Author

John Jesson

Date

22nd December 2024

Reading Time

4 minutes

The traverser on board 4 (the “Rest of the World” RoW traverser – left hand end as watching the layout) of Orchard Wharf has never worked satisfactorily. Unlike the traversers at the other end of the layout, which use roller bearings, the RoW traverser used drawer slides. Those slides were mounted horizontally, which was a mistake, as adjustment was next to impossible. Another shortcoming, shared by all the traversers, was that the track centre spacing was 50mm. This has proven insufficient to get some of the stock on the track reliably, in particular bogie vehicles, diesel locos and steam locos with bogies or pony trucks, as fingers don’t fit in the narrow space between vehicles.

Both problems have been addressed in the rebuild of the RoW traverser. The drawer slides have been remounted vertically and screw adjusters installed near each corner, so that the deck can be finely height adjusted. The track, which was brass strip, has been completely removed and is being replaced with soldered rail/copper clad construction. The track centre spacing is still 50mm at the end meeting the viewable part of the layout, but spreads out to 67mm at the other end. This is one of the reasons for replacing the brass strip – soldered construction is much easier to curve. The brass strip will not go to waste, though, as it will be used on the yet-to-be-built extension board.

The soldered track has 20mm wide pads of copper clad sheet at each end, with 30mm long sleepers placed 35mm apart. Under the rails between the sleepers are 30mm long copper clad strips. This seems like a lot of unnecessary soldering, but those strips are there for a reason. That reason is that accidents happen. Things can get dropped on the track, and rails can get dented. Such damage can be difficult to repair, maybe impossible. Making the rail solid by putting a support underneath makes such accidents much less consequential. Anything that prevents accident damage is worth doing.

 

Work on tracklaying started last Thursday and this is how things looked at end of play. Left is a general view of the RoW traverser. Centre is a close-up of the pads at the interface with the rest of the layout. Right is a similar close-up at the other end, which will interface with the extension board. One rail of each of the 4 racks has been soldered in place on the pads at the layout end.

Work started Saturday with cutting several long strips of copper clad and placing them under the rails. The rails were soldered to these strips as tracklaying proceeded.

Next, the second rail was added to each of the 4 tracks (I’d forgotten my EM Gauge track gauges on Thursday).

Then track 1 (closest to the back of the layout) was extended to the end of the traverser and soldered to the end pads and the intermediate strips. This track is straight, so was easy to lay. The sleepers and rail supports were added at the extension end to secure the short rail pieces (the board is 1100mm long, the rails are 915mm long).

Once this first track was laid, the second was laid, using the first as a baseline. At the extension end, the tracks are spaced at 67mm centre lines, so tracks 2, 3 and 4 have increasing sideways displacement. At each end there is a straight section, and acrylic railing assisters will be installed at the 50mm spacing end, possibly, at the other end as well.

Three tracks were laid on Saturday and the fourth should get done next Saturday. Then the intermediate sleepers and rail supports will be added and the long temporary strips removed.

Before the track wires are reattached, everything will be removed and the board painted to cover the coloured lines. Repainting the coloured lines will be more difficult, and I’m inclined to just add colour coding to the end pads. What does everyone else think?