track radius?

[newfiegod]

Need a little help.....just laying out my n scale track an my bench and i was wondering how you determine what the radius is on the turns and if it is enough? I am laying a layout on a 3x5 sheet of wood and i am doing the outer main which is a big oval and before i finalize it with cork and track i wanna verify the radius in the turns i laid out and make sure it will work with most or all trains.

[newfiegod]

I guess i should have added i'm using flex track!!!

[Conrail Quality]

Do you have any sectional track to use as a guide? If you have some, that might be the easiest method.

Timothy

[newfiegod]

hahahahaha.....thank you for the advice......i have some bachmann e-z track 11.25 and i just ran that over my cork all the way around and none of the turns on the cork and tighter than the 11.25.........THANK YOU!!! aNOTHER QUESTION......i'm as green as can be at this.........can you go tighter than the 11.25 or is that as tight as one should go?

[Conrail Quality]

You CAN go tighter, but I would only do it if you plan to run freight cars and small lcomotives. If you're planning on running anything larger than a GP-40, stick with the 11.25". In any event, I would not go sharper than 9.75"; that's pretty much the limit to run almost anything.

Timothy

[newfiegod]

once you have the track laid out how do you determine what the track radius is? Is there a certain way to measure what the radius is? I got my track laid out and i ran a piece of 11.25 track over it and there are no curves tighter than that but there is one area where i am going from one side of a switch to another switch and it is about 10 inches apart and tey dont really line up so i had to put a tighter kinda s curve in it to get them to meet up. I ran a couple of cars over it and it seemed fine but i want to make sure in the early stages.

[RoundupBob]

THE RADIUS OF A CURVE IS MEASURED BY THE DIAMETER OF THE CIRCLE SIZE. A 22" RADIUS WOULD MAKE A 44" DIAMETER CIRCLE.  THIS IS EASY TO MAKE WITH A BOARD. PENCIL AND A NAIL. DRILL A HOLE IN THE END OF THE BOARD FOR THE PENCIL. MEASURE DOWN 22" AND PUT THE NAIL THERE. THIS WILL MAKE A 22" RADIUS CURVE. BY MOVING THE NAIL OR PENCIL YOU CHANGE THE RADIUS. THE CENTER OF THE TRACK WILL GO ON THE LINE THAT YOU DRAW.  HOPE THAT HELPS.  BOB

[RoundupBob]

PS. THE RADIUS YOU WANT TO USE IS DETERMINED MOSTLY BY THE ROOM YOU HAVE AND THE TYPE OF ENGINES AND CARS YOU ARE USING. LONG CARS LIKE PASSENGER CARS AND BIG ENGINES LIKE 4-6-6-4, 4-8-4 NORTHERN, BIG BOY 4-8-8-4 WILL NEED 22" RADIUS. A 2-6-2 WOULD WORK WELL ON 11.5" RADIUS. BOB