Pictured is a combination DCC programming track/car weight gage. I had a piece of oak leftover from a home woodwork project, (1/2"x 1.5"x 16") Couple of coats of water based varnish, glue on some Atlas track with two rerailers and two bumpers. Don't omit the bumpers as without them, a programming or run loco mistake provides a high ball loco rocket off into space......please don't ask me how I know this. The car length/weight gage is copied from the NMRA weight standards, cut out and glued with varnish unto the wood as shown. So.... by the gage, the car weight is determined by the car length. I use a inexpensive postal scale to weigh the car with added weights to match the NMRA standard. I also use the steel car weights shown. They are available from Amazon. They seem to work well as two 1/4 oz. weights usually brings my N' rolling stock to the standard or very close to NMRA weighted standard. Care must be taken to adhere the weights exactly in the center on the car bottom as the weights are quite wide for N' rolling stock. Build one for your bench, use whatever you got laying around and adjust your wood/track sizes for your railroad scale. You will like the versatility of this tool.
Great idea on the the ruler to quickly figure weight. Do you have a link to the weights you used? Sumner
??? Yes I've know of the wheel weights since the '60s. The same for the postage weight scale. But there's no explanation for the scaled track layout with electric hook ups and scales. And where do the weights go on an N gauge. On an aluminum/magnesium wheel there's plenty of room, they are a wee bit bigger. I'm sure the track could have other uses.
Nice. I have something similar that I built several years ago. The bottom track is the test track and the top track is the programming track.
Excellent! I was going to build this, but I did not have a wider piece of wood scrap to do it. You eliminated the choo choo rocket scenario. Well done!
Thank you, sir. If you notice on the lower test track, I used insulated rail joiners and put Micro-Trains Coupler Height and Tip Pin Gauges on each end. I also installed a 33 ohm resistor on the test track to try to keep from letting out the magic smoke.
Nice is the resistor that lil' thing at the inch mark of the scale. I don't remember them being that small. Very good ideas. I will put them in my list. Richard
