I want to install working crossing gates in my Z scale briefcase, but my skills are limited. Does anyone know of someone or a company that could assemble the circuit board and a couple of small servos for a fee? I can install the IR sensor and install it in the layout, but I don’t feel confident I can do the servo wiring. Any help locating someone would be appreciated. Thank you.
why not use a stall torque motor?
You could use a servo. But I’m thinking a stall motor would be easier.
Unfortunately there’s not enough room for that. I have probably between 1/2 inch to an inch under the layount in the briefcase before I have to start shallowing the foam. Servos ae fairly small which makes them the best choice for the job.
Ask Azatrax cusromer service; they should have a control module that will do the job for you
Logic Rail Technologies is great. I use alot of their stuff and have GREAT customer service.
I’ve looked at both of those manufacturers, but I’m looking for someone I can purchase the products from and have them assemble the servos so that they’re wired appropriately. The servos have more wires than what would get hooked up to the module which is what confuses me so much.
Nichrome wire lengthens when it heats, with some leverage you can make gates go up and down and not use servos. Part of this hobby is the challenge, and you have a project you want to do, figuring it all out is part of the hobby, running it off to somebody takes it out of your challenge and work and skill. This hobby has taught me plenty of skills. Aside from this, Proto87 has a smaller stall motor that works like the tortoise. I like it better. A servo will need some higher tech electronics and since you need to run this off to someone else to do it, I reccomend staying away from the servo, if you have problems, you would have to keep running it back to the fellow worker to keep working on it till its fixed, this is not enjoyable. A lot of this hobby is the “you did it”. This is what its all about, how “industrious” are you.
I bought assembled circuit boards from Rob Paisley.
http://home.cogeco.ca/~rpaisley4/AGC11.html
For the mechanical part, I used a single Circuitron Tortoise machine plus the linkage (also from Circuitron) to drive the two gates remotely, eliminating the tight clearance problem that I had, too.
These are HO scale gates from NJ International.
This package works very well for me. The electronics run on 12 VDC, and they drive both the Tortoise and the alternating LED flashers on the gate posts. There’s an output for a bell circuit, too, if you choose to add one.
I took a look at the Proto87 Mole stall motor switch and it looks like it could be a good candidate, but does anyone know the dimensions of it? I couldn’t find that and I also couldn’t find a way to contact them.