Well, I made one of those bad decisions that are madewhen building a layout. I layed all my track in one area, thinking that I would just use manual ground throws. Well that won’t work well and everything is in place. I don’t want to rip it all up to drill holes. Any one have any ideas, even back ones cold be good. Thanks
Vern
What about using Atlas under the layout?
Vern
I have a fairly large layout that I have all of my turnouts with ground throws. Quite a number of them are remoted to the edge of the layout so it is easier for the operators to change turnout positions and not have to reach into the scenery.
I use Caboose Ind ground throws and connect the turnouts with music wire. I just bend ends on the wire and insert the ends into the turnout throwbar and the ground throw. I usually have an end bent so I can fine tune the movement of the groundthrow.
BOB H Clarion, PA
Couple of clarifications:
What kind of turnouts are they :
Atlas ?
Peco ?
Walthers/Shinohara ?
How far away from front of benchwork is most distant turnout ?
What is scenery made of between front of bench and turnout? Is it higher than track ?
Is track up on cork or other roadbed, or flat on homasote or other type base ?
regards/Mike
One way I’ve tried, and it worked in my particular case, is to cut a small V-groove in the top surface of the Homasote, put in a length or two of small brass tubing [ spot it down with hot glue ], and run the music wire through the tube. The tube gets covered over with scenery after you’ve checked out the operation of the throw. What you’ve got, essentially is a small version of the old 'choke cable’method.I have also done something like this in styrofoam scenery, by poking a hole through the foam with a coathanger wire, then putting brass tube through and gluing it with liquid nails.You can solder up multiple lengths of the tube. Good luck & regards / Mike
Well to help clarify a few things -
The turnouts are a mix of Peco and Shinohara. The real problem is that right under a few of the turnouts is the framing for the layout. It is a little hard to get through 2 X 4’s with a needle drill bit! It does sit on homasote for the most part. Now I may have come up with a solution - that is to drill over a little ways where it is clear. Then try to control the turnout with wire from one side. Does anyone see a fault with ths? as always there are no bad ideas.