Building a tram layout

[IST]

Thanks for your answers. If only Kato had offered more straight plates in the V50 set instead the same oval.

It would be good, but I'm afraid we have to wait some month for the straight plates.

[IST]

In the previous days I was thinking about a long line, which can be built from the start set. If you separate the 90° curves into 2 pieces and connect them in a different way, you got a long but curving track. I had to try it, so today I made some changes, just for fun. It looks interesting, but of course it is not so useful with these baseboards. If someone would like to build a shelf-layout, he could do it in this way.

[disturbman]

It's a start but without turnouts that doesn't look good at all. This layout cries for a little bit of operational fun which is for the moment impossible with Unitracks.

[nekomo]

Hi,

Thanks for your pictures, IST. With the Unitrack turnouts you show some days ago, definetively is not possible to close this circuit, is it?

[IST]

With the Unitrack turnouts you show some days ago, definetively is not possible to close this circuit, is it?

It is possible, but currently I have only digitalised version of turnouts. And these pictures was made just for fun, I won't use the Unitram set in this way.

[IST]

Just a quick update:
My second tram (the blue one) arrived some days ago. I started to work on the parking area set plus I bought a bank building. I also bought a #4 turnout, so I will try how can I use it to make a big loop from the track.
You can see more pictures here.

[Hobby Dreamer]

Thanks again for sharing IST;

That's a great link site you provided - makes you realize how well done the model trams are when looking at the prototype pics and video..

Given that there is only an oval available you are doing some interesting stuff with your layout!!

[IST]

Thanks Hobby Dreamer!

Today I made a try with the turnout. It seems to be that I had wrong, because my idea is not working. I'm sure that I did something wrong, but do not know what.
Please see the attached picture! As you see, I made a new trackplan which is a big loop with one turnover. My idea was that I can use this loop with only one controller, as the #4 turnout has non-power routing, so I can not make any short circuit. I was wrong, it does not work. Have you got any tips how can I make this layout to work?

[qwertyaardvark]

Just looking at it, and IIRC, I'm pretty sure the #4 turnout *is* power routing, and that whenever you make a "return loop" like that with a power routing turnout, it will short circuit. You will need a special setup of a DPDT (double pole double throw) switch and wiring and need to isolate the turnout from the loop.

A quick google search  of "model railroading reversing loops" yields this website: http://www.building-your-model-railroad.com/model-railroad-wiring.html

[bill937ca]

I think putting a loop on both ends will eliminate the short circuit.  That would really be no different than a oval or loop. The existing loop is OK.  It's at the stub end that the problem occurs with a conflict between the positive rail and the negative rail.

But of course loops eat up a tremendous amount of space.  I already know that! 

[IST]

I'm pretty sure the #4 turnout *is* power routing

It has a non power routing setup in the basement. But you have right, it seems I can not avoid isolating.

A quick google search  of "model railroading reversing loops" yields this website: http://www.building-your-model-railroad.com/model-railroad-wiring.html

I would never thought that I will find picture of Hungarian type signals in this home page. 

I think putting a loop on both ends will eliminate the short circuit.

Yes, it is true. But my idea was that there is a one track final station in the end of the loop.

It was a good experience for me. As so many guys in this forum, I am waiting for the straight sections and turnouts and until that time, it is interesting to see what type of track plan can I build.

[KenS]

A return loop always causes a polarity problem, because the left rail on the switch curves around and meets the right rail. 

If your turnout can control polarity on both rails, then you could connect the power pack to track on the loop, and the turnout would do the reversal for you, although that might cause other problems.

But Kato's #4 is "power routing" on the inside rails only (assuming both screws are set to "non-power routing"; yes, the name seems backwards). See suggestion #19-2b on this site for an explanation of how the switch behaves. So that won't work with this switch.  Basically, if both screws are in "non-power routing", the polarity of the inside rail of the loop will reverse when the switch is thrown, without causing a short, but the outer rail won't reverse, so even if it is isolated, the train won't run.

If you set both screws to "power routing", the switch works properly if you want to power a non-loop siding continuously. When set to "non-power routing", the siding (or straight beyond the switch) will be dead unless the switch is thrown towards it. This is what you'd normally use on a passing siding or engine storage track.

I think you'll need to isolate both rails of the loop as qwertyaardvark  said, and install a double-pole switch wired to reverse polarity.

[Hobby Dreamer]

You are in good hands here regrading the wiring..

But I really like your layout experimenting! 

