I recently bought the NTRAK manual and the other pieces as I'm wanting to build a modular layout for a spare bedroom I have. I'm working on a layout that would have two corners, a 4', two 6' modules, and then a modified 'turnaround' as pictured in the 'non-standard' section. I've never done any scenery before. My last layout was built at the age of eight by my dad. He put it out on a homasote board and I took a marker to it trying to turn it 'green'. I believe I lasted about a foot before I quit. I've been enthralled by the Woodland Scenics stuff. I played around with their 'subterrean scenery kit' that is a small diorama using their system and I think it'll really work well for what I want. I've only been to one train show and took a look at the NTRAK modules set up there. If you adhere to the standard the track is right on the plywood, which short of carving up your plywood you don't have a sub-floor to work with like you would if you put the track up on 2" risers. I have no plans to put my home modules in a club, or anything like that, so adhering to the standard isn't necessarily my big concern. I was just wondering if anyone else did it out there? If I did my math right I can take two of their risers, stick them side by side, and that's wide enough to put the three main rails on it if I wanted too. Just wanted someone who's done it to comment, if there is anyone. I mean in the grand scheme of things if I wanted these to hook up to a standard non-woodland scenics if I made the legs 2" - 3" shorter so that the top of the WS risers match the on the board next module it's probably work too. I'm just thinking out loud now. I've not gotten the benchwork completely done and right now I'm just laying out a small oval on some foam board to get the hang of working with flex track and putting down roadbed/ballast, etc.
I'm building an Ntrak module right now and simply used 1x6's on the sides and rear and a 1x4 on the front. I'll cut notches in the sides for the clamps and my track height will match other's. This will give me the extra 2 inches I need to get away from "plywood central".
Our club uses the height measurement in the N-Trak manual to be to the tops of the rails, not the top of the plywood base. Our modules have roadbed under them and are mostly boringly flat, but they don't have to be. As long as the ends of the module (or module set) can be clamped up to others modules, they should be OK. Whatever happens between the ends scenery wise is up to you
Go ahead and make the track and height to the nTrak standards. If you later want to hook up to a club, you're ready to go. IMO, there's only 1 super critical dimension.... the distance between the 3 track centers. If you use t-nuts and screws on the bottom of the legs, you can get adjustment of +/- 1" to the track height. The distance from the skyboard can be off a little to the blue line (a couple of 1/16ths). It's from the blue to the yellow and red that needs to be right. One of our club members uses 4 nTrak modules with his own special corners as his home layout. At any time, he can just remove 1 section and take it to a show. There are 2 NC events coming up where there will be nTrak modules. On March 31 at the Expo Center in Hickory is the 4th Annual Railroad Extravaganza. The CCNScalers will be there with a 20' x 30' layout. On June 9 (and 10th) is the Rail Day event in Spencer. Plans are being made now. At this point, none of the CCNScalers are planning on attending because the location is in the open section of the roundhouse, but I would guess the NRMRC, RANTRAK and Lynchburg guys will probably be here. Kevin
Was planning on hitting the Rail Day even in Spencer, not sure if I can make the Hickory event. I saw the Wilmington one in January. Instead of buying model railroad stuff we stopped at the nearby AC Moore for fun and ended up spending a boatload on wooden thomas the train sets that were 50% off.
