Maximum HO grades for HO?

I'm just getting started with my first serious HO scale layout. I have lots of room and distance to cover on a G shaped table. What is the recommend hill grade for HO scale?

I'm planning at least 3-4 over/under passes and maybe even a spiral mountain climb in a 4x6 area. The table is a 4x8 connected to a a 2x4 connected to a 8x2 in a J config with and connected to a odd shaped 4x6 (if that makes any since at all).

Any advice out there?

The recommended grade is "as small as possible!"!

generally 1% is reasonable.
2% is doable but steep.
3% is too much, and will severely limit what you can run.

Scot

Scot is generally right on. An additional comment I have is that if you have to run a steep grade, 2.5% or better, it's best to prepare to operate in one direction (down) through this trackage. Have an alternative route to run in the opposite direction. With grades, you will find an increased chance of a pull-apart, train uncouples, or locomotive wheel spins. And unless you want to incorporate some complicated retaining system, forget about leaving a cut of cars on unlevel track.

For example; I have a mainline with broad curves and mild grades, along with a secondary bypass track with sharper curves and steeper grades which provides access to several industries. Short local way freights can usually run in either direction on the secondary. It is possible to have a long throughfreight train use the secondary, but it can be tough to run up the grade, depending on the locomotive power assigned.

Try to limit all your grades to 1.8%, unless you really want some interesting (or aggravating) operations to be required.

Woodland Scenics has pre-cut foam inclines

4% is 4" High in 8FT
3% is 3 1/2" High in 12'
2% is 4" in 16'

4% is an absolute maximum... real railroad have very smooth, gradual changes in elevation, your model railroad will look best if it does the same.

http://modeltrains.about.com/od/layoutc ... grades.htm

-otto-

Scottychaos is RIGHT ON THE MONEY. As "Speed Kills" in the real world, grades are a losing challenge and eventually burn out the best of mechanisms.

Sure, you can build grades, add a helix to a multi-level layout, but the extra strain from pulling while climbing shortens the service life of your units.

Keep your engines HAPPY; instead of raising the grade, LOWER THE RIVER. You can have all the fun of varied terrain by making your landscape roll up and down, instead of raising and lowering the tracks.

The other side of it is seeing what happens when a coupling gives way, and you have a runaway going backwards down the slope. That usually ends in the proverbial, gut-wrenching SMASH at the end.

Treat a grade like a "Duckunder"; AVOID THEM.

D/

Otto Vondrak wrote:4% is an absolute maximum... real railroad have very smooth, gradual changes in elevation, your model railroad will look best if it does the same.

http://modeltrains.about.com/od/layoutc ... grades.htm

-otto-

Otto,

Thanks for the link. It pretty much confirmed my thoughts. I plan to have one of a currently under construction series of modules that will have a 4% grade for a HOn3 climb from the terminal, more or less like the 4% grade climb on the C&T out of Chama. I figure that it will give me a good reason to double head, and then drop the helper to make it more interesting. Also contemplating a helix inside a 'mountain' at the corner module, to get the narrow gauge a lot higher than the standard gauge. Long-term project, mostly due to work (both the $$ work and the BR&W volunteer work) getting in the way.

If you have the room for it don´t go over 1,5% grade, too much troubles with longer trains !!!

I have a short piece of an electrified local railroad fitted with a 7% !!! grade where i only use streetcars and short trains with a heavy loco and only two waggons. One of the used streetcars is an 8 - axle Roco with rubbered driving wheels but it needs a second motor and gear to climb the grade......so you see what would be possible under special circumstances too.
The local railway had been oriented on the historic Fondo - Pso. di Mendola adhesion railway in northern Italy which really had very hefty 8% grades.
Here you can see a rebuilt Gogtram streetcar with hanger on the tracks, the origin mechanic collapsed shortly after running this track, since then the streetcar has the adapted technical interior from a Liliput OEBB 2095 narrow gauge loco......
An adapted special high pulsed transformer (from a mini drilling machine) must be used to get a evenly speed at the different gradings on the line.
The lower track on the photo belongs to the same line, there´s only a very narrow horseshoe curve between the two parts.

It depends on the line that you are modeling. If you are modeling a HOn3 mountain line or something, I've seen people get away with 8% on a reverse curve. If you are modeling a standard line, all of my grades (up to 5.1%) have worked fine for me. I have had only one memorable wreck on that part of the line with that grade, which ironically had nothing to do with the grade, and a lot to do with a cat!

