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Simon,
I was wondering the same thing. To my knowledge the importers you named are the only ones who supplied E-8's in brass. Butch |
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cheez, I'm sorry. I meant NJ Custom Brass.
yikes! a senior moment at age 53! Chris |
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Don't worry Chris. It gets better with age.
 Butch |
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OK now I'm looking into Atlas 2 rail track. Probably because I've always used it for my HO. Later I switched to Peco and Shinora switches and found they were much smoother on equipment passing over them. I'm wondering what you do for switches/ how are the atlas O switches? Is there a more prefered brand of track, switches, and crossings. Joe P
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Hi Joe,
On my railroad, I use mostly House of Duddy track. It comes with code 148 rail or smaller. I have not tried the Atlas switches. I have found laying my own switches goes quite fast, and saves a lot of money. Lisa Marie |
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Joe,
I use Atlas track and tricked up Old Pullman turnouts as well as a few Atlas turnouts. When I designed the layout, it was before Atlas came out with their switches, so I designed it for OP, otherwise I'd have probably designed it for Atlas back then. Atlas came out with 5's and 7's and my layout was set up for 6's and 8's. As it stands, I am very pleased with how the OP's worked out. There are still details I want to add to them in the future. The Atlas switches work well and are smooth on my layout as well.  |
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Like Christopher, I use a mixture of Old Pullman and Atlas turnouts. I have found all of the Atlas to be in gauge and all of the Old Pullman to require work. With a very few exceptions all my Atlas are #7 1/2 and my Old Pullman are curved, #8 double slip, or 3 way, ie configurations that Atlas does not make.
I do not use Atlas switch machines - tried a few and took them out. |
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I use Atlas Turnouts exclusively, with about 36 being # 7 1/2, and two being #5.
  As did rheil and Christopher, I have had no problems with these: they were all in gauge and required no work to set up. However I did solder jumper wires to the point rails as a precautionary measure. See Ken Rice's article on this: Solder Point Jumper Wires I use Tortoise switch machines, mounted on Woodland Scenics Foam roadbed for sound quieting. They work well, and I use one of the set of Tortoise contacts to power the frogs. The guard rails are a bit long, but that doesn't bother me. They should be easy to change if you want to One caution about Atlas turnouts..I found taking them out of the box to sometimes be a bit bit tricky. Cut the styrofoam out from the converging end and you'll be OK |
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I'm a relatively new 3 railer. I happened to peek at your forum and saw this post.
I wanted something bigger than HO. I'm shooting for 'good enough' realism. Nice and vague goal, huh? I have a relatively small area for a layout and wanted room for some action - crossovers, reversing loops, etc. So I was never going to be able to run really cool the big scale stuff anyway. I'll just have to look at yours and be impressed. 3 rail does what I want. But I am really impressed with what you guys do after getting rid of the goofy center rail. No matter how hard the rivet counting 3 railers try, it is still there. But we don't seem to mind. Now, the floating ballast on my fastrack running on a trestle IS just ridiculous looking. Some balsa and time and I ought to be able to make it good enough. |
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Dinosaur alert! Dinosaur alert!
 You could always - GASP! - lay your own track, spike down the rail or real individual ties, and even build your own switches, etc. Seriously though, building a switch in place really is not very hard and it does have the advantage that you can build a switch that goes where it's needed and does just what you really need and what you just cannot buy....like a completely asymetric 3-way stub switch..... We now return you to your comfortable era of RTR pre-assembled everything... The horror, the horror.... Questions are a burden to others, answers a prison for oneself |
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when I get done laughing about the dinosaur response.... I want to post a thank you for the pictures and info. The prospect of starting a new gauge generates so many questions I feel like I'm just starting into trains. I thought again of how my peco switches are insul. frogs for dcc use. I plan on running MTH DCS so the part of leaving the frog unpowered helps answer more. The photos of the trackwork let me know how it should look if all goes right. Thanks all, Joe P.
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I have not seen the new Atlas turnouts but for the price I can get two OP and spike them myself. Once you make the template and glue the ties, spiking goes quickly. Now, I am not crazy enough (or have the time) to hand lay my track but I can save a bit on the turnouts. I am using 8's on the main, 7's going into the yards and 6's in the yards all code 125. For yard track I drop to code 100 after the turnout.
