I model in N scale and some of you may have seen my work on the N forum. Our club layout (N) has an amusement park and I am toying with the idea of making a "park train ride" by using Z goodies. So I have some questions, if you have time to make suggestion; 1. I was thinking of Z flex track, no roadbed ala KATOU Unitrak. What brand flex would be easiest to work with? 2. What make of train, most likely a diesel and one or two "old time" passenger cars ? 3. Are there any wooden trestle kits available? Does anyone have a jpeg of an N and Z sitting next to each other? Any suggestion or links you know would be appreciated. Thanks & be well, Carl
Have you considered T-gauge as well??? Smaller yet than Z and may give a better representation of what you are trying to do.
I have used the micro trains flex with very good luck. I have made some very small layouts with it. Including 2 in makeup cases. I have both Marklin and Micro Trains F7s. They both work well. There are also a couple hood type units out there. Most Marklin stuff is going to be European prototype. Although they have a Mikado that is a very nice runner. I have a few of the older type European passenger cars. I don't have any of the us prototype passenger cars so I can't comment on them. I will see if I can get a pic of a Z and N scale F unit next to each other. If you buy used equipment you are gonna want to see them run. If they have set for a while with out being run the grease in the Marklins turns to peanut butter. They can be cleaned up and got running not a terrible job, just a little tedious, as long as they have not burned up the motor trying to get it to go, or put to much voltage to the motor. 9-10 volts is MAX. Later Richard
RSlaserkits offers a wooden truss rod bridge... https://www.rslaserkits.com/4028-Wood-Truss-Rod-Bridge-55-Span_p_3938.html Matt
Wouldn't it be super if you could get that sort of detail in T as pictured above, plus have them run reliably?
Thanks to all of you for comments and link. Z t t, That is my concern with the T, I am afraid it would not run as reliably as a Z train would. I don't want to "mess" with the thing, especially during a show. I want to set up a station with auto stop/start built in so I may just go with the Z. Thanks again, be well, Carl
I've seen a couple of T layouts in my area, pre-covid when we had train shows, and they were ran pretty much all day long with barley any glitches, really smooth runners. I've come really close to buying a basic set, just for fun. Some of the guy's in the T forum have come up with some great stuff!
The T Gauge does run well, GREAT for SMALL sets and such, but, still a novelty. That US loco is custom. I have a lot of T offerings but just use them as an interest, on a table, at Shows. Back to the questions. MTL flex is greatness scale lookin rail. But only 12" long (about 10-11" in a curve) and black undetailed ties. no turnouts (switches) unless you use the road bed ones. Atlas 2810 flex is 24" long, more flexible, detailed brown ties (same spacing as MTL =U.S.) but uses larger rail head (but same head as Peco, märkln, Rokuhan) and offer sorta realistic turnouts and . . crossing. Note though that the turnouts and crossing are true number frog so the divergent (exit) rail is straight (not a continuous 490mm radius curve). This makes the layout a bit larger in both length as width. Atlas turnouts require a through mechanism to move them (finger, servo, motor or electrical slide switch [like, an on/off] You can play around with some example section (roadbed) track using the free SCARM software, then adapt to flex. http://www.scarm.info/index.php For running, I like freight. So many dynamic cars to put into a train. If you do switching (Micro-Trains [MTL] only), you can always have many variations of that freight cars. Nice when the are passed by a passenger though