Building and operating the Atlantic Inland

  When I built AIR1 I took some bad advice. Quite a bit in fact. Most of it turned out to be VERY costly. Today’s “Rant” is about gluing track, which I was promised would be the very best way to build my layout. This turned out to be the single most costly piece of advice I took when building AIR1, and now after some research I have found it wasn’t only bad for me.   I was strongly advised to glue my track down with DAP Brand adhesive caulk. Gluing track down allows you to get a lot of track down FAST.  If you use push pins and a straight edge, your tangents can be made VERY straight. In yards I cut a spacer that I used between tracks. First I laid the first track using the straight edge, then slipped the spacer block in and butted the next track up to that. Yards went down fast and straight. I was, and to be honest am still very happy with the results of my track laying. Laying track using DAP Brand adhesive caulk is very forgiving during the actual installation process....

 I am modeling a train that, due to my track work, must change direction. A train out of “South” staging running west to Littlerock yard then turning and running east all the way across my layout. On a map of the eastern USA this train would be running west to east. Within the confines of my basement it runs west THEN east. The “EAST” leg of this train will be #93-94. The “WEST” leg will be #95-96. It will primarily carry LCL and produce from the Southwest to the Northeast. On the return it will carry LCL. I am assured that there are numerous examples of this happening on the prototype.