Switch motor

Model Railroader Prototype information for the modeler
1

Hi all,

I’m modelling actual era Cajon Pass in HO scale and I’d like to model the motor that in real life move the switch.

I tried searching on the internet but couldn’t find much. Does anybody have photos or some drawings of the motor used by BNSF?

Thank you,

Guido

2

Guido - Welcome to trains.com! [C):-)]

3

idrive, Guido,

Welcome!

If it is the motor on the turnout switch, does it look like this one?
Walthers number: 235-903
White metal Kit I believe.

https://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/235-903

Peco also has a different version in plastic, Walthers number: 552-SL47

http://www.kato-unitrack.co.uk/peco-sl-47-scale-dummy-point-motor-3475-0.html

Hope that helps, good luck!

4

Thank you all!

The Peco motor looks very nice, but I think the Walthers one might be more correct for an American prototype.

Anybody by chance has a photo of the real one?

Thank you,

Guido

5

Had a quick browse and found this…

http://www.cajonpass.net/

http://www.northamericanrails.com/bnsf_-_cajon_pass

Not a point motor but it was in the era DEC 1956.

and this from Amtrac…

6

In 1956 all the switches on the Cajon Pass line were hand thrown except for the interlockings at the entrances to San Bernardino and Barstow. The Aerotrain photo shows a dwarf automatic block signal governing the westward main line in the foreground (if you could read its number plate you’d see that it’s signal 553), but no switch motors.

It was only when CTC was installed after the big 1972 line changes that dual-control switch motors were applied to the mainline crossovers on the old First District of the Santa Fe’s Los Angeles Division… Many of those motors are probably still in service for BNSF.

So long,

Andy

7

Found this US&S switch motor on the net:

http://www.irishtracklayer.com/Electropneumatic-Switch-Machine-Valve-right/dp/B005L63HHG

Could it be correct for, say, year 2000?

Thank you,

Guido

8

Finding photos of this kind of infrastructure is tough, since railfans concentrate on locomotives and sometimes cars. Switch motor installation is fairly similar regardless of location, so you may want to start looking at places elsewhere on the BNSF, or even other railroads. This shot at Amboy, CA shows some switch motors http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1015589, and here’s one at Daggett, CA http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=192059. This photo shows the former SP line at Devore, CA, but the installation is similar to what BNSF uses http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=282309 . Here’s Cisco, UT on the former D&RGW http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=1637051.

9

The Details West part looks more typical of prototype installations I’m familiar with for CTC/dual controlled siding turnouts in the interior West, and is also based on a US&S design for an electric, as opposed to electro-pneumatic, machine. Here’s a close-up of a prototype of the Details West part http://home.comcast.net/~pugsplus/nw_ash_dcuss.html . Apparently the Irish Tracklayer detail is based on an SP prototype from the San Francisco terminal, and similar to others used on various roads (especially in the East), but you’d have to do further research to see if BNSF or AT&SF (the predecessor road through Cajon Pass) ever used something similar in that area.

10

Did you note the link is for an electro pneumatic? This would be the air operated version, not the dual control model that would be used Cajon when CTC’d.

Dick

11

I couldn’t find one of these taken near my childhood home in Houston when I was looking for it, but I found it just now while I was looking through my scanned photos for something else. There was one just like this (as I remember) on the Houston Belt and Terminal, installed by 1953 or so. I had electric switches on my Lionel layout so I knew what it was and I knew not to step too close to it because it could go into action controlled by someone somewhere else -who couldn’t see me-- with no warning…

This is on a crossover on a section of double track at Sinton Texas, taken about 2000.

12

Thank you all for the information.

So, the motor shown in this picture could be pretty close to the ones Santa Fe installed on Cajon when it was CTC’d?

Thank you,

Guido

13

A switch motor is not going to be specific to any particular railroad because they are made by companies that sell to all the railroads.

Here’s a You-Tube link to an Alstom switch motor in action.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sA0SHsZ-RVU