Ok guys i am new to this . ok i am building the Atlas #36 layout. and i want to go with DCC when i get the track laid. do i need to wire the frogs of the turnouts? and if i need to what would be the best way to do this?Thanks
Scot
The frogs on atlas turnous are insulated so they shouldn’t be a problem. They are live also each piece of track gets the correct power so no wire is nessesary.
The problem you might run into if you use very fast acting circuit breakers is the tred shorting out the supply as metal wheelsets cross the frog. This is usually solved by somewhat lengthening the delay time. DCC boosters usually cut power in .5 second, and the defult for the circuit breakers is probably .1. All of the circuit breakers I’ve seen are adjustable. It simply needs to be shorter than the booster so not to trip the booster.
The idea behind circuit breakers is to seperate a booster into districts so you only shut down a small area. Before these things came along, Many boosters had to be used at great cost to do the same thing.
Scot, are you using Atlas track? If not look at this web site for an explanation for many of the common wiring issues related to different turnouts.
Yes i am using atlas code 83 turnouts.i spent today seting the cork on to the layout,
thanks Scot
Are they Custom-Line or the Snap-Track Code 83? I don;t think you can power the Snap-Track frogs, I think they are plastic. Custom-Line you can, see the thread on this subject from the other day. Do you ahev to? Well, it depends on the equipment you run. I have nothing with less than 8-wheel power pickup, and none of it stalls or hesistates running over unpowered frogs. I WAS planning to power than anyway, although that job has moved to a lower priority based on my results from test running things.
–Randy
yes they are custom-line turnouts. thanks for the replys.
anyone else have anything to say about this?
thanks again Scot