I watched several videos and thought I could solder the Scale track together. I made a huge mistake that will need to be corrected. My basement goes through some changes over the different seasons. The layout will shrink a bit in the winter from the heat drying stuff out. When spring arrives the heat does not run very much. The air conditioning is not on yet either. So the humidity goes up a bit and the plywood grows I imagine. To make things worse, my 3 rail is an elevated loop like the Chicago transit and the track can flex when trains go over.
Whatever the reasons for whatever is going on, my track joints are failing. I keep finding at least one or more sections apart every time I run. I just found another 4 joints failed. The joints were good and the solder stuck to each side, yet they separated? I believe that track joiners should have been used to help the stress? I have re-soldered joints so many times that I am at a loss. I will try again with joiners where I can get the joints cleaned up before I scrap the whole idea. I used to make cables for my sound system and light show, so I am pretty good at soldering. I have been soldering for most of my life. I guess that doesn't make my joints good enough? Urrgggg.
I noticed that my 2 rail Atlas joiners look like they will fit the center rail on the Scaletrax. So I just need to get something for the outside rails now. It will probably take me a year to fix all the joints. That's if they will hold up with joiners? It sure looked easy in the videos!
