This question applies to only those who use this type of drive & turnouts. Does the servo drive have enough torque to overcome the spring tension in the Peco turnouts? I already have my track layed & glued and on the NEWER turnouts you cannot remove the spring without taking up the turnout like you could do with the OLDER Pecos with the spring on the top of the turnout. The short of it is that I don`t want to take out any of the springs whether the turnout be new or of the older type. I already have the 1/2" throw hole drilled in both the subroadbed & the roadbed.
Thanks
Bob D
Bob D,
Ask the people who will know for sure. I have used a lot of servos for RC apps. But not for turnouts.
http://www.tamvalleydepot.com/support.html
Frank
I know you don’t want to take the springs out, but for the record, I was able to pull them out on ones I just bought and mounted last week (and forgot to take the springs out beforehand). I just grabbed the spring with side cutters and twisted. It popped right out.
Brendan
If you use stiff enouhg wire, the servos do have the power. Same deal as with Tortoises, the smaller size piano wire just bends, but with a stiffer wire it cna overcome the Peco springs.
Little trick i figured out that might make things easier for you, Elmer. I had one serve end up right at one of my frame members, so I couldn;t mount it in the usual manner witht he tick-tock action. I had to use the crank method like your link shows. On top, it looks just like what you did. On the bottom though - I just attached the vertical wire to the servo horn in the exact same manner as if the upper part was the same old rock back and forth link. When the servo turns, not only does it push the wire to the side, it ALSO spins it. I discovered this after the work session when my friend was over and got all of the servos installed under my layout. I didn;t have the controllers in place yet, so I just left excess wire sticking up until I got the motion set up and then I would cut off the excess with a cutoff wheel. To keep from running in to these pieces of wire, or poking myself in the eye, I attached flags of blue painter’s tape to the ends of each one - also so I wouldn’t run a train into one. The first one I hooked up, I noticed the flag was twisting as the servo moved from side to side. There’s actually planty of spin to fully throw the extended link bent over 2 or 3 ties. And that’s through 2 layers of 2" foam plus a 1/4" layer of plywood, and cork roadbed on top.
Otherwise what I did is the same as you show - same size piano wire with the same size brass tube through the hole.
–Randy
Thanks for the info Randy. I expect that it will come in handy soon.