Anybody have a design for using a tortise to switch a #6 double crossover WITH OUT using 4 machines? I have 2 of these to do and realy do not want to purchase (8) plus the hares.
Thank you
Not here. I used 4 Tortoise machines but no Hares.
Will NEVER convince me to use Hares until the price comes down. Sure it’s neat but for the same price I can get a CVP AD4-MC that can run 4 - well, a lot more than 4 because you can have probbaly 4o ro more Turtles on each output, but there’s only 4 addresses to control them with.
Anyway, I remember seeing an article or someone’s web site that showed a linkage to allow a double crossover to work with 2 Tortoises. It’s basically rods that pivot about right where the tracks make the X. If you think about it you can see how it would work. Looking up from the bottom, twist the rod clockwise and the two diagonally oppositepoints go to the normal position. Twist it counter-clockwise and they will be in the reverse position. You just need a long bolt int he middle as a pivot, the two rods have to be on different planes for this to function. I’ll have to see if I can remember where I saw the diagram.
–Randy
here’s a diagram
The nice thing about double crossovers is that either all the turnouts need to be crossed or all straight. So there are only two physical positions.
Use the traditional bent piano wire throws, only bend them in the opposite direction from each other for the parallel turnouts. Think of it sort of like rowing a boat with two oars. The rower would be the stall motor. Lean back the parallel turnouts are crossed, forward they are straight. In this way one only needs two motors (one for each end). We’ve done it this way at the club. I did give the fellow who did it a hard time for wasing a motor though (especially since he is supposed to be a mechanical engineer), because… Then just extend the idea to 4 oars. One would have to bend the wire throws the mirror of the first set. But one motor would be able to throw all 4 turnouts.