Depends upon how hard you wish to work your engines, and how durable they are. As you lengthen the train you probably are also shortening the life of the engine. In any grade that I have I use weighted engines, and engines that have all drive axles powered. I also clean and lubricate them on a monthly basis.

Chessie GM50 wrote:It depends on the line that you are modeling. If you are modeling a HOn3 mountain line or something, I've seen people get away with 8% on a reverse curve. If you are modeling a standard line, all of my grades (up to 5.1%) have worked fine for me. I have had only one memorable wreck on that part of the line with that grade, which ironically had nothing to do with the grade, and a lot to do with a cat!

I hate quoting my own post, but that grade is on a helix heading up from my staging yard, max visible grades are about 4%
Anyway, I'd tend to agree with Otto saying that 4% is the max for visible areas, in Standard HO, but on areas like helix es, 5% is about the max that you should go.

Is it too much to expect four six axle units to pull a 15 to 16 car freight train in HO Scale up a 4% Grade about 24' in length to meet a rise of about 12 feet ?

---> Mark

Mem160 wrote:Is it too much to expect four six axle units to pull a 15 to 16 car freight train in HO Scale up a 4% Grade about 24' in length to meet a rise of about 12 feet ?

---> Mark

....In SCALE?....YES. You're asking for trouble. As someone else aptly noted here; tackle the steep grade going downhill, NOT UP, as if the train uncouples, you're in deep doo-doo. If you use a pusher and the push/pull force is uneven, you will cause a derailment in the middle of your consist. SALUDA on the SOUTHERN RR (USA) is/was the steepest mainline grade in the USA (http://www.polkcounty.org/saludagrade/H ... rivia.html) (http://www.polkcounty.org/saludagrade/T ... Grade.html).
This nightmare comes in at 4.7%, read the links above to see what kinds of conditions you have to replicate on a model for this kind of SKI RUN!

Just LOOK at this slope!

Now I ask you, is this a ROLLERCOASTER or WHAT??

I have been up Scranton Hill (Eastern Pennsylvania, Pocono Mtn. Range) in the days of the Erie Lackawanna, and that climb from the station in Scranton almost to Moscow was at least 3% and change. With a 24 car passenger train behind Reading 2102, some B@$t@rd greased the tracks so he could get the drive wheels on the locomotive slipping on his movie camera. The train lost traction and began to slowly slide back downgrade. The train gently slid back to the nose of an "F"Unit helper which stopped the train until the steamer dumped sand and regained traction to make the grade virtually unassisted. The grade was so steep that in a coach, we felt like we were in recliners.

Point of that is, 4% is rare to unnatural outside of logging operations and Alpine railroading. In the scope of modelling, you have to be afraid that it will look unrealistic to the eye. Be careful not to "Overtrack" your layout area, and if you want to hide some of these potentially steep grades in tunnels (think about that), make sure you have physical access in the event of a catastrophy. We all tend to try to cram ten pounds into a three pound bag; my vice is curves too sharp for the eye but that the equipment can handle -- hidden in tunnels.

D/

You can have all the fun of varied terrain by making your landscape roll up and down, instead of raising and lowering the tracks.

This is what I have already done, but I am seriously considering a second deck and need a way to connect them, or else it probably isn't worth adding a second deck at all. I was planning a 10"-12" difference between them, but I don't know if I have the room to get away with 2% and certainly have no room for a helix. I wasn't planning any grades on the upper level either, which leaves my only other option to be a train elevator, I guess; but I feel that could turn into a nightmare too, though it would cut out the grades. I am running basically nothing but Atlas, Athearn, Kato and Life Like 2000 engines, they're all very reliable and pretty powerful, but I don't want to have to replace them either.

Mem160 wrote:You can have all the fun of varied terrain by making your landscape roll up and down, instead of raising and lowering the tracks. This is what I have already done, but I am seriously considering a second deck and need a way to connect them, or else it probably isn't worth adding a second deck at all. I was planning a 10"-12" difference between them, but I don't know if I have the room to get away with 2% and certainly have no room for a helix. I wasn't planning any grades on the upper level either, which leaves my only other option to be a train elevator, I guess; but I feel that could turn into a nightmare too, though it would cut out the grades. I am running basically nothing but Atlas, Athearn, Kato and Life Like 2000 engines, they're all very reliable and pretty powerful, but I don't want to have to replace them either.

Just male a few 1.5% grades, with rolling terrain. From what I can tell, that combo seems to be the best.