Thinking About Kato N Unitrack

I had a mild case of the model railroad doldrums, and what pulled me out of it was going back over my stash of N scale stuff. This included some Kato Unitrack. I got two N gauge Unitrack sets about 1993 when we moved to this house and I still wasn't sure if I was going to switch to HO. It was what is now the M1 set, although at the time this didn't include the power pack, and the V1 set with two switches and a siding. Now and then I made false starts with this, but never really followed through.

Pretty much the standard HO construction method -- at least for modelers above a certain skill set -- is homasote (or equivalent) base, cork roadbed, and flex track. A big problem with this is that it isn't dimensionally stable. Unless it's sealed, homasote shrinks and swells. Flex track by definition isn't stable on either a homasote or cork base and can easily get out of level or go into dips or humps, especially with changes in humidity. I say this based on experience.

The plus side of Unitrack is that it's dimensionally stable. If it's fastened down to a stable base, it's likely to stay how it was laid. The stable measurements impose a lot of discipline on deisgn and construction -- there are basically no fudge factors, which I believe will pay off in performance.

I found this piece of plywood while I was cleaning out my late parents' garage. It measures 28-5/8 x 48 inches. I finally decided to mate it with my Unitrack over the weekend. At this point, I expect to use it as an analog test track while I begin the project of installing DCC in my old N locos. At a certain point, I will convert it to DCC when the project is more or less done and do something to mate it with the T-track modules I have on order. However, while it is not a T-track module itself, I expect to set it up mechanically, electrically and dimensionally to interface with T-track.

Unitrack has downsides, too. It favors people who set things up on living room floors (a good part of the Japanese market), so it assumes you aren't going to drill into the baseboard or install Tortoise machines. This is fine for me, because my days of crawling under baseboards are over, and I can work from the surface without problems here. But not everyone is ready to work this way.

Otherwise, the track is too clean and shiny, and worse, it's dimensioned to appeal to the Japanese market, where the rail lines other than the bullet trains are 3 foot 6 inch gauge. The tie spacing reflects this, although it looks like the newer concrete tie track is better this way.

I weathered my track by hitting the sides of the rails with airbrushed Floquil Rail Brown (no good replacement, I'm afraid) and giving the whole thing an overspray of heavily thinned Floquil Mud mixed with Flat. This lightened the too-brown and shiny ties. I looked at videos to get an idea of how to tone down the Unitrack effect, too. Often you don't see the details of track in videos, since they're focusing on the train itself. Other features like weathering, vegetation, grass encroaching on the ballast, etc, can distract attention from the ties.

On the right is a Kadee N electromagnetic uncoupler installed in a Unitrack section. Kadee no longer makes these, but it's possible to convert an HOn3 version.