Alternatives to soldering track

TinGoat

Ignorant know it all
Try Crimping

Hi Steamhead,

About rail joiners & soldering.....I noticed a few days ago that the locos stalled when entering one of the spurs in the yard at Portales.

http://forum.zealot.com/t159719/

This is track that's been recently painted & ballasted. I traced the problem to a joiner not doing its electrical duty.... So now I'm going to have to solder the joiner, or put in a feeder wire. I think the wire is the safest bet, as there is probably matte medium in the joiner....wall1wall1wall1:curse:

Try getting a small pair of needle nose pliers to the rail joiner and giving a little squeeze. This should crimp the rail-joiner and re-establish electrical contact with the rails.
 

Russ Bellinis

Active Member
I'd only bother to solder rail joints between sections of rail that are small. [Less than 1-foot long] Instead of soldering the rail joiner, I prefer to solder a small jumper wire between sections of rail.

The other reason to solder rail joiners is when you need to use multiple pieces of flex track to complete a curve. Putting together 2 pieces of flex track with a rail joiner and trying to curve it tends to result in kinks at the joiner.
 

TinGoat

Ignorant know it all
Yes, of course...

Hi Russ,

The other reason to solder rail joiners is when you need to use multiple pieces of flex track to complete a curve. Putting together 2 pieces of flex track with a rail joiner and trying to curve it tends to result in kinks at the joiner.

Yes, of course...

I forget the evils of RTR track. :mrgreen: :mrgreen:

I hand lay, so I can pre-bend all the rail before spiking to eliminate kinks.
 
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