Trackwork What ever you decide, just have fun. Dan "If you over think, you stink!" |
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Easy mwb, or I'll post a picture of floating fastrack and taint your forum! |
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As long as it's not floating up the Nung River to visit Colonel Kurtz you can post whatever you like,  BTW, it's not my forum, but it's all in good fun,  !Questions are a burden to others, answers a prison for oneself |
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Just remember you cannot go out into space with fractions -what are you going to land on - one-quarter, three-eighths?
Hopper sounds a lot like me when I was trying to get a fastrack reversing loop to line up and close properly-- You can't close a loop with up with half straights - what are you going to do use a 1-3/8's?  The freedom to have the track where I want and not where available pieces will work would be realy nice. |
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Hence the value of being able to handlay track and switches........try it, there's only a small amount of suffering involved, Questions are a burden to others, answers a prison for oneself |
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Haha, guess that's so their fat tired little loco doesn't feel like the lone ranger? ....dave |
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As mentioned above, the biggest reason, that I have been laying my own switches, is that the track work just flows smoothly. Most of the switches that I have built, are not available from anyone. Some are on curves and others are just to close together. I use no templates, I just do them in place so they fit the rest of the track work.
Lisa Marie |
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well I'm not selling this so I think I can post this item
http://cgi.ebay.com/Atlas-O-2-Rail-3114-1-WM-EMD-GP35-w..._trksid=p3286.c0.m14 wow that looks wrong. It is a TMCC equipped 2 rail engine on ebay. I was going to ask if it's custom install? I was wondering if dcs would control it through a lionel base on 2 rail like it does on 3 rail? It's like the set up that Lisa runs? Joe P. |
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Hi Joe,
Atlas, did put out 2 rail diesels with TMCC. I was very disappointed, when they stopped. They should run fine with the DCS controller. Lisa Marie |
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I found their website on switches (handlaid). http://www.oldpullmanmodelrailroads.com/
I hate to ask but does the code 100 rail line up (same dimension) with regular atlas 2 rail. Does another code work out better? Joe P. |
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Code refers to rail height in thousands of an inch so code 100 is .100 tall, code 125 is .125 tall, etc. Atlas track is code 148. Any code will work with any other code by shimming the bottom till the rail head heights match. The prototypes do it too. What works better depends on what you are trying to accomplish, heavy mainlines look good with larger codes like 148 0r 138, code 125 for average sized rail and code 100 or less is good for spurs and old time track. The best way to learn the differences between brands and sizes is to get a piece or two of each brand and see how you like them, don't go by advertising or reviews as they are all pushing their own product and the various brand groupies are even worse. .......dave |
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I'm finally getting up the courage to put away my 3-rail track and start setting down some Atlas 2-rail (w/ studrail courtesy of Hugo). I'm not going pure 2-rail, since my engines will still draw power from the center pick up, but eventually all of my rolling stock will get converted to 2-rail. Most of my 3-rail engines can run on code 148 track without the flanges touching the ties, but even those will get '2-railed' with the exception of the power pick up (it will be interesting to see how the Lionel engines will go). Too bad Atlas stopped making 2-rail TMCC.
Christopher and John- compliments to both of you on the great tracklaying. How did you guys develop your trackplans? I don't have a solid plan down yet, but want to start on a staging yard with 5-6 tracks. Any suggestions? Geno |
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My layout was originally set up for stud rail. Most of my locos were set up with slider shoes, to pick up from the center studs. I worked quite well and looked good, except around switches where the studs had to be raised up above the running rails. I was looking at it one day and said to myself, this is not what I really want, so I removed the stud rail where ever it was noticeable and started converting my locos to 2 rail. As far as I know, Hugo and I were the only two people that had an operating O scale stud rail system with American trains. I have since sold all of my left over supplies. Stud rail, is a nice step up from 3 rail, but 2 rail is much better still.
Lisa Marie |
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Lisa Marie,
I would just go 2-rail if I didn't have so much 3-rail and enjoy running at AGHR so much- admittedly it would be alot easier than doing the studrail. But I still think I will enjoy it, if I can ever get more studrail made up (most of the shops around me want too much money to make it- I'll find a decent shop or make the tooling if I have to myself). Geno |
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