[cteno4]

in this situation with a point on a reversing loop like this you will need to also isolate the outside point rail as that ends up common all the way around the loop -- turning off the power routing does not affect those outside common rails! you can do this with an insulated joiner on the diverging points of the turnout. reversing loops are a pain to deal with. there are some auto circuits you can get to switch the feeder track once your train is in the loop section or you can do that by hand. best way is to just do the feeder track on one totally isolated block wiring and the loop on another. then put a reversing switch on each. basically you have to keep flipping your reversing switch for a block when a tram leaves that block so it is set for the appropriate polarity when you run into it next time.

ill put the mention in again for the ru21 reversing/pausing circuit for odd tram layouts like this and point to points. it really does a wonderful job of doing a reversing point to point and giving you a bunch of pause points in between! really makes it seem like realistic operations. you can even get up to 10 pause points if you want, so you can have it stop at intersections as well! then it lets you not worry about dealing with reversing loops!

http://www.jnsforum.com/index.php/topic,1255.0.html

cheers

jeff

[IST]

ill put the mention in again for the ru21 reversing/pausing circuit for odd tram layouts like this and point to points. it really does a wonderful job of doing a reversing point to point and giving you a bunch of pause points in between!

I plan to buy and try this ru21 unit, but the second tram was more important for me at this moment (my budget for model trains is quite limited). ru21 works with more trams, or there can be only one vehicle on the track?

[cteno4]

you could put more than one tram on, but it would be like doing it with a regular power supply, faster tram would catch the slower one. also when one tram trips a sensor both will either reverse or pause (depending on what circuit the sensor is plugged into).

to do more than one tram on a line you need to go to a block control system east penn has a new circuit like this for their ttrak. it stops a tram before it enters a block that is occupied by another tram. only problem is the stop points are not as coordinated as the sensor system and its a bunch more circuitry to do.

other option is dcc, but harder in the trams to install at times. also you still need to keep track of all your trams with the decoder. you can automate the dcc, but thats a whole nother ball of worms to get into!

the ru21 really works best with just one tram per line. getting more than one tram per line running is a big jump in automation (block control, dcc, etc) if you want them running independently.

cheers

jeff

[IST]

Thanks Jeff for your explanation. I am thinking about running more trams on the layout, so maybe ru21 won't be a good solution, but I will be curious a video about it.

I modified a little of my last attempt, I put back the track on the TV stand and turn the swith at the one end of the line. With this I can use 2 trams, which follows each other in one way and when one of the tram reaches the other end of the track, I have to turn all of them. Or, I can make a return trip with one tram, while the other one is just standing on the side. You can see a picture about it below.
I have the bank office, it looks good, I like it.
And I am thinking about my biiiiig plan, maybe I can have a dogbone type layout in the living room in the length of 4.5 meter.  My wife has to agree with it, so I think I have to know the vacuum cleaner in the next few years. 

[Hobby Dreamer]

the ru21 really works best with just one tram per line.

Thanks for the great info Jeff... 

[IST]

Hmm, I wrote here quite a long time ago. Not much happened in the past few days or weeks, I am just playing with the set and quite like it. A wrote a little review to our railway related website with a lot of pictures about the trams, so can see here: http://www.vonatmagazin.hu/?p=16726
And I am currently working on this:

[westfalen]

I have one of those waiting to be put together, good to see a good photo showing where all the parts go.

[IST]

It was a surprise for me that I had to use glue to keep the smaller parts in their positions.

[nekomo]

Is that a Kato reference?

[IST]

I don't know, but without gluing, small parts fell out from the holes.

[IST]

After more than 3 month, I almost completed my little town. I bought some new buildings since my last post, placed the stickies and made some photos about the result. I turned the layout so you can see it from all sides (and I moved my cars every time, I do not have so many  ).
I know that this layout has not finished yet, peoples are missing, I'd like to buy or make a lot of trees and I need to get more cars also. It was a very good experience to make it, I enjoyed (almost) every minute and it looks good in my living room. I won't continue it until new tracks and swithces won't be available for Unitram.

[cteno4]

IST,

nice! the new tomytec 5 and 6 story building will go nicely with the unitram layouts and kato buildings. hopefully new track will be out this year and you can start to expand! its nice the basic setup sits on a pretty small footprint. if you make a small base out of thin plywood framed with some simple molding you can not only make a nice display stand, but its also pretty movable then!

glad you had fun with it.

cheers

jeff

[westfalen]

Looking good.

[KenS]

That looks very nice. it definitely needs more cars to look like Japan. 

[Bernard]

IST - The layout looks great.... but don't you know layouts are never finished, we always find something to add on or redo.

[clem24]

One of the recent copies of RM Models showed some home made straight sections of unitram track (basically just unitrack, a base to match it to the height of the roadplates, and then plastic overtop for the road) and some neat layouts. I can post some scans if that's allowed here...

