Let’s hope you guys understand this 
I’m installing my first tortoise turnout under my masonite spline roadbed. The roadbed is around 22 mm thick, the cork roadbed is around 7 mm, the plywood that I mount the tortoise on is 7 mm. That gives me 36 mm from the top of the tortoise to the underside of my turnout. This is a problem because the tortoise will move from one side to the other in about 1 sec with 9v. How long does a real turnout take from one side to the other? This is what happens. The green plastic piece with a hole in it on the tortoise is to far from the turnout. That gives me a very big movement of the piano wire. And I can’t adjust it because it’s in the top position already. I tried to take away the plastic piece and used styrene with a hole in it under the cork roadbed, much better. Now the piano wire does not move far enough to throw the turnout. I think the best position for the styrene would be around 15-20 mm under the turnout, but that’s in the middle of the spline roadbed. I have a idea to cut the spline roadbed and glue the plywood between the gap. This will give me around 14 mm between the top of the tortoise and the underside of the turnout. Or 7 mm if I lay the plywood directly on the spline roadbed. But it feels a little scary to cut the spline roadbed. How do I solve this?
It shouldn’t hurt anything to move a large distance - the wire is pretty ‘springy’ and the pressure is slow and even, not a sudden snap like a solenoid machine. The problem is the great thickness of the roadbed and all - with flat subroadbed and cork or other roadbed on top, the distance is not usually that great from the bottom to the throwbar level. There are alternative ways of getting the motion to the throwbar - the simplest is a wire turnign inside a brass tube. The wire comes up a coupel of ties away from the throwbar and has a J shaped bend in in to go over those ties and then stick down in the hole in the throwbar. This can be between the rails or off to the side. Underneath the wire is bent at 90 degrees where it comes out and eith various bends you can connect it so tha tthe Tortoise moves this wire back and forth. They make a ‘remote mount’ that does this: http://www.tonystrains.com/technews/tortoise/off-center-mounting.htm but with some brass wire and tube you can accomplish pretty much the same thing yourself. You might have to fashion a bracket to hold the Tortoise on its side.
–Randy
I think I understand what you are doing but I am unsure what exactly you are asking. In your first scenerio it sounds like it worked but moves too fast. I have no idea what the prototype speed is. However, I run my tortoise switch machines off of an old tyco transformer so I can bump it up or down to get the speed where I want it.
Remember also, since this is your first switch machine. I’m assuming you will be powering multiple switch machines off of the same powerpack. Each time you add a switch machine the speed of the machines will go down a little. Stall motor switch machines all suck up a little power, even when not in motion. So just keep it in mind that while it may move too fast right now, it will get a little slower.
It’s hard to explain in a foreign language what I want. I will try again. Is there a way to get the tortoise closer to the turnout when using masonite spline roadbed?
What Randy said is (as always) right on. Since you already have the hole in place in the spline for the tortoise, try using a heavier gauge piano wire. The Tortoise is a stall motor so you won’t hurt that, and since the piano wire is a spring, it can bend very far and still be just fine. There are places where I have had to use remote throws to get the turnouts working. What Randy mentioned are these:
Topside looks like this:
I scratchbuild something similar that works as well and costs much less using some old rail. Looks like this when done:
The Tortoise machine is a slow motion machine in reference to a twin-coil machine which is a bang-bang type operation, and tends to tear itself apart in a few years. Because the Tortoise is motorized, it won’t tear itself or the track to pieces.
The points on a real switch take about one second to move from one side to the other.
On thick roadbeds or where the distance is more than 3/4 inch, I make a new throw wire. The original wire is about .025 diameter. I use a little bigger wire, .032 diameter wire. The wire is stiffer and will provide a stronger force at the longer distance. Just bend it as the drawing shows. At the same time, I would leave the green adjustable piece as high as you can on the Tortoise and not worry about raising it above it. As long as the turnout completes the throw from one side to the other, and the point is held against the stock rail firmly, you are OK. If the points are not held against the stock rail firmly, you may have to move the plastic adjustable pivot piece down some. Once you have it set up right, put a small dab of caulking on it so it won’t move by itself.
electrolove,
Mac has the solution. Use the heavier spring wire. This gives a better action when your roadbed is thick.
