Garden Railway Forum

Hi,

I am about half way through building the twelve points needed on our new layout. A video of making a frog which might be found interesting.

https://youtu.be/8CLo71-pLh4

Take care stay safe.

Tony.

Nice explanatory production Tony. Thats the way I make mine as well, but I've not seen it explained so well before.

Neatly done! What do you mean by 'pickled'?

Interesting that you've got 10 likes and one dislike. I wonder if the dislike is from a disappointed amphibian lover .......

Rik

Nice work indeed.

It's not so different from how the real thing is produced. The significant difference is that in 12" to the foot scale the back of the point rail is planed to accept the splice rail, which has a 'nose' (rather than a fine point). This reduces the risk of a rail flange 'splitting' the spliced joint. Quite an important consideration in a bolted assembly, but we are soldering ours together so the problem goes away. (As it does in reality where a crossing vee is produced by welding!)

Being a masochistic purist I file the rebate in mine, I'd considered bolting them but using stainless steel rail makes the drilling impossible - plus I still have a shred of sanity left!

Andrew

That’s a really helpful video, thank you for sharing it. I might just have to have a go myself now.
Can I ask how you determine the angles for the jig please??
Thanks
Doug

ge_rik wrote: ↑Wed Jun 03, 2020 12:44 pm Neatly done! What do you mean by 'pickled'?

Rik, I'm far from being expert but afaik, 'pickling' in this context is washing in a weak acid solution such as Citric Acid, to neutralise and remove any acidic flux residues. No doubt Tony or somebody else will correct me if I've got it round my neck!

Hi Rik,

Interesting that you've got 10 likes and one dislike. I wonder if the dislike is from a disappointed amphibian lover .......

Possibly. Though typically in English frog has several meanings one of which might be why the pointed bit on a point is know as a frog; the 'V' shaped portion on the underside of a horses hoof is known as a frog. Maybe a horse lover?

And correctly as Phillipy says Picking refers to cleaning in usually acid in this case Citric as suggested.

Hi Doug,

Can I ask how you determine the angles for the jig please??

It might be visible in the attached photographs the track work is drawn on to the base boards and the track work built on top so the angle of the frog is created or as in this particular case a Peco short radius point was copied. I am not sure I posted this in this group but a bit of a video made of track laying and point construction.

https://youtu.be/QYI17SbmzJw
Take care stay safe.

Tony.

Interesting but it strikes me it doesn't make for the most satisfactory soldered joint as you have a gap at the back where the rail web is - unless you fill the whole thing with solder.

I have always done mine a slightly different way using a method I read about somewhere back in the forgotten mists of time.

I first bend both rails as in the video but only half as much. Start the bend at the point the rails meet and bend so that the centreline is exactly on the point of the vee. Then file both sides of each rail similar to the video. You end up with two rails that both go to the point of the vee at the centreline of the rail and you have a large flat mating surface between them.

To my mind it gives a much stronger soldered joint - and looks prettier ! Don't know if you can see what I mean in the picture, it's rather weathered !

Hi Brian,

Yes, a lot prettier joint. I am not sure about strength though, the first one made I tried to break, both rails just became 'U' shaped the silver solder wouldn't part and I suspect wouldn't under any normal effort.

Take care stay safe.

Tony.

Tony Bird wrote: ↑Sun Jun 07, 2020 5:54 pm
Yes, a lot prettier joint. I am not sure about strength though, the first one made I tried to break, both rails just became 'U' shaped the silver solder wouldn't part and I suspect wouldn't under any normal effort.

Yes Tony, I accept it was a bit of a spurious point about strength ! Nothing in our scales is likely to subject it to massive forces !
Mine is only soft soldered - silver soldering is a bit beyond me.

Brian,

That's a beautiful job. I've seen worse full sized ones!

Who's chairs do you use?

Andrew

Ha ha, thanks Andrew !

That one is entirely Tenmille parts, sleepers, chairs and brass bullhead rail. Hard to believe it's brass when it's weathered for a while !