Turnout building and track laying

Turnout building and track laying is making steady progress. Once the cork was in place I glued down all the turnout tie blocks and the track tie strips, except were I will install code 55 track. I left those stretches for later, since I think it will be easier to get a nice transition between the different rail heights if the code 70 parts are first in place and sitting tight.

Once the turnout tie blocks were installed I glued the frog blocks in place, followed by the points. The points need to be cut to length and filed to get a good fit. I also soldered a feed wire to each point rail, as shown below.

I cut the excess wire and bent it 90 degrees so I could thread the wire down the hole I had drilled through the foam. Here is the point in its final position, but still with the wire "above ground".

And here the wire is disappearing down the hole.

With all the points in place I could proceed with the stock rails. I omitted the piece of metal foil that is supposed to create the required electrical contact between the stock rail and the future closure rail. My experience from building the first two test turnouts was not that good when it comes to that detail. Instead I will solder a wire to each closure rail and thread it down through the foam, as for the point rails. Tedious but guaranteed to deliver juice to the rail. For each closure rail I removed the connecting web between two ties so that I could drill a hole through the foam, directly under the rail.

Here are some general progress photos, showing turnout building and track laying in various states towards its completion. Note that I build the turnouts in place, meaning I can have long uninterrupted stock rails, spanning several subsequent turnouts.