Another thing I do in cases like these is to rock the drill bit used for making the hole for the throw wire from side to side. This gives a hole that is more like an oval, giving the throw wire more clearance where it goes through the roadbed.
I have several places where I had to mount a Tortoise under a double thinkness of roadbed. This gives a total thickness of about 2 inches (or 5 cm).
This whole topic is uppermost in my mind right now as I am planning a new layout and instead of the single layer of foam I am planning on using 2 layers - total 4" or a bit over 10cm. No way will a Torotise work though that in the ‘standard’ fashion, no matter how thick a piece of music wire I use. And I don’t want to do it like I did on the previous layout, which was to dig a square opening under the turnout and drop the Tortoise in from the top. I discovered late int he game that the Tortoise could be eaily sucured to the underside of the foam with the same latex caulk I was using for the track and roadbed, so I just want to stick them on the bottom. I checked out the K&S tubing display at the LHS yesterday and there are plenty of compatible sizes (tube with a big enough inside diameter to hold a particular size wire without excess slop). I intend to do pretty much exactly what the Remote Mount does, only make it myself since I’m pretty sure I can get a lot of tube and wire for the cost of one Remote Mount.
–Randy
Randy I just did a clinic on the Tortoise for our NMRA Division meet last week. You might be interested in one of the home made remote type of installations I showed. This could be done under the foam with no problem and is made from small brass tubing, piano wire, and a length of old code 100 rail. The piano wire is bent to fit on top as shown in my earlier photo (exactly as you would install it with the Tortoise Remote Mount). Under the layout the brass tube is cut off with a little left over so it is level with the throw on the Tortoise. After the piano wire is dropped in place from the top make a right angle bend in the wire 45° off center from where you will mount the tortoise. I then add a piece of the brass tubing as a shim. The rail (which has had a hole drilled in each end) is then put on the piano wire. Finally make a 90° bend upward in the piano wire (cut to be the right length for this) to hold the assembly in place. I use a weight on top of the throw above to hold it down while I am doing this. You should also use some shims to hold the point rails dead center in the turnout. Then install the Tortoise at the other end of the piece of rail. Works like a charm and easy to install.
Some pics:
Mine are on plywood substrate, but it should work on foam just as well.
Perfect! Hard to tell from the picture but I assume there’s a hole drilled in the end of the rail that attaches to the vertical piano wire like the one at the end that connect to the Tortise’s wire? And if I screw the Tortoise to a small piece of wood like that, it will DEFINITELY hold to the bottom of the foam with caulk. The terminal strip is a good idea too, although I think I’m going to borrow John Plocher’s idea and use molex connectors on mine. That way I can basically build a wiring harness at the bench, crawl under, and just plug it in.
–Randy
You are absolutely right sir! And… The first thing I told the people at the clinic is that I like to as much as possible at the workbench before I install them (soldering over your head is not a good thing…!).
Glad I could be of help!
As the others have said, some sort of actuator connecting the tortoise to the turnout. We’ve used this method for decades on the club layout. I know this isn’t a tortoise (it is another slow motion turnout machine), but the concept is the same. As you can see we used PC boards for the connecting rods instead of old rails. Once again different application of the same concept.
This particular one is controlling two turnouts.
Another option is to connect them from the side rather than the bottom. Mount the turnout on a board at the same level as the bottom of the cork.
Hey thanks you guys, I’ve decided to replace some of my “troublesome” top mounted atlas switch machines with tortise, and the ones that are giving me problems are in places I thought I couldn’t get that accomplished. All I have to do is what Texas Zepher has shown and accomplished. Love this forum!
ve to do is You have made my job much easier, I don’t have to reinvent the wheel, so to speak!