I am starting the trackwork to Ophir following the completion of trackwork in Rico. I am trying out a new technique to make the spline roadbed. This was suggested to me via email from Steve Hatch, of Railway Engineering. This method is faster to construct, and I find that it is easier for me to keep the splines and blocks aligned crossways than in the method I used before.
As before, I cut splines from scrap lauan plywood. I cut the strips 3/4" wide, rather than 1/2" as I did previously. The thicker splines were chosen to match up with the 3/4" plywood base used for Rico. I then squared up a piece of leftover 2"x2" pine, as used for legs on the layout, such that it was exactly 1.5" square. The legs were carefully crosscut on my table saw into pieces 3/4" long. These were laminated between the two 3/4" splines, and glued in place with Titebond III Ultimate Wood Glue. This glue is waterproof, which is an important consideration, since delamination of the roadbed while installing scenery would not be a good thing! The width of the completed spline roadbed is an exact match for the Cascade Rail Supply milled Homasote roadbed. It still requires a lot of clamps to construct the roadbed!
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| Initial installation of the spline roadbed. The outside spline was simply clamped to the existing 3/4" plywood roadbed. The roadbed will be trimmed, and aligned with the track centerline. |
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| The spline roadbed with about half of the spacer blocks glued in place. |
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| Question: How many clamps does it take to build spline roadbed? Answer: All of them! |
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| A closeup view of the spline roadbed. The roadbed will be sanded smooth prior to installation of the Cascade Rail Supply milled Homasote roadbed. |
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| A closer view of the completed spline roadbed. |
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| The spline roadbed sanded and with the track centerline marked. The milled Homasote roadbed will be installed using the marked centerline. |
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