Phil Paskos mentioned the Quirks' portable track. For most of the track, the track is not on plywood. The "roadbed" is made of pieces of cedar. The pieces were "end cuttings" left from another project not related to live steam. So the grain of the wood runs perpendicular to the running rails. Each piece is as long as the track base is wide. At opposite corners, two screws per piece of cedar, a screw is run down into the metal supports. The metal supports are actually metal studs, used in place of 2x4s in some construction jobs. You can buy the metal studs at Home Depot and the like. To make the portable sections, two studs were laid down side by side, as far apart as the track base was to be wide. The cedar pieces were then screwed to the two metal studs. Near the end of each section the cedar pieces are left off until the two metal studs are screwed to the support that sits on the ground. After the metal studs are secure, the end pieces of cedar are screwed onto the top. Then the track is in long sections, and it is placed on top of the cedar and tacked into place with screws. The Pennsylvania Live Steamers' track was set on treated plywood and then treated again with essentially an industrial quality wood preserver. Already there are places where the plywood layers are separateing. As one PLS member concluded, if you lay down plywood you are only laying down problems for the future. I plan to use cedar with a coat of Thompson's or the like on the track that I plan to build in the back yard this summer, essentially following the Quirks' method building on metal studs. When I said above that most of the Quirks' track is on cedar, I used "most" because I'm not sure if the section with the steam-up tracks is cedar or plywood, but the bulk of the track is not on plywood. Bob Blackson
