them in place and warm the rails until the Pliobond melts. That method goes back to the '50's and was used for code 40 in n scale before PC ties in the '70's.
Harold

I stand "educated" :o .
I'd almost completely forgotten about Pliobond !, and yes, it was once fairly universally used for that, and much more. ( Once upon a time, in a fair land, far, far, away,......I could actually remember ! )

Sumpter250 Wrote: ... I'd almost completely forgotten about Pliobond !, and yes, it was once fairly universally used for that, and much more. ...

Ditto!

I had totally forgotten about Pliobond! Do they still make that? I haven't seen it in years!

Our local hardware keeps Pilobound in stock. It isn't expensive as hobby items go.
Charlie

It's my understanding that Barge cement is a contact-type cement, the same as Pliobond. For contact cement, I prefer LePages' Gelled Contact Cement, although I was unsuccessful recently when looking for this brand. I did, however, find DAP Weldwood Gelled Contact Cement, and it seems to perform as well as the LePages. The advantage of the gelled formula is that it's much less stringy during application, but the disadvantage is that it's available only in quart or gallon cans - probably too much for a few hobby projects, although it is useful around the home, too.
If you use it to bond something (just about anything) to styrene, it helps to "prep" the styrene with a coat of lacquer thinner first - this prevents the solvent being drawn out of the contact cement by the plastic and yields a stronger bond. For non-mechanical joints between dissimilar materials, it's my cement of choice.

Wayne

Thanks for all the helpful replies and suggestions gents. I was kinda hoping that someone had tried the dried hot glue method as I have that readily available. I've used it to glue Tortoise Machines to the underside of the layout before using #4 screws to hold the machine in place and seemed to bond really well...a little too well in some cases where I was not careful and had to use a putty knife to pry the machine off the plywood in order to reposition it properly.

Barge Cement does not seem to be readily available around here, at least not in the local Lowes, Home Depot, or Rona stores I went into. Although I did find a couple of similar products, but was not sure if I wanted to take the chance and try them out. I did find it available in tubes at Tandy Leather, and they are just around the corner from my house.

I do have a tube of Pliobond, but I have not had great experience with it so far. I must be doing something wrong as just seem to make more of a mess then actually accomplish any cementing of materials. :?

I might give the hot glue a test go on a mock up and see how it works...see how easy it is to apply and then go from there. I think it would only be fair to at least get a tube of Barge Cement to try out the methods suggested by others as well as give the Pliobond another shot and then decide from there which of the three is good for me.

Once again thank you all. You've been most helpful.

Also to settle the idea of embedding the rails. I had thought about that, however I was inspired by Craig Bisgeier's Pier and Wharf contruction for the Housatonic Railway as well as Tim Warris' Pier construction for his former Port Kelsey layout. That and numerous pictures I came across while looking for photo samples of older wooden pier construction with rails on them.

I guess you could say I fell in love with the idea and decided, "I got to have one of those on my layout."

I've used Barge cement to fasten rails to wood ties with great success. I bought mine mail order form a shop in NY state which sells clothing for hunters and such, sorry I can't remember the name. I bought a second order some time ago and was dismayed to see a new formula (you know the story, cancer) Although it has yet to stand the test of time, it does seem to still work well. Do a search and you'll find sources. I thinned mine with an adhesive for ABS plastic, Pro Weld I think it was. And I did not use heat, I used more Pro Weld to reactivate it.

I recall an HOn3 layout in which the focus was on being able to shift the time period through three different eras. The relevant point was that all of the rail was glued instead of spiked (except at turnouts). The builder used notches in his glue dispenser (I believe it was a caulking gun application) so that it left a thin bead on the bottom of the rail when applied.

tetters Wrote:I do have a tube of Pliobond, but I have not had great experience with it so far. I must be doing something wrong as just seem to make more of a mess then actually accomplish any cementing of materials. :?

The stuff in the tube is hard to use. The solvent rises to the "top". The old stuff use to come in a brush bottle. Probably the best approach is to squeeze it out and apply it with a stick.

The reason Pliobond was used for track laying over other contact cements is it is "rubbery" and more flexible and gives a stronger bond than most. I found trackbed sections in my father's barn that had been out in the weather that still had the code 55 rail bonded to the ties.

Edit: The roadbed was from the mid=seventies.

Harold