Morning terry great watch for a Sunday morning the how to videos are great watching and now the colder days are coming there will be more. Keep it the good work buddy. Cheers Ian
Good way of doing it Terry very well explained your layout mate is leaving us all behind in terms of detail. Watch out George Dent Terry's on your tail.
Used pretty much the same method for doing mine except i put a dab of glue on the sleeper before inserting the pin of the conductor chair and i also used the little disc which raised the code 60 a bit higher plus i done it every 4th sleeper. It is time consuming but it really does look the business when its done, and personally to me i hate seeing layouts with third rail or pantagraph based stock without the infrastructure in place.
I didn't bother using the washers on my third rails, either. They are far too fiddly, but they did come in handy for making insulators for the transformer and switchgear in my lineside traction substation. Incidentally, 3mm white or blue LEDs partially buried in the ballast at the ends of the conductor rails, and triggered by reed switches give pretty good flashes.
lol my wife would disagree. but i have learnt patience since starting this hobby. and for me a good layout is in the little details and the final touches.the more realistic the better.
This an excellent instructional video. I have gotten a little behind on my viewing. I had a couple of weeks interruption, but I had it in my watch later list. Very good, high quality. Thank you. Rob
It's not common, but did happen in a few places, mostly in london. Euston to Watford Junction has both. Also platforms 9 and 10 at Euston have third rail and OHLE.
Would have definitely used this kit if I had peco track on my layout but as I had hornby I kept it similar and made my own on my layout! Great work on the layout!
excellent tutorial track looks great I think if you are running third rail stock you need it I don't think I would try it in n gauge (lol) regards keith.
Great tutorial. Whilst not necessarily applicable to my own work-in-progress layout, still an interesting and well made video to watch none-the-less :) - Sim
well the third rail is an alternative to the over head electrical lines. so instead of the loco having a pantograph on the roof it will have an electrical pick up on the side of each bogie which in turn runs along the top of the third rail in order to get its power. hope this answers your question mate.
At around 07:37 you refer to the importance of alignment of the fixing holes which raises two questions: 1) Wouldn't a gauge tool help with the hole you are going to drill? and 2) Assuming your track gauge is 16.5, do you fix the third rail to below the modelled conductor shoe or to the correct spacing from the running rail, which looks best?
thanks for the comment alan. yes it is a long and boring job but it really adds something extra to the track work when it comes to detail so well worth the man hours i would say.
very good vid very imformative, and your layout is looking fantastic, but tell me iv always wondered what the 3rd rail is for , surely nothing runs along it ??, thanks
Looks great Terry, I'm tempted to model NSE so this will come in handy in a few years! Could you do a track weathering video please? I look forward to your November update, this was much better than Saturday night TV lol. :)
I tried to add a third rail back in 1985 but as far as I know there were no parts available then, I just broke some of my track and used the rails and glued them to the sleepers directly, made a real mess! If I was to get back into model railways and went to all this trouble to add a third rail, I would want it to actually supply the power to the trains.
not sure it will work with all my western region stock, will try the over head power on the main line one day but will give the 3rd rail as miss, would stress me out trying to do that lol
Ok, log into your account, go into the forum, click the layout topics section, there is a button (can't remember off the top of my head) where you can create a topic.
great help thank you ill be doing that next year, two questions how close to the edge of the sleeper do you drill holes for chairs... All if I am going to use code 75 or Bullhead will I have issues with height and fouling on locos and EMUs thanks again
cheers jason. well if you ever want to add it in the future when you have run out of things to do on the layout at least you can come back to this video before you make a start.
Great video - curious about placing the chairs on the sleepers. I thought slightly longer sleepers are needed to fit the chairs. Slightly longer sleepers are used on the prototype of the NYC subway trackage. Thanks.
Ah ok, I'll check it out. I look forward to seeing the ext update. Also would you mind creating a Glebe road topic on my forum? It'd be much appreciated :) Tom
This is a really helpful video - exactly what I needed. Just wondering, how did you weather the rail, was it simply a case of spraying on some sleeper grime with an airbrush, or is it easier to handpaint on?
no i find it easier to spray sleeper grime along with frame dirt with an airbrush along the sides of the rails to take away the shine and then add weathered black down the center of the rails.
Glebe Road Junction Ah ok, many thanks - I've got this job to look forward to but having watched your video I feel much more confident about tackling it! :)
tjf4375 they rail sides get pretty dirty over time, they end up with some thick black gloop all over the foot and the web or the rail. The ends of the rails will angle down towards the ground, they will never touch the ballast and the bend that makes them angle down starts 3-4 sleepers away from the end of the rail. When they are in a box to stop things (like people) from touching the rail it can be on one of both sides of the rail, Ive seen them fitted when the rail is in the cess or in the 6 foot but never seen them fitted when the rail in in the 10 foot.
thanks for the comment les. i know third rail is not for every one but it does depend on how much detail you want to add to the layout i suppose. and im sure others have thought about third rail but thought it may be a difficult job and decided not to pursue it.so this video is to show those that it is any easy job and that it is well worth having on a layout. terry
Excellent tutorial. Looking to place a conductor rail on a layout im building. Where on the sleeper did you drill the hole and did you drill right through the sleeper? Wondering if a power drill may be too powerful to use.
i just drilled small holes with a micro hand drill around 2mm in from the edge of the outer part of the rail sleeper. an electrical drill will ruin the track. oh and i did not drill all the way through either.
Thanks for the reply :) I did start using the micro drill using the .9mm drill bit and then I thought I'd try using the power drill, which was good for the first 20 holes then the bit snapped. Foolishly I decided to carry on using the power drill using the .85mm drill bit and that also snapped after 15 holes, Anyone reading this please note, the micro hand drill is the better option although it can be tedious especially when I'm working on 22ft x 10ft of layout.
Couldn't you just run power through the two main metallic rails? I'm sure you could easily design a pickup system for it. That is unless the axles are also metal. That would just create a dead short.
You forgot to ramp the end of each 3rd rail section at either end. It's a shame that Peco don't do the prototypical guard planks that flank both sides of the 3rd rail on Southern Region.
fjrboy I use Railmatch sleeper grime for the most part with a little frame dirt then i use sleeper grime weathered black or roof dirt for the centre of the track.
Glebe Road Junction It would be good though if it really did carry power. It would make it more authentic. Plus you could simulate arcing like on the real trains.
Glebe Road Junction there's an old model railroader magazine from the 70's that does how to do electrified third rail. I've been trying to track down the article, but traction modelers have been doing live third rail for years.
Glebe Road Junction euston to watford used to have some sections with 3rd rail and overhead, is this the line? ,im out of date with what london railways look like now,last time i was there it was still British railways blue....looks good mate...marty
