Moving on

 

The piece has been attached and an initial layer of filler added.  I have also stripped back the rails either side of the new piece to start thinking about the new alignment.  One clear issue is that the water tower base will foul the new alignment so this was removed too.

Another layer of filler will be required once this is dry and then I shall glue down the cork roadbed.

Legs eleven (well, 9)

I have managed to install the base plates for the new breakfast bar style legs.  Here’s one upside-down for the hidden corner section.

and a close-up

Here it is the right way up and attached to its neighbour board

Here the Waunfawr end hidden sidings are erected with two new legs.

and here’s the table ‘board’ (to be used for running repairs, cups of tea etc during exhibitions) with its three base plates added.

 

The garage has also acquired a new cupboard for modelling materials, which was to be part of the new ikea kitchen, but we found we could squeeze a 50 cupboard in (just) and so this 40 was free for use in the garage. 

and here’s the last baseplate in place on the station approach board.

Very satisfying to have all these in place, they will be so much more sturdy that the legs I had first decided to go with.  and they are so easy to attach/detach – just one grub screw per leg.

Traverser images

Here you can see the idea – the runners map to the struts.

Except that the runners were too long so I have to say 2 inches off them.  I then glued on 6 pads to get the height correct

  

Here they are in the garage drying.

Further hidden sidings progress

Last night I took apart the hidden sidings baseboards as the only way to access the struts was to take the whole structure apart.  It was also worth doing anyway as the screws holding the board square weren't really long enough so these were replaced too.  I now have the bases ready and will be adding new struts to take the runners soon.  The traversers will be permanently fixed in place.  A method for stopping the traverser moving when in transit will be devised too.

I also trimmed the rail on the ends of the traverser roads to ensure they are flush with the ends and in doing so noticed a few had come loose from the copper clad (probably due to the house move and storage in the garage over winter).  These are now back in my (finally) rearranged office for repair.  I will also use the traverser for a test of the CMX cleaner with the wonderful 'goo gone' stuff.

Good progress over a couple of hours.  It won't be long until the hidden sidings are ready to be erected next to their neighbour boards and the alignments sorted. As the layout is DCC there is no need to worry about wiring across the join between traverser and main line - it's all wired live all of the time.  Thus I will probably use strong magnets on steel flat pieces to align the track at the traverser edge.  This will allow for very fine adjustment, better than the fixed nature of say door bolts.

Will post some pictures to show you what I mean when the boards are finished.

Traverser method change

I have never been happy with the slightly bizarre design I first decided upon for the traversers.  This worked using the shiny sides of hardboard and allowed them to move by facing the base of the board and the base of the traverser with the shiny sides.  The system worked, but the hardboard bowed far too easily.  Thus a trip down to the local homebase (for other things as it happens) occurred and I purchased two sets of ball bearing based runners.  These have been mounted to the struts underneath the traversers and although over long (not a problem as this can be hidden once the boards are installed), they will work far better. 

Now to redesign the hidden sidings boards around these!