I used a total of 24 strips of one-inch wide Masonite board. At about $5.00 per 4'x8' sheet, this roadbed cost about $2.50! Granted, you have to have a good table saw to pull this off. :-)

What I noticed was that it is easy to not glue the strips perfectly level at the top. I needed to do a lot of sanding to get the track surface to be smooth enough. Masonite board is hard to sand down. Some people prefer to use 3/4" Pine board and then cut them into 1/4" thin strips. This would guarantee that the strips are the same thickness. However, I am pretty sure that the strips I cut were the same width, it was just at the gluing stage where I didn't pay close enough attention to the process. The same problem exists if one were to use the Pine board approach. Oh well, lesson learned!

The first order of the day was to trim off the ends of the roadbed. Since I also was going to sand the top, and I didn't want to make a mess in the house, I carried the entire layout (!) to the garage and did the work there. A dust collector is definitely handy to have when working with Masonite. The next photo shows the cross profile of the roadbed.

The roadbed needs to sit on risers so as to allow for wiring and possible Tortoise switch machine mounting later on. Given the 4-inch clearance needed for the Tortoises, I made the risers 6 inches tall. These will be glued to horizontal "footers". The roadbed rests on the risers. The width of the footers depends on where on the layout they are located. The footers are wide not only for stability but also for future mounting of front fascia panels and/or backdrops.

The risers are made out of 3/4" thick plywood, and the footers are made out of 1/4" plywood.

The next set of photos show the risers glued in place. Should they ever need to be moved, the glue bond can be broken fairly easily.