Track Deviation Detector

[Paul Townsend]

A have a device that is a detector wagon, it can be built for P4 or EM track and has a pair of levers that waggle about if the rails are not level.
The cunning design means it all fits within the loading gauge.
There are painted stripes on a scale that show good, iffy or bad. It has proved very useful at Highbridge especially after the house move and enforced rebuild.

The etched kit was bought years ago and is marked as Track Deviation Detecor of P4 and EM copyright Mac 2017.
I have no recollection of where I bought this.

Here it is indicating "iffy".

Track deviation detecor wagon.jpg

I have some track troubles on Dartmouth and so want to build another on for 28mm gauge.
My preferred route is to acquire another kit and modify it.

There was an earlier design for a scratchbuild job which I don't fancy as it used tall levers which would make it unwieldy and way out of gauge height wise.

[40C]

Masokits

[Steve Carter]

Masokits

11.15 Track Defect Detection Vehicle: Suitable for P4 and EM ONLY:
It detects deviations and steps in the track and can be either propelled or pulled by a loco (or shoved about by
hand). A calibration scale is included. Only the flat etch is provided. Wheels, bearings, piano wire and brass rod
and tube being required to complete. Please note that perfectly round and parallel wheels are essential otherwise
this will be a wobbly wheel detector.
£10.00

[Paul Townsend]

Thankyou both

[andrewnummelin]

...
There was an earlier design for a scratchbuild job which I don't fancy as it used tall levers which would make it unwieldy and way out of gauge height wise.

You may have been thinking of Dave Reynolds track defect detector (unfortunately my scan of the article does not include the details of the publication).

Capture2.JPG

There was also Don Rowlands' diplometer in Model Railways February 1976 page 83.

Capture.JPG

This shows cant and gradients rather than defects.

My own test items also include a Masokits one (it is very sensitive, highly recommended) and one for electrical supply (MERG pocket money kit connected to a split axle with solid metal wheels - one LED lights with DC and both with AC). They were brought into use when I fitted facing point locking bars to the club layout - irregular running of locos was shown not to be a bar within a check rail being too high but virtually indetectable bits of superglue that had strayed onto the rail surface.

DSC05083.JPG

I guess this could be made more sophisticated to be able to show which wheel fails to pick up rather than a simple lack of current collection.

[Noel]

You may have been thinking of Dave Reynolds track defect detector (unfortunately my scan of the article does not include the details of the publication).

MRJ 57 page 230. There is another version by Don Rowland, in S4 News 142 page 14.

[martin goodall]

Yes, Paul's 'machine' was built from the kit produced by Mike Clark (Masokits).

I have one of these, but I have never really got on with it, and it has been languishing in a drawer under the layout for many a long year.

I have noticed recently that a few rail joints have gone out of alignment on the layout, but this was obvious from the behaviour of vehicles running over these spots and so they were easily identified.
When I get 'a round tuit', I must fire up the soldering iron and make the necessary adjustments.

[Hardwicke]

Now somewhere I've a version of Don Rowlands' diplometer