[Toni Babelony]

Looks really great, but the grey low building in the middle makes my heart bleed. I don't think in Japan a pre-war corner building would be blocked off by an ordinary combini (small supermarket) like that. I really deserves to be on a street corner with teh combini in a less prominent place...

[westfalen]

That looks very nice. it definitely needs more cars to look like Japan. 

Maybe they are leaving their cars at home and catching the new light rail into town.

What it needs to look like Japan, a big city at least, is people, lots of people. And when you get them on add a few more for good measure.

[IST]

Thanks for your comments. I have two other projects also (you can see a big size (really!) picture one of them here, which will be my first modul ever if I will have time to finish it), so it is very hard to find a good compromise between them. But peoples and cars are on my list and I would like to buy also a Tomix office building, or two and make a small skyscraper.

And sometimes I am dreaming about Shinkansens, but my wife would not prefer to collect another type models...

[Hobby Dreamer]

I can post some scans if that's allowed here...

Please do!

[wmo168]

You should be able to stack the Kato structure with several unit to make skyscraper.  Search the forums and there are people who had done it.

[IST]

Just a short update:

In this weekend I rebuilt my Unitram layout. I frankly bored the base oval layout, so started to thinking about a little extension with one part of my current Unitrack pieces. I wanted to make a connection between the two separated tracks with the double crossover from the V7 set and also wanted to make a short siding for one tram. The available space was about 140*60 cm.
You can see the final version on the pictures. My biggest problem was that the spacing between the two tracks at the Unitram set is 25 mm at the end of a curve, while the crossover has 33 mm spacing. I tried some variation with my different radii curves, but I had no luck or the space was small. After some useless test of track connection, I simply connect the Unitram track and the crossover with 248 mm long track. It looks not so good, but works perfectly, trams can go on it without any problem.
After the changes I quite liked to play on the layout, changing between the two rails with my trams, go to the siding and back, so it was fun. Now I am thinking about buying plus office buildings to hide the Unitrack section of the back area of the layout. (Yes, I saw the new Kato buildings...)

 

[Hobby Dreamer]

Nice Job!

You did the best one can do within the limits of what track is available. The intersection in the lower left looks great. Although Kato Unitram track looks terrific, its just crying out for more variation and I hope Kato will respond.

That's a nice table you have with room for your controls etc underneath.

Thanks for sharing!

Rick

[IST]

It is a common Ikea Bonde TV bench. Really good and useful it can hide all of my model train boxes. :-)

Currently I am thinking about hiding the gap between the 2 Unitrack tracks. I think I will make a photo about the Unitram baseboards to use it as a texture, print it and glue it to something cutted to the right size.

[IST]

First try...

[cteno4]

IST,

hey looks great! you might try just plopping the track on the scanner to get your texture.

this is basically how im building my tram ttrak module roads. 0.25" x 0.040" styrene strip is perfect to fit between the spikes on unitrack and with a paper top come up just below the rail tops. this is what im using on my street car ttrak modules. i was going to then put my street sections up against the outside rail, but now im thinking of only going out to the edge of the roadbed with the paving blocks then butting my streets up against that. this way its easier to tear up the streets later if i decide to change markings, etc and it matches well with the unitram if that ever gets intermingled with the ttrak modules.

only problem with this is you have to very firmly glue down your paper to the styrene between the rails as if any little corners start to come up they will be nasty catchers for the trucks to catch. my solution is to take my printout of my center road texture and put it on the light table and mark where i want the strip to be on the back side of the larger paper. i print the texture strip wider than the actual final strip. then liberally glue the strip down onto the back of the paper, weighted down well to give a very even bond. then i just trim the paper from the strip (along with any excess glue).

then give it a shot of matte spray to seal the edges up well and protect the surface. this also lets you play with chalks on the road surface for stains and wear and still take it off if you are not happy with it or go too far (if you do that on the printed paper directly it sticks for good).

you have created a great poor mans unitram straight track! im betting a lot of folks will start doing this to expand unitram affordably. the road plates give you a host of road signage details to play with as well!

great work!

cheers

jeff

[westfalen]

How hard would it be for Kato to run off some straight Unitram track sections and package them separately, maybe 4 to a pack? They are going to have to start doing something to keep consumers interested in the product.

[Hobby Dreamer]

Great job IST !!

How hard would it be for Kato to run off some straight Unitram track sections

Straight track is a no-brainer but I wonder if they are holding back so people buy their "system" of track. If they just sold the track maybe no one would buy the oval set. (And then they would not get their structures etc.). But anyone who has the oval will want more track!

