Nomenclature

..or should these be termed 'guard rails' ?

Maybe my idea of how close

Maybe my idea of how close this extra rail needs to be is distorted?

This looks to be an even different size rail?

different rail

Yes, the guard rails are normally a size smaller.

Guard rails are smaller than the primary rails.

For modeling purposes, check the spacing on an Atlas rerailer.  If you can make the spacing about the same as the Atlas rerailer, it should work for you.

So would using code 55 as

So would using code 55 as guard rails on a code 70 track be fine?

And I guess I should use

And I guess I should use code83 guards for my code100 track.

My Shinohara Bridge Track & making some

So here is piece of that 'bridge track' I had collected up. It labeled Shinohara

The sections are about 3 feet long, and it appears the inner and outer rail sizes are the same.
 

Here is a comparison,   the Shinohara track on the bottom and a normal Atlas CODE100 flex track on the top. But there are two different safety/guard rails laid in there. The top rail is another piece of Code100, the bottom one is Code83
 

You can see that the molded rail keepers on the stock track keeps the guard rails away from the main rail by a greater distance than with the 'commercial built' Shinohara track. But this apparently is not a problem when I look around at all the prototype installation that vary widely?

Tracks from the end view,...
 

How effective can these guard

How effective can these guard rails actually be on our scale model railroad track?
 

I am currently working on my entrance-way bridges that comprise my swing-down bridge structure
https://forum.mrhmag.com/post/layout-room-entrance-swingdown-bridges-3-of-them-in-combo-12210684

https://forum.mrhmag.com/post/layout-room-entrance-swingdown-bridges-3-of-them-in-combo-12210684
 

At the actual cut joints I am considering the multiple use of sectioned up Atlas rerailers. BUT yesterday I started to think of an alternate plan to one particular aspect of that use. I had been thinking of using a cut up portion of the Atlas rerailer on that exiting portion of the bridge track that leaves the bridge going to the cut joint itself. In other words I would have a small portion of the atlas rerailer between the end of the bridge track and the angled cut joint space.

What if I left this short section of rerailer out,.... and just extended the Shinohara guard rail track over to this cut joint space,...and bent the ends of those guard rails inward like many of the prototypes. Would it work ??

I found this and have no idea

I found this and have no idea why they are positioned like this on this bridge.

Guard rails

Guard rails keep cars that are ALREADY derailed from going off the ties on a bridge, destroying it.  

They do not PREVENT a car from derailing.  They do not rerail a previously derailed car.

If your cars are derailed before they get to the bridge, then the model guard rails might work.  If you have quality track work and your cars are normally not derailed, then it won't matter.  In any case a model car hitting a model bridge will rarely destroy it (if its a commercially made bridge.)

Also note the commercial bridge track is greatly overbuilt.  The guard rails have tie plates and spikes in every tie.  If you look closely at the pictures the prototype rails don't have tie plates and are only spiked every so often.

I will have a full size Atlas

I will have a full size Atlas rerailer incoporated into the decks track as it comes to the slotted space of the bridge's track. So then it is only a misalignment in this slot space that could cause a derailment. That's the derailment I am trying to account for. My basic question is could I count on that rather closely spaced Shinohara bridge track (with its closely spaced code 100 guard rail) to contain this derailment,...or to even rerail it??

the Shinohara track on the left in this photo
 

My basic question is could I

Rerail?  Neither can be counted on to rerail. Neither is designed to rerail.

Contain? Maybe both can, maybe both won't.  Depends on how bad they are derailed.

Experiment

I did a very brief little experiment with those bridge track rails butted up against conventional flex track, and found as you said DAVE no rerailing capabilities at all. However I did find that the joint could tolerate a little misalignment without derailing some hand pushed trucks,...actually a bit more than I suspected.

So I have decided to hook things up like this to start out with. I will leave the safety rail track in its longest form all the way to the gap/slot. There it will mate up with a rerailer like this,...

If for some reason I have problems with this arrangement I can shorten the bridge/safety track, then insert a portion of rerailer in that space.

But I think this will work, ....and I can minutely adjust alignments by ever so slightly swinging the rerailer piece just a bit.

The upper bridge rail would look something like this (with the rail cut properly of course).
 

Gluing Track to its Plastic Ties?

One piece of my 'bridge guard rail track" has a big deformed curve in its end, and has two of its rails loose from their ties. I want to straigthen it back up and reglue the rail to the ties. What is the best glue to use??

Dull Coat Question

Hi gang,

Quick question, should I use my ink/alcohol wash on my painted car first before the dull coat?? What kind of a relationship does dull coat have with alcohol??

Best, Scott 

Hey Brian - if you’re goal

Hey Brian - if you’re goal is to contain a possible derailment from falling off the bridge maybe some thin clear plexi glass sheets on each side would work?

jeff

Cut them in two

Cut the rerailers in two.  All you really need is the ramp portion.

Put one on either side of the gap, one on the bridge, one on solid benchwork with the rerailers facing each other.

Use the rerailer as the "point" of the guardrails on the bridge.

Ramp Portions

@Dave

I had/have considered something like this after noticing the importance of those ramp portions. One hesitancy in doing so right away was my reluctance to cut/shortened those special Shinohara bridge rails. I only have 3 of them to experiment with, so my thoughts were that i would first try the 'longer version' before modifying them for another consideration.
 

If they work out as I currently have them configured, then it will save me a lot of additional cutting/modifying.

This was a consideration at one time, but now I am hoping to keep that rerailer sections off of the bridges themselves.
 

thin clear plexi glass

@Jeff
That's a possibility, and I have some if needed.