Page 17 - May June 1999

The procedure, which runs to several pages on this site, is the well-tried one of flat bottom rail soldered to copper clad circuit board ties. These are made on templates drawn up from examples in the United States Steel Company’s trackwork catalogue, published in the 1950’s. The frog angle chosen was #6 - tight enough to allow extra trackwork to be squeezed onto the trackplan without looking toylike. I would not recommend a lower number frog angle unless perhaps a ‘Y’ turnout was being built.
P87 track gauges are, of course, vital. Fortunately these are available from Alan Gibson of Norwich (regular adverts. in Railway Modeller) who also makes a back-to-back gauge and a range of steel-tyres P87 wheels. His catalogue is essential reading for P87 modellers.
I also used standard HO track gauges where plain track was being soldered or held. I made my own flangeway gauge because I like to have this as a separate item, but a couple of AG’s track gauges could also be used as effectively.
Another difference to standard HO was the use of Code 65 flat-bottom rail, chosen to give the effect of light section rail in the old freight yard system. The copper-clad is ground away with a rotary stone to give the appearance of steel tie plates beneath the rails.
Turnouts are planned to be operated by Scale Shops units (ordered from Walthers, via Ken Dickson at North American Models, of Whitley Bay). These have been satisfactorily tested on a rig over a period of months.
One of these units was used on a display at a recent Newcastle Model Railway Exhibition and greatly impressed many visiting modellers who are generally not too familiar with products from the other side of the Atlantic.
Useful Internet Details:
Diagrams of P87 wheel and track standards, mainly European orientated, Proto:87 International Team website at: http://perso.wanadoo.fr/ proto87.team/normesp87.html
and the Proto:87 SIG is at:
http://www.cs.utk.edu/~davison/ proto87/
that weighting cars with lead to about 250g produced an inertia effect that allowed Kadees time to deflect and open in a suitable magnetic field. Thus, so far as my own layout was concerned, it would be possible using Alan’s wheels to have a good number of freight cars in operation, but not open cars such as hoppers, flats and gondolas etc.
It looked like any P87 layout I was going to build would be confined to running boxcars and other similar vehicles into which the necessary lead could be crammed. Another option would be to have semi-permanent loads carved from lead. This situation was soon to change however.
Conversations by e-mail with NWSL resulted in an order for 33” wheelsets in nickel silver. These were not quite to P87 standards and would not negotiate the turnouts. I flinched at the thought of re- profiling dozens of these by hand on a lathe. Further correspondence revealed they planned a new run of true P87 wheels. Samples, with two alternative axle lengths, arrived at the beginning of 1999. The samples were turned in brass but when production gets under way they will be nickel silver, I am informed.
They ran equally as well as the AG wheels and future availability of these non- ferrous NWSL wheelsets means that the modeller will be able to run all types of cars reliably, with Kadee coupler operation, on a P87 layout.
The photos hopefully show the comparisons (I only have a x2 lens attachment so cannot manage very close up shots!).
The micrometer reveals small differences but both types run smoothly through the P87 turnouts I’ve built. Both look great, and I intend to use examples of each on my freight stock as the layout progresses.
I envisage also using smaller couplers than the Kadee #5. But it is one step at a time - experiments with smaller coupler knuckles are still some way off.
Trackwork
The P87 turnouts for the new layout are built using the same basic techniques outlined on the trackwork pages of my web site...
http://www.jhwright.demon.co.uk/ track/turnout1.htm
ELECTROMAGNETS FOR
FEDERAL STREET
To uncouple a pair of Kadees requires two magnetic poles of opposite polarity focussed just below rail level at either side of the track. I found that to effect reliable operation of Kadees where Alan Gibson (P87) steel wheelsets are in use required a number of modifications to the normal magnet set-up.
Firstly, permanent magnets proved to be of little use. In order to get a strong enough magnetic field, the magnets needed to be quite large (as in Kadee’s own offering) with the result that the steel wheels and axles are attracted by this wide field, even when the car is heavily weighted. This also precludes the use of hinged permanent magnets as used so effectively on several standard HO layouts, and elsewhere, where non- ferrous wheelsets are in use.
The solution was to use electro-magnets (plus lead-weighting of suitable freight cars to around 250g). After a number of attempts, the design was refined to that shown in the figures.
I decided to use electro-magnets because I will be using a mixture of Alan Gibson steel wheels and NWSL non- ferrous ones. In theory though, if only the nickel silver NWSL wheelsets will be used on a layout, the standard Kadee permanent magnet system could be employed.
The two magnets are arranged as in the relevant sketch. There was a marginal improvement in the opening of the Kadees when the magnets were slightly offset, about 5 degrees, as shown. Also note the direction of the windings, necessary to achieve opposite polarities.
Disclaimer: I have no connection with Alan Gibson or NWSL except as a satisfied customer. Their service and interest has been excellent and I’ll be using more of their products in the future.
Alan Gibson:
The Bungalow, Church Road, Lingwood, Norwich, Norfolk NR13 4TR.
Tel: 01603 715862
Northwest Short Line:
Box 423 Seattle Wa. 98111-0423 USA Tel: 206/932-1087 Fax: 206/935-7106 E-mail : info@nwsl.com
Web Site: http://www.nwsl.com
JUNE 1999 17