I also sense that if they sold track separately now, before a "buy-in" to their track system, people would just get Tomix track.

I also wonder if they are acting in a manner to not compete with themselves.


Thanks Jeff, for those pointers! 

Cheers
Rick

[IST]

- Scanner... What a clever idea, it would made easier my yesterday evening. Thanks, good tip, I will try it in the weekend.
- Styrene: I have never used this before, which is not a big deal as I do not have any modeller experience, but I will looking for it. I used cardboard, but it was too thin.
- Wider strip: good point again. I was thinking how can I solve that the paper does not come up at the end and this is the solution.

[cteno4]

IST

you can get the strip styrene in the hobby shop, then just chop it to your desired length.

on the outsides of the tracks im finding that .020 thick styrene works best once the paper is on top. this can then go out on top of the spike heads on the outside of the rail, butt up against the rail. this gives you a slight elevation on the rail which is good to keep good contact with the tram wheels and rail (any bump up might jump the wheels up a tad).

nice thing about the styrene is that it stays pretty flat and wont warp with moisture, glue, etc. you can also probably find strip 020 styrene wide enough for your various track and road parts at your hobby shop as well or buy a sheet of it and cut it up. the 020 is pretty thin stuff and cuts like chipboard, just be careful as the knife tip will want to wander easily off the straight edge with styrene much more than with chipboard.

i wonder in hungary they probably use metric measurements for the styrene though! .020 is approx 0.5mm. 0.25" is 6.35mm, so probably in 5mm or 6mm package. usually the strips are like 30-35cm long and like 6-10 to a pack here in the states.

i toyed for a short time doing a decal to put onto the styrene for around the tracks, but quickly realized that trying to get long skinny decals onto thin strips like this would probably be very frustrating and not come out all that straight (a problem with the concrete pad pattern around the tracks!) paper is easier and cheap and lets you experiment a lot. for the final streets im using a heavy rag drawing paper that has a nice rough surface to give a tad of texture to the road surface. regular bond paper for the cement brick around the tracks as that feel smoother looking.

have fun! keep posting picts of your progress!

cheers

jeff

[IST]

Thanks for the info, I will go to a hobby store today and have a look around.
And yes, we use metric system. 

[IST]

I had no luck on the weekend:
- I couldn't buy styrene sheets in our DIY store, so I have to find another shop.
- I scanned the basement and printed it, but the colours are different, so it didn't look better than my previous attempt with the camera.
So, next turn, I will ask some help from my modeller friends. :-)

[cteno4]

IST,

try a plastics shop. they usually sell just plastic to folks like sign makers and such. usually in the industrial areas of town! you can buy larger pieces at a fraction the cost you get at the diy or hobby store. the also usually have a scrap pile (these places also sometimes do some custom fabrication or cutting for clients so will have a lot of odd scraps or at least a scrap bin) and sell it cheap or free. you want like 1mm and 2mm thick (i use 2mm between the tracks and 1mm outside.

hobby shops usually carry a lot of pre cut strips of styrene at various thicknesses and widths for folks that do scratch building. this works great for the between the tracks as cutting long, very straight and parallel strips here is not easy to do.

on the colors, you will probably need to fiddle with the hue, saturation, brightness, contrast and color balance of your scan to get it to print at the same color as the original plates. this is due to the printer not being perfectly color matched, always a challenge, but with a little playing in an image program (lots of free ones out there), and some experimentation (just do a small patch as a test to not waste a huge amount of ink) you should get it pretty close. if you have a friend who is a good graphics person they can probably help show you the tricks to get something to come out the desired color range on your printer. at least the scan will get things in perfect parallax so it wont be warped at all (hard to take a picture totally flat).

best of luck!

cheers

jeff

[IST]

July issue of the British Model Rail magazine has just arrived. There are two pictures about my Unitram layout on page nr 91. 
I did not forget to mention the JNS Forum in the article of course.

[KenS]

That's great.  It takes several weeks for MR to show up in the local bookstore here in the States, but I usually pick it up when it does. I'll keep an eye out for your layout.

[Bernard]

July issue of the British Model Rail magazine has just arrived. There are two pictures about my Unitram layout on page nr 91. 
I did not forget to mention the JNS Forum in the article of course.

IST - Congratulations on the article and thank you for mentioning the JNS forum!

[Hobby Dreamer]

Looking forward to reading this!

How did you get connected to the BMR magazine? I'm sure readers that are unaware of Kato's tram venture will find this fascinating.

You've done a great job of experimenting with the new Kato product so the readers are lucky to see the best work out there.

Rick