1. I assumed it was fairly common knowledge that SMP and C & L ready-to-lay plain tracks are available and that the real problem we were talking about was therefore the pointwork. I fear it is hardly any better to use a mixture of better plain track and Peco toy points, as the clash of rail styles, timber sizes etc may then add to the problem of the wholly deficient appearance of the Peco.
2. What's the special problem if a new, better version of a track system appears and makes the other version into the "old" one? Manufactuters and retailers have to move on all the time. Loco and rolling stock models become old stock in due course. Hornby in fact are now exploiting this phenomenon by offering the Railroad range for those who still prefer the establshed, older, more basic, "coarse scale" system. It could work with track too if the design of the new poinntwork were carefully worked out so as to demand in essence only a new moulded base and some clip-on bits. Why should track be specially protected from the process of evolution?
3. Bill is right about wheels too, some more than others, but that's not the subject of this discussion and I think it makes the argument for improved track no less strong.
4. I believe that the problem of flanges striking chairs is more proounced with C & L than with current SMP, owing of course to the height of the inside portion of the chairs. I have seen accounts of devices using razor blades at a controlled height to skim down C & L chairs
. Why not use SMP in the first place? ALSO, an older friend of mine talks about "Mark 1 SMP" from the days when Colin Scoffin was involved and it was made in Cleethorpes. The chair height was, I believe, greater at that time so if Corfe's track is of sufficient vintage that may be the real problem.5. As a further bonus, a bit more thought on the design of new moulded point bases might lead to a little bit of genuine flexibility being incorporated. I know this is blasphemy for those who know about real track, and you cannot of course have much flexibility or alter the crossing angle. A degree of flexibility is however a feature of the Tillig system, and an ability to create track formations that do not look like a wiring diagram but incorporate flowing curves without dog-legs and threepenny-bit-corners is highly desirable. The more the design of a new track can eliminate the need to think about building bespoke points, the more it is likely to sell. As an interesting side-shoot here, it is in fact possible to slightly flex the existing Peco points after strategic cuts have been made in the bases - I haven't tried it but I think John Houlden can tell you all about it if you ask him nicely.
) then this is no worries.