I am interested in building a control panel for my layout. Due to budget, I have used atlas
snap switches. On the panel I would like to use a toggle switch to throw the switches. My
question is what toggle [spdt,dpdt,…] and how do I go about wiring them?
Use SPDT (DPDT also work) center-off MOMENTARY toggles with at least a 2 amp rating. The momentary is critical - the toggle must be spring loaded to return to the center off position when released. If that doesn’t happen, the magic smoke will be released from the switch motors in short order.
The nice thing about toggle switches or similar is that you don’t have to mount them on a central control panel. You can mount them near the turnout so that if you are using walk around control you can throw the turnout from a local position. Or you can use 2 toggles, wired in parallel, and use whichever toggle is more convenient to reach. You can easily add the 2nd toggle at a later date, when time, money, and energy permit.
The center terminal on the toggle goes to one side of your switch machine power supply. The outside 2 terminals go to the 2 coils of the switch machine - usually the 2 outside terminals on the switch machine. The center switch machine terminal goes back to the other side of your power supply.
I highly recommend a book on model railroad wiring for reference and learning, like the one Kalmbach publishes ( http://www.kalmbachstore.com/12207.html). A used version is fine, the material is about the same in all of them. The book will have much prettier diagrams than I can draw.
Long term, you can increase the longevity and performance of your toggles and switch machines by installing a Capacitive Discharge (CD) power supply. The CD unit delivers a jolt of energy, and then rapidly tapers the power off, preventing the release of the magic smoke I described earlier. You can build your own CD unit easily, or buy one ready to use from Circuitron.
my thoughts, your choices
Fred W
Thank you for your answer and thoughts. I do like the idea of two toggles. I knew there
had to be a way to do this and I am sure that I am not the only one that wants to do this.
I think that I will look into the book that you suggest. Thanks again.
I think you will find the SPDT center off toggles to be on the pricey side - especially if you have a lot of switches to control. On my old layout, which used twin coil switch machines, I used inexpensive momentary on push buttons - one for each side of the switch.
SPDT Center off switch $3 -$5
push buttons $1.50 - $2.00
-George
I have recently built one control panel and am about finished with the other one. I use DPDT switches. I am using the Tortoise switch machines and use green and red LED’s for turnout position indication on the control panel. Each toggle is wired to the power source (which I use Digitrax PW14). The five wires from the Tortoise are wired to terminal strips in the control panel and from there to the toggle switch. I use the black wire (negative pole) and common wire both the green and red LED’s to the negative power terminal strip. The red wires are wired separately to the positive terminal strip.