Model Railroading > Should a 25 watt soldering iron be enough

To solder atlas flex track togeather ?

I wouldn't solder it together - keep your rail joiners free of solder so your rail has room to expand & contract.  For electrical continuity, solder small jumper wires around all of your railjoints.  And yes 25 watts should be sufficient.

Yes 25 watt is fine for track, but I agree with the other reply above, don't do it, at least on all track.

I ocassionally solder rail when alignment is critical, as on a curve that might be giving trouble, but
never two joints in succession, as you need the rail room for slight expansion and/or contraction.

I bought a 40 watt Weller soldering iron.  Sure, I know it's not a posh soldering station that many go with, but it seems to work pretty well.

I used to solder my rail joints together and did so in a garage layout that was subject to major swings in temperature and humidity; the track on that layout experienced joints that pulled apart and broke during extreme cold and kinkied in hot weather.  My current layout is in a temperature and humidity controlled basement, but as a precaution, I plan to leave most rail joints unsoldered.

As mentioned above, it may be a good idea to solder joints on curves to keep them smooth and flowing, but I plan to leave most other joints unsoldered. 

What I do is solder feeder wires to the bottom of rail joiners and run them frequently, minimium every other flex track joint, to cause there to be positive power to all parts of the layout.  This allows the track to expande and contract a bit as the rail is free to slide a bit in the joiner.  I'd put a business card between the rail to provide a slight gap for expansion.  In many cases I solder the feeder to the rail joiner after it is installed - usually to the side facing away from the aisle where it is mostly hidden from view after painting and ballasting.


Cheers, Jim

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Jim has a nice photo above complete with heat sinks on either side of the joiner to protect the ties. However in my experience, this method fails when you ballast because the glue will seep in between the joiner and the rail and insulate it. You could solder one end so that rail always has good connectivity. In my layout room, which is a bonus room where climate control is a couple of windows and a fan, I planned for expansion and included expansion joint areas very eight to nine feet. It wasn't quit enough and I had to go back and add two more in key locations. I like WWM's suggestion of soldering your curves and feeders on every rail.

25 watt iron should be enough if kept clean.

All of my track joints are soldered along with my switch track to flex track joints my room used to run from 40 to 90 degrees. I did have some kink trouble on a section I did with the room temp not controled  on the low side to 55 max never did control that. So not having any trouble with anything would not use jumpers too hard for me to do as eyesite problems make things hard. Just my fyi on things and I have about 200ft of track and 45 switches on the lower level no track so far on the upper. And it ON30 gauge ME track and switches with San Juan cars and MMI engines NCE controls.

I have a large N layout with code 55 track. Soldered all joints  All rail down on cork with contact cement ballest rock and glue. Room has AC for a max of 75 degrees.  Never a kinking problem and no pull aparts etc
RB

ChrisCampi Wrote:
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> However in my experience, this method fails
> when you ballast because the glue will seep in
> between the joiner and the rail and insulate it.

Perhaps the only way of guaranteeing power and allowing expansion/contraction to all rails is to have a feeder for every joint and soldering one side leaving the other side float.

SPDRGWfan Wrote:
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> ChrisCampi Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > However in my experience, this method fails
> > when you ballast because the glue will seep in
> > between the joiner and the rail and insulate
> it.
>
> Perhaps the only way of guaranteeing power and
> allowing expansion/contraction to all rails is to
> have a feeder for every joint and soldering one
> side leaving the other side float.

I think that would work well Jim.

I suppose the trick will be to solder one side and avoid having any wick over to the other side.

> > However in my experience, this method fails when you ballast because the glue will seep in
> > between the joiner and the rail and insulate it.
>
> Perhaps the only way of guaranteeing power and allowing expansion/contraction to all rails is to
> have a feeder for every joint and soldering one side leaving the other side float.

One possible sugestion would be to put a little anti-oxidant compound in the rail joiner when assembling the track. That would help to keep the ballast bonding agent out of the joint during ballasting.
Dano

steeplecab Wrote:
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> One possible sugestion would be to put a little
> anti-oxidant compound in the rail joiner when
> assembling the track. That would help to keep the
> ballast bonding agent out of the joint during
> ballasting.
> Dano

I"m not familiar with the anti-oxidant compound.  Can you elaborate?  What is it, where do I buy it etc?

I soldered a feeder wire somewhere to each rail on all sections of track, that way the joiners could fill with glue, or oxidize and there is no power loss. I used 24ga wire tied into a feeder wire below and it works great.

It's called NoOxide and you can get it at Home Depot, Lowes or any electrical supply house.

SPDRGWfan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> steeplecab Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > One possible sugestion would be to put a little
> > anti-oxidant compound in the rail joiner when
> > assembling the track. That would help to keep
> the
> > ballast bonding agent out of the joint during
> > ballasting.
> > Dano
>
> I"m not familiar with the anti-oxidant compound. 
> Can you elaborate?  What is it, where do I buy it
> etc?

SP4360 Wrote:
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> It's called NoOxide and you can get it at Home
> Depot, Lowes or any electrical supply house.

Thanks for the tip.  So this stuff could mitigate the issue of ballast adhesive getting in between the rail and the joiner issue?  I haven never heard of that problem honestly.  I had apparently wrongly assumed that if I had a tight joint with a rail joiner, it would generally stay conductive.

as to soldering the rail joints, a lot depends on the train room environment.  Mine is N-Scale in an upstairs large room and is climate controlled with the rest of the house (never under 65 or over 75).  I soldered everything and have zero problems.

Mike Stewart
Oakley, CA

Oh well as two of us pointed out just keeping the temp between those two like I do now cured the only problem I had. It occured when the room was about 45 and had not warmed the track yet so by keeping it above 50 solved the problem. Again all of mine are soldered joints no jumpers anywhere.

As a foot note: The best tutorial on soldering I've ever seen is the one made and sold by BPL. The sell a DVD
Ken Harrison just did a show on soldering on his show recently. 

BAB Wrote:
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> Oh well as two of us pointed out just keeping the
> temp between those two like I do now cured the
> only problem I had. It occured when the room was
> about 45 and had not warmed the track yet so by
> keeping it above 50 solved the problem. Again all
> of mine are soldered joints no jumpers anywhere.

I am not sure what temperature range minimizes track expansion and contraction problems.   I do know when I had a layout in extreme temp conditions, it was a problem (low of 0 and high in the 90's). 

My current basement (recently finished) probably has a temperature range of (guessing here) maybe 60 in the winter and maybe 80 in the summer.  There are only two vents running to it presently so without modifying it can get a bit chilly in winter.  There is also a dehumifier running usually from about May to Sept to keep humidity down to about 50 or 55.  So while the environmental controls are not as tight as some listed above, they are aren't too bad. Bottom line is there may be a bit of expansion and contraction; at least I'll plan for it but environmental swings are not major like I had before.
 

Here's the No Ox. You can see it's a thick grease like substance. I use it time to time on switch point heels. Never thought about it when installing joiners.

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