G scale Emily turn radius

[thomasgleek444]

I was wondering if anyone knew of the best turn radius for Emily? I have LGB brass track and her engine grinds on the curves and her tender either grinds of squeals, and her coaches do both I have R1 rated LGB radius turns. 

[Plow_Bender]

I'll be the first to say that you should steer away from the R1 curves.  Yes Emily and her stock are designed to negotiate these curves, but that doesn't mean it's a good idea to run them like that.  R1 curves are better for very short trains under a Christmas tree during the holidays, but not much else.  Regular use tends to shorten the life of your trains and the track overtime.

When I first got into Large Scale I used 4' diameter curves, but at the time I also wasn't running my trains as much as I am now.  The big problem with these curves is they are tight and add a lot of friction to the wheels of your locomotive which in turn causes wear on the motor, gearbox, and the gears.  Not to mention that overtime the wheels on the engine slowly grind down the railhead.  I wish I could say I was joking, but...



In addition to that you'll also start to notice a lot of black dust that is hard to remove from your carpet under the track.  This is a mixture of brass from the metal wheels grinding away the inside of your outside rail and plastic dust from the brass track grinding down the plastic wheels on you rolling stock.  As the rails wear, the gauge of the track will also become larger in time and eventually your rolling stock will start dropping down between the rails.

What I would recommend is to use the largest diameter curve you can fit into the space where you're running your trains.  About 3-4 years ago I went out and purchased a box of Bachmann 8' diameter curves and it was one of the best choices I've ever made with large scale.  As I said before, the best thing is to use the largest diameter curve you can, but I wouldn't recommend using anything smaller than 8'.  Anything smaller than that and you risk damaging your trains and constantly replacing track every 2-3 years.  In this case, bigger is better.

-Rusty