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Steam or not, i enjoyed the shows greatly Daniel !

Been looking forward to see that outdoor track of yours, and it certainly has been worth the wait.
A fine setup, and some very nice looking locos (big Shay fan here !) and rolling stock.

Thanks for sharing

Test track is just a 60 foot circumference oval that was flopped down one day where SWAMBO allowed. I'd had it elsewhere first, but it got into the way of her bird & fox feeding, so it had to go. As I understand it, real railroads often had problems securing right of way and trackage rights, so that just adds to the "scale effect" of my "Iron" (should read as Aluminum) Road.

Grades run from near flat to almost 6% on curves that are somewhat shy of a six foot radius. When I get my actual trackage laid, it should have a minimum radius more like seven or eight feet, which is really significantly better, and a maximum grade of about 2 1/2%, except on a ramp up to an ore bin and then further on up to a service platform, which will need to be a bit over 4%.

At 60 feet per lap, 88 laps makes an actual mile, or about 20+ scale miles ...... and both engines have done a whole lot of laps by now, and still running strong.

Most of the roadbed has been in place for a few years ..... aging as it were, but my hangup is that I don't want to lay track without the initial turnouts in place, so I don't have to take it up to cut in the switches when I go to put in a yard or otherwise expand. Just can't seem to get around to building the dang switches, even though I have built the jig and have the materials on hand.

Wow, looks like you've done a lot of work already - shame you're not lazy like me and just buy readymade turnouts. Is your roadbed sand/gravel or did you put some cement in the mix - it certainly hasn't lost definition over the years.

Wow, looks like you've done a lot of work already - shame you're not lazy like me and just buy readymade turnouts. Is your roadbed sand/gravel or did you put some cement in the mix - it certainly hasn't lost definition over the years.

Larry... it's all "sand & gravel" or rather DG (decomposed granite) which is much the same, with no cement, so it most certainly has lost some definition as it is more a rounded mound now, but of roughly the same dimensions. Those photos were taken years ago when I first troweled it in, but other than the nice flat top and all the cat, raven, racoon and fox tracks it really is about the same today. Those critters all walk all over my test track as well, but don't seem to disturb it much in the process.