The numbers, the words, and what to do when it stops.

Ballastscenery

The stone that holds sleepers in place and drains the trackbed. In models, crushed stone or ground walnut shell glued down with dilute PVA.

Benchwork / baseboardscenery

The structure the railway sits on. British modellers say baseboard, Americans say benchwork.

Blockelectrics

An electrically isolated length of track. Essential for running two trains on DC; on DCC used for detection and power districts rather than control.

Bogie / truckstock

The pivoting four- or six-wheel assembly under each end of a vehicle. Same object, two names.

Boosterelectrics

An extra DCC power stage with its own transformer, feeding its own section of track while taking commands from the command station.

Buselectrics

The pair of heavy wires that run the length of the layout underneath, to which every feeder connects.

Cassetteoperating

A removable length of track — often aluminium angle on a board — used to lift a whole train off the layout and turn it round or store it. A fiddle yard in a box.

Check rail / guard railtrack

A short rail set just inside the running rail opposite a frog, which holds the far wheel and stops the near one picking the point of the vee.

Codetrack

Rail height in thousandths of an inch. Code 83 rail is 0.083″ tall.

Command stationelectrics

The box that turns your throttle movements into DCC packets on the rails.

Consistoperating

Several locomotives working as one, under a single throttle. Also, in North American usage, the make-up of a train.

Crossovertrack

Two turnouts back to back, letting a train move between parallel tracks. Contains a built-in S-curve, so use generous turnouts.

CVelectrics

Configuration Variable: a numbered setting inside a decoder. CV1 is the address, CV3 acceleration, CV29 the configuration bits.

DCCelectrics

Digital Command Control. An NMRA standard for sending addressed digital packets through the rails alongside the power.

Decoderelectrics

The small board inside a locomotive that reads DCC packets for its own address and drives the motor, lights and sound.

Dogbonetrack

A continuous run shaped like a bone: two turnback loops joined by a long double-track straight. Folded over itself, it fits a room without looking like a circle.

Easementtrack

A gradually tightening transition between straight track and a curve. Costs nothing, looks right, and stops long stock lurching.

Fiddle yard / stagingoperating

Off-scene track where trains are stored, re-formed or turned by hand. It represents the rest of the railway network.

Flex tracktrack

Track that bends to any radius, usually sold in 900 mm lengths. Fewer joints and cheaper than sectional track.

Frogtrack

The vee where two rails cross in a turnout. Called a crossing vee in Britain. Can be plastic (dead) or metal (live, needing polarity switching).

Frog juicerelectrics

A module that senses the momentary short as a wheel enters a live frog and flips its polarity in milliseconds.

Gaugetrack

The distance between the inner faces of the rails. Not the same thing as scale.

Gradient / gradetrack

Rise divided by run, as a percentage. 2% is the practical maximum for models.

Helixtrack

A corkscrew of track used to climb between levels in a small footprint. Eats space, hides trains, and is a nuisance to reach into — but sometimes the only answer.

Inglenookoperating

A classic shunting puzzle: three sidings holding 5, 3 and 3 wagons, a headshunt holding a locomotive and three, and a randomly drawn train of five to assemble.

Insulfrog / Electrofrogtrack

Peco's names for dead-frog and live-frog turnouts. The first is simpler to wire, the second has no dead spot.

Keep-aliveelectrics

Capacitors that keep a decoder powered for a second or two over dirty track or a dead frog.

Kitbashscenery

To cut up one or more kits and reassemble them into something else. The standard way to fit a large prototype into a small space.

Loading gaugestock

The outline beyond which a vehicle must not project. British loading gauge is famously tight, which is why British stock looks small next to American.

Moduleoperating

A layout section built to a shared standard (Fremo, NTRAK, T-TRAK) so that members' sections can be joined into a much larger railway at a show.

Narrow gaugetrack

Track laid narrower than 1,435 mm. Modelled by running larger-scale bodies on smaller-scale track: On30, HOn3, 009.

NEMtrack

Normen Europäischer Modellbahnen — the European standards, published by MOROP. NEM 362 is the standard coupler pocket.

NMRAtrack

National Model Railroad Association. Publishes the North American standards (S) and recommended practices (RP), including the DCC specification.

POMelectrics

Programming On the Main: changing a decoder's CVs while it sits on the layout, without disturbing other locomotives.

Power districtelectrics

A section of track fed through its own circuit breaker, so a short in one place does not stop the whole layout.

Prototypeoperating

The real thing being modelled. “Prototypical” means faithful to it.

Quarter testelectrics

Laying a coin across the rails to check that the command station trips instantly. If it doesn't, the wiring at that point is inadequate.

Radiustrack

Measured to the centre-line of the track. Set-track radii are usually far tighter than anything looks good on.

Rail joiner / fishplatetrack

The small metal sleeve that joins two rail ends. Mechanically necessary, electrically unreliable — always add feeders.

Roadbedtrack

The cork or foam strip under the track that raises it, gives it a shoulder to ballast against, and quietens it.

Rolling stockstock

Everything that runs on the rails but does not power itself: wagons, coaches, vans.

RP-25stock

The NMRA's recommended wheel contour. Modern models use it; older “pizza cutter” wheels do not and will bump along fine-code track.

Scaletrack

The ratio between model and prototype. 1:87 means eighty-seven models laid end to end equal the real thing.

Sectional / set tracktrack

Fixed-length straights and fixed-radius curves that clip together. Fast to lay, geometrically restrictive.

Selective compressionscenery

Modelling the recognisable ends of a large structure and leaving out the middle. The core skill of fitting a railway into a room.

Shunting / switchingoperating

Moving individual vehicles about to make up trains and serve customers. The most absorbing thing a small layout can offer.

Sound decoderelectrics

A decoder with recorded prototype sound played against the model's actual load. Needs a speaker in a sealed enclosure.

Spurtrack

A dead-end siding serving a customer. Where the work on a layout comes from.

Static grassscenery

Short synthetic fibres given a static charge so they stand upright in the glue, producing convincing grass and crops.

Stock railtrack

The fixed outer rail of a turnout that a point blade closes against.

Timetable and train orderoperating

A prototypical operating scheme where trains run to a schedule and meet at defined places, often with a fast clock running four to twelve times real time.

Tortoise / stall motorelectrics

A slow-motion turnout motor that pushes the blades over and then stalls harmlessly against them, with spare contacts for frog polarity.

Turnouttrack

The moving junction that sends a train one way or the other. Points in Britain, switch in North America.

Weatheringstock

Adding dirt, rust, fading and streaks so a model looks used. Best done in specific, prototypical patterns rather than all over.

Whyte notationstock

Counting a steam locomotive's wheels front to back in three groups: 4-6-2 is four leading, six driving, two trailing.

Wyetrack

A triangular junction, used to turn locomotives. Electrically it is a reverse loop and needs the same treatment.

Wetting waterscenery

Water with a drop of washing-up liquid in it, sprayed on before glue so the glue soaks in instead of beading up.

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