Now I get what you are talking about. Once it goes from paper to wood, the grids are gone. Not sure about what to do...but then again it may not be too much of a problem.
Let's think about it and see what we come up with.
I was planning on using ripped pine instead of the masonite. It gives you the same smoot contour, but weighs only a fraction of what masonite does. It is much easier to level with a belt sander as well. I used this construction on a friend's layout once and it worked very well. Plastic strips would be good, too. Perry Lamb used that technique.
Question on flexible luan...how would you cut something that bendable?
Maybe we should go back to Tom's as a group and look around.
Scott G. Perry, CPM
----- Original Message -----
From: "Bob & Halina Wheeler"
To: NCIOG@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Monday, November 23, 2009 4:41:48 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern
Subject: Re: [NCIOG] New layout design
Scott,
You asked "I didn't understand the 'reference point' comment....can you explain further?"
What I meant is that with a typical rectangular layout configuration we measure track,centerlines, turnout tangent points, building locations, etc from one side of the rectangle and then other face. Quite easy to do. But with the circular configuration these flat and well define planes are no longer there. To add to this the center of the layout circle will also be an empty non existing spot on the physical layout itself to measure from. So when doing the Dixie Central a measuring protocol will have to be determined. It could be two reference lines, x and y coordinates drawn on the layout face with dimensions taken from these. You may remember the -x and -y and so on measuring methods on graphs, the same idea here. Maybe you can think of something easier or we could just wing it.
Another thought. I visited Thomas Lloyd's layout yesterday. Both he and his dad spent time here last year on my Ramore sub looking at my benchwork. With his dad being a cabinet maker they have taken bench work to a new level, very impressive! They use materials I did not know existed. If you did not visit Thomas Lloyd's it is worth a visit. I want to go back. For his curved benchwork sides he used laminated layers of "bendable luaun". This material is amazing and comes in 4 x 8 sheets and he said is available here in Atlanta.
I contacted the above linked company and they said they could ship it in a box! Imagine, plywood rolled up and shipped in a box.
This stuff would be great to make the outer faces of your inner and outer circles. But to use material wisely I suggest that you reduce the inner circle to 30" so we could use one 8 foot length to go once around the circumference of the inner circle, three times.
It is expensive but I figure we would need only one sheet as follows;
- Using 1/4" thick, need 3 layers to get 3/4" thick sides.
- For inner loop need 3 pcs x ~ 8' = 24 running feet.
- For the outer loop need 9.5 pcs x 8' = 75.4 running feet
- Therefore total running feet = 100'
- If we make the benchwork 3.5" high we would have enough material from one sheet of 1/4" bendable luaun. In other words we would get 13 strips out of the sheet whereas we need only 12.5.
Another though with this bendable luaun is that it would make some amazing sub roadbed with beautiful easements. We could use 3/8" sheet to do that and ends up costing $$38.40 a sheet. At one inch thick sub roadbed we would get 341 feet of strips enough for 68 feet of 1 7/8" wide sub roadbed. Cost would be $0.56/ft.
I am guessing you have about 77 feet of mainline so we could get by with one sheet of 3/8" for he sub roadbed and use conventional plywood for the rest.
An alternative is to use Paul's Masonite method and we will see soon how that work out. One thing with Masonite I don't know if we can nail into it. Paul is gluing his track to the Masonite. His easements are really nice and smooth.
Bob
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