Hi Wal,

This is also my first foray into the world of Z scale (I'm more familiar with N scale). I'm currently building something quite similar in concept to your planned layout, though not as extensive. Both my outer oval and inner branch lines are kept separate (my outer oval is a high speed 'passenger express line' and those locomotives wouldn't be expected to run on my inner local branch line). The outer oval has 195 mm radii or greater and the inner branch line has radii down to 145 mm:



Having read up extensively on other peoples' experience with Z scale, most recommendations mention keeping the slope angle as shallow as possible/practical while sticking to the Marklin recommendation for minimum height where the track crosses over itself. I performed some initial testing of slope angle using some spare track with my smaller branch line locos and the maximum number of cars that I plan to run attached. What I found was that 1.5 degree slope was fine with the 145 mm, but that 2 degrees was not (the tighter the radii, the more drag on the consist). You might want to consider testing what will/won't work before starting construction (if you haven't already).

With a fair amount of design work using a computer program (Anyrail), I was able to reduce my incline to 1.4 degrees and the decline to 1.9 degrees within the constraints of this particular layout design. As you can see in the video, the inner line consist has no problem with these slopes:

Kleinhopfensee Z Video (both track lines running only)


Cheers,

Ralph.

Edited by user 28 October 2018 20:27:34(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

I could have just used the 1.5 and 2 degree foam inclines from Woodland Scenics, but in this tiny scale I figured why not expend a bit of extra time and get the slope as low as possible for this layout design. This turned out to be a fair bit more labor intensive than I first thought it would be!


I created the 1.4 and 1.9 degree slopes by hand for each length of track out of the pink insulation foam. Anyrail was helpful for this since I could obtain the start height, end height and then calculate the height for the middle for each section and then use some filing techniques to get the desired slope and make it flat. I used the Woodland Scenics 'risers' for those higher elevation areas over 1" (the pink foam is a bit less less than ~1" thick).

Ralph.

Edited by user 09 November 2018 04:42:36(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified