OK back to the pain in the coboose engine switch yard / engine house. Even with the sparks the peaco turn outs seem to derail less stock / tenders than the atlas I have installed. Today Ken from K-10 trains told me how to install them right and I want to make sure he is right.
Turns out are Y shaped, bottom is the heel and the \ / are the toes. I was told to use plactic joiners on the toes \ / and add power to the heel bottom of the Y. Do I have to do all the wiring? Is that the way to stop the arching?
Cuda Ken
Yes. Power the points end stock rails, and leave a tiny gap where the other four rails meet their yard tracks. Note that you will probably have to solder feeders to at least two of the rails between that gap and the next turnout(s) if they are insulfrog.
On that note i know it has been said before what the difference is of a insalated frog and not .I was looking atsome old switches I bbought awaile back and they all have medel frogs. does that meen they ar insalated? slow ed
Ken, as with your previous post on these turnouts, they are Peco, not Peaco.
I don’t mean to be picky, but if anyone is searching the forums for Peco, they won’t find threads that spell it Peaco. Or, in your case, if you were to search for Peaco, you would only get your own posts, not the ones about Peco track and turnouts.
There are two kinds of Peco turnouts. Insulfrog and Electrofrog. Look at the points (the v where the two tracks come together. If that is solid metal, no plastic, it is an Electrofrog. If there is a black section of plastic, then they are Insulfrog.
Electrofrogs are more trouble to install. They have a couple of drawbacks, but their big advantage is engines won’t stall when the pickup wheel goes over the points because the points on Eclectrofrogs are powered.
Most people starting out use Insulfrogs. Try those and learn their idiosyncracies, then move on tow wherever you think there is improvement.
Smart man knows what he can and can not do. I can not spell, but that is a given when you see Cuda Ken.[;)] Yes they are Peco and Insulfrog turn outs as well.
Crandal old friend and mentor. You kind of lost me on that last part.
“leave a tiny gap where the other four rails meet their yard tracks” Do you mean use the plactic joiners or something driffrent?
“have to solder feeders to at least two of the rails between that gap and the next turnout(s) if they are insulfrog” if you are using the term like I do heel Y "bottom of the Y) and toe \ / I understand I need to power the heel of the turns outs that are hooked to the toes of the first turn out. If Iam missing something could you do a crud drawing and post it?
Thanks for all the answer’s kind members, next best thing to a LHS.
Cuda Ken
Ken, I had surgery in my mouth the other day, and the Tylenol 3’s have been dulling me a bit, so I probably haven’t been clear, and certainly have made more typos than usual.
The LHS owner was right. It is generally best to gap the frog rails between two turnouts if they are power routing. It is most useful to consult a site offering a diagram that shows why the shorts happen, and why gaps are necessary.
If I find one first, I post a link. Okay, see if this helps. Get a beer first. [:P]
http://rail.felgall.com/pfo.htm
Do you know where I can buy a 55 gallon drum of Clear Nail Polish?[:D] Before I spend hours of wiring I am going to install them wrong, clear nail polish the needed spots and see if that takes care of my backing up problems.
If it does then I will redo it the right way.
Soory about the tooth problem there slector, but Tylenol 3’s do have there + side![D)]
Ken
Couple of things.
1 Peco turn outs so far has fixed the backing up problem. Monon Heavy was giving me the most greff, not now.
2 No sparks and no clear nail polish!
I think what you kind folks missed was the power that was feeding the yard came off an heel of a peco turn out. The toes feed other heels of Peco turn outs. I have 4 installed and all the steamers so far back up fine with no sparks.
I will wire right before I add blast.
Cuda Ken