GETTING BACK INTO HO SCALE AFTER THIRTY YEAR ABSENCE. ALMOST ALL OF THE TURNOUTS WE SEE LISTED FOR SALE DO NOT HAVE A SWITCH MOTOR ON THEM.CAN THEY BE FITTED WITH A REMOTE STYLE SWITCH MOTOR?? THANKS…
simply put yes, any and welcome back
Welcome back. There are a lot of us who have returned in the last few years.
For remote control of turnout, there are two o[ptions.
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Electrical - The most popular is Tortoise. Learn about these, they are nice. There are other brands, including the old Atlas with top of layout motors. Few would recommend these today.
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Manual - there are many variations of the old choke cable approach, but I have found and become of fan of Humpyard switch levers. They are great.
Do some research and ask a lot of questions. You will get a lot of answers, some of which are useful.
Atlas and Peco offer machines for their switches (turnouts). Others, such as Rix, and Tortoise make Universal switch machines, and Caboose Industries with manual throws. Each have different mounting requirements.
What is important is Twin coil types, and Motor driven types, have different electrical and actuation requirements.
A Walthers catalog will show you pictures and prices.
This is sort of a sidebar to “turnouts” I’m a thousand years old, grew up in a small city with a mammoth railway divisional point, everyone worked for the railway, we played on the property, I worked on the ice gang at 18, I never heard the term “turnout” until recently, the term I use is “switch” and so does everyone I know, I have heard the term “switchman” but never “turnoutman” Is turnout a local term?? is it strictly an American term? is it a correct technical term and is it a newer term ?? thanks.
I’m pretty new to modeling, but I believe that modelers use the term “turnout” instead of “switch” because we use electrical switches all over the place for DC block control. Using “turnout” for the track switch eliminates the confusion with electrical power switch.
Jim
Jim, you have that right. It took a while to get used to it, but a switch is for elctricity, a turnout is for trains, but only on a model railroad. Go figure.
I grew up in a railroad town in southern Illinois that had both Illinois Central and Missouri Pacific main lines and roundhouse facilities, and I never heard them called anything but switches by the railroad people. I never heard the term “turnout” used until I got into HO scale modeling.
As others have pointed out, I think the term turnout was coined to end the confusion between a track switch and an electrical switch, but Wikipedia and Answers.com both refer to them by both terms, as well as the British “Points.”
The answer is YES. I have a combonation of Atlas and Peco turnouts on my layout. I use Atlas under the table switch machines to power all my turnouts.The nice thing about these machines is, they are fairley cheep. and they are easy to install or replace.The only thing that you have to remember when using these machines is , You can not have more than one inch between the bottom of your layout and the hole in the turnout,as the pin on the machine is only an inch long. Tortoise is probably the best machine on the market,but they are a little expensive. Peco also makes a under the table switch motor that sells for about tan dollars.
It apparently is a difference between operating crews and engineering departments in some cases. I have a number of ATSF prototype engineering drawings that use the word turnout. This is usually referring to the whole assembly (like what we modelers buy) as opposed to just the moving points, which seem more often to be referred to as “switch”. Most of these documents date back to the 1930’s, although “turnout” is also used in later prototype documents I have or have seen.
Jon
From http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/turnout
[quote]
turn‧out /ˈtɜrnˌaʊt/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[turn-out] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun
| 1. | the gathering of persons who come to an exhibition, party, spectacle, or the like: They had a lar |
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“MIMI & PAPPAP”]GETTING BACK INTO HO SCALE AFTER THIRTY YEAR ABSENCE. ALMOST ALL OF THE TURNOUTS WE SEE LISTED FOR SALE DO NOT HAVE A SWITCH MOTOR ON THEM.CAN THEY BE FITTED WITH A REMOTE STYLE SWITCH MOTOR?? THANKS
You can use what is known as a ‘tortoise’ switch machine. They work very well.
A couple sites to look at are here
http://www.blwnscale.com/Circuitron.htm
and here
http://www.greenwayproducts.com/buy_tortoise.shtml
I never been to them but that’s what google spitted out when asked.
Anyhow, that is what you can use instead of the older type of turnout control.
Hope that answer your question 