Soldering track pieces together.

[Puffed Out]

I am short of a few pieces of straight track, although I was given some old short straights. They're not in the best condition, slightly bent, and fish plates which are hardly tight enough.

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As these peices will be used in sidings, I came up with the idea of soldering two pieces together whilst retaining the old fishplates.  I did manage to straighten them to my satisfaction.

I put a tiny piece of soldering flux on the fishplates and pushed them together and clamped them flat. Soldered them up with cored solder and my soldering iron with a pointed sodering bit.

I was a bit concerned about melting the plastic sleepers, but the heat never damaged them at all. I removed the soldering iron as soon as the solder ran. A wipe with a cloth, and a rub with some extremely fine emery paper. They looked pretty good, if I may say so.

I tried to pull them apart,but they were fixed solid, so I was happy bunny.  Tested and running on the main track(then removed), and they worked fine.

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Has anyone else done this 'fix/bodge'. I'd be interested to know.

[walkingthedog]

It's not good practice to solder track together. I guess it is OK in a siding but definitely not on the main layout. I personally would have purchased a length of flexi to fill any gaps or at least a packet of new fishplates. 

[Puffed Out]

Yes, most definitely will never be used on the main track.  But as these pieces were virtualy scrap, I thought I'd give it try. 

I know fishplates are as cheap as chips, and flexi track is available. But it's saved binning these pieces, and purchasing parts, it was worth the 'experiment', and it worked(so far).

In this world of 'green', and 'wastage'......I guess I can live with it as being a 'fix/bodge'. 😆

[LCDR]

Provided you don't solder all the joints, I don't see much of a problem in soldering the occasional pair of track pieces together, especially if it gets you over a problem. You should leave the majority of joints as simple mechanical joints with rail joiners / fishplates unsoldered, to allow for minor expansion and contraction, especially if your layout is in an attic or exposed to sunlight. 

 

Re-using old track is perfectly acceptable provided it is in good condition, that is it isn't distorted or broken, and you can buy replacement rail joiners if any are missing. Avoid mixing rail of different material when soldering , most modern rail is nickel silver, but brass and steel rail is not unknown. Steel is particularly difficult to solder, especially if it has zinc coating.

 

It is important that you match the rail profiles, using the same for each bit of rail, unless you are prepared to reshape the rails where they join by filing. The commonest profile is Code 100 flat bottom, used by all the UK trainset makers as well as many HO manufacturers on the European continent.  US modellers frequently use Code 83 flat bottom rail for fine scale HO track and in the UK Code 75 both bull head and flat bottom rail. These will require adaptor pieces.Any difference in profile will make a derailment more likely.

 

The Japanese Shinohara brand track  is now in the hands of the US train maker Walthers. This track was available in Code 100 and Code 70.

 

Code xx indicates the height of the rail in thousands of an inch.

[Puffed Out]

I bullt a mini layout to test the soldering, and ran and old Loco and wagons for 40 minutes, and everything was fine.

These pieces are for only 3 sidings, and will fill 60%+ of the siding straights,(up to the buffers). I have visibly marked them(subtly), so I won't use them again, except for what they weren't meant for.

It's old Hornby short straights, so at least they have some more 'life' to give. As said before, they were almost scrap anyway.