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Building easy sub-roadbed


Once the center spline and upright are ready to receive the next strip, (top left) measure and mark the strip for cutting it to length. Apply the hot glue (top right) to the strip. In this case an 80-watt gun was used. A strip of hardboard (above left) has hot glue ap-


center spline and force it straight while holding it in place. Imagine trying to apply three feet of


hot glue to an eight foot length of strip, and then holding it in place while one person applies more glue and slowly moves along the first strip, putting the rest of the second strip in place. After much laughter and some burnt fingers, we realized it couldn’t be done. From all of this has evolved a simple, inexpensive way to build mainline sub- roadbed that is incredibly strong, easy to build, with beautiful flowing curves, which transmit almost no sound. Place uprights where needed, using


the method described above. Screw two inch screws on either side of the center- line mark. Put the eight-foot by one- inch spline in place over the marks be- tween the screws. Clamp a piece of board or other stiffener along each length where the track needs to be straight. Slide the spline back and forth until the curve leading into the straight track looks correct. The strip will create its own easements. Place a


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plied and is ready to be attached to the center spline. Press the prepared strip (above right) onto the center spline. Start at one end and work to the other using a slight up and down motion to distribute the glue along the length of the strip.


dab of hot glue under the spline so that the spline is secured to each of the up- rights. Looks pretty good, right? But wait! When the stiffener is re-


moved the spline will fall into curves again. Plus, if you leave the clamps and stiffeners in place, how do you glue the strips on? We discovered that the only strip that needs to be long and continu- ous is the center one. The rest can be of almost any length. Now, a word about hot glue. You


should not use a lot of glue. We buy ours at a craft store by the five-pound box. We have tried yellow acrylic glue and ordinary glue. The regular glue works just fine. Cut several strips of spline to the


length of the straight track. Hot glue three strips to each side of the center spline where it needs to be straight, holding the stiffener to the opposite side so that it comes out reasonably straight. Continue adjusting the curves and gluing the center spline to the up- rights, while gluing stiffeners to the straight sections until you reach the


end of the eight-foot strip. Place the next strip on the uprights between the screws. Pull the ends together, hot glue a six-inch strip to the end of the first strip, then glue the lap patch to the next strip. Continue this until you reach a reasonable stopping point. At this point, the center spline


should present you with beautiful flow- ing curves with no strength yet, except in the straight sections where addition- al strips were glued in place. Hot gluing additional layers onto the center cre- ates an incredibly strong, stable and quiet sub-roadbed. We determined that three or four feet is the ideal length for these reinforcing strips. We have a home improvement store where we buy the hardboard and have them cut the 4′×8′ sheets into two 3′×4′ pieces with one 2′×4′ piece. These fit into the car better, and once we get home they are easier to handle as we cut them into the needed one inch width. We only use eight-foot strips for the center spline so we can cut down on the number of joints and make best use of the materi-


DECEMBER 2011


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