Fiddling with the track plan

I have fiddled with the track plan to eliminate the three way points (not available in peco code 75) and to put an extra crossover in - and to get the max radius back to 60cm - but on the main scenic parts of the track the major curves are all 80cm or better.

This version also shows all of the trestle construction which has been designed to keep the woodwork from fouling the tortoise point motors that will go under the circuit.

American Drills and Taps

Thinking about Kadee couplings you get offered taps and screws and drills you get advertised by Kadee - these come with confusing notations like 2-56 and #50 - here is a decoder to those notations - concentrating on the small sizes relevant to Kadees

American Drill Sizes

#43 ....2.2mm
#48 ....1.9mm
#50 ....1.8mm
#53 ....1.5mm
#56 ....1.2mm
#62 ....1.0mm

American Screw sizes

Tend to be of form X-YY (e.g. 0-80) where X is the diameter and YY is the threads per inch

000 ~ 0.85mm
oo ~ 1.2mm
o ~ 1.5mm
1 ~ 1.85mm
2 ~ 2.2mm

Kadees

I have been doing lots of work on kadees, I have modified some of my stock, and researched a lot.

It seems very complex, with a bewildering array of kadee types and fixings.

It isn't helped by the fact that the NEM standard that should help and is bandied around alot is both poorly adhered to and poorly explained...

There seem to be two relevant standards -

The NEM 362 http://www.miba.de/morop/nem362-d.pdf
and the NEM 363 http://www.miba.de/morop/nem363-d.pdf

though everyone seems to just talk about NEM coupler pockets.

Whilst I have found the Kadees for NEM (17 though 20) work ok in the 362 pockets, they rarely seem to work well in 363 in my very limited experience.

Sorry can only find the standards in German, think may have to get them translated.

There also seems to be a real need to gather everyone's UK conversion experience together and no-one has really done a solid job on this.

A Track Plan

Only working intermittently whilst I am here and not in Oxford.

But I have settled on a track plan. Well I say settled it has been through about 40 revisions. I am using the freeware Xtrkcad, which is actually very good once you get up the learning curve.

The room is about 5.5M by 4M at maximum, but it has the boiler room taking out a corner of it, and it is also narrower at that end.

I have now built two of the trestles and have bought the wood for most of the rest, but not done much more, apart from succumbing to an occaisional shopaholic desire to purchase lovely models - mostly locomotives.

I have been thinking and experimenting with couplings a lot and more on that anon.