Help with ME #6 Code 55 Turnouts

[Point353]

They still carry it: https://www.radioshack.com/products/rosin-soldering-paste-flux

Does "sold out online" imply only temporary unavailability?

[peteski]

Does "sold out online" imply only temporary unavailability?

Hmm...
That is what I saw last night (when I tried lookign for the flux from work). But when I went to their website from my home laptop (few hours ago), it showed in stock. 

[Point353]

The MSDS for the Radio Shack paste flux mentions CAIG, so it's probably the TYPE RSF-R80: http://caig.com/soldering-flux/

[MK]

The MSDS for the Radio Shack paste flux mentions CAIG, so it's probably the TYPE RSF-R80: http://caig.com/soldering-flux/

I like that they show a 3 gallon size (I'm guessing due to no scale reference) version of the stuff in that link. 

[chuck geiger]

Ordered 12 G bus wire, stranded and 22 G feeders, solid, rosin flux paste and 60/40 rosin core solder. I will
run the bus from power to the track with the feeders to the frog rails on both end of the t/out's? I hope
that's right. How many feeders per turnout (4)? With turnouts in tandem, stock rail power will power at
the start of the turnout and frog rails power out past frog and closures?

[nickelplate759]

I don't have a picture , but here's a description of what I did.
1. green feeder to the frog (I use powered frogs).  There's a solder point on the bottom of the frog.  Skip this if you don't want powered frogs.
2. One black feeder and one red feeder to each turnout.  Each feeder is soldered underneath both an outside rail (black on one, red on the other) and the corresponding frog rail.

So, a total of 3 wires, but 5 electrical connections (2 each for red and black feeders).

[OldEastRR]

The question is whether Chuck is using the turnouts themselves to route power to the tracks the legs lead to, or whether he's using a block system for controlling train action. If he prefers using the turnout to route power to the leg he wants then wiring every section of track will not let him do that. If going with the standard old-style block system, he needs each end of the track section he puts feeders on to have insulated joiners or open gaps. Then each set of wires from each section needs to be routed through a Double-pole switch to allow him to either turn the track off or route a different power pack to it. In both cases, tho, he still has the option of powering or not powering the dead frogs.
The block system is used for multi-cab loco running. Otherwise just simple on-off switches will work to control each block.

[chuck geiger]

No block control, just standard DC wire with feeders for turnouts needing power.

[mmagliaro]

Okay, I am still not clear on whether you want these to be power routing.  Do you want the outgoing tracks from the turnout to turn on and off depending on which way the turnout is thrown?  Or will you be okay if both outgoing tracks are live all the time?
Once I have that clear, I will make a drawing of how I have always done this.

[chuck geiger]

Simple DC from power pack to stock rail with feeders to power turnout frog rails. No block control, power the same (live on outgoing tracks) all the time. Thanks M.

[mmagliaro]

Well, in that case, that original diagram you posted  has it exactly right.   

You only need the two feeder wires going up to the outgoing legs of the turnout, like your diagram showed, but you do need to connect each one to two rails on the turnout.  So you might think of that as 4 wires, depending on how you do this.  You could solder 4 wires to the rails, drop them through the benchwork, and then connect the two blues together and the two reds together, and then just run two wires from there to your track bus.   Or, you could bridge those pairs of blue and red rails with small wires soldered under the turnout itself, and then just drop two wires from those down through the benchwork.

If you want to power the frog, and I strongly suggest that you do, then you need one more wire from a SPDT switch, as shown, up to the frog.  The other two connections to the SPDT switch will come from the track bus as well.

Your diagram, just so we keep clear which diagram we are talking about.  Your two feeders are the red and blue wires going up to the outgoing rails at the far right of the diagram (2 wires, but 4 connections):




Since I bothered to edit up a picture, here is how I would do it for power routing.  I really think you might consider this.  It's a little more work, but giving up the ability to shut off a train in a siding is a big thing to give up in a DC system, in my view.  Without track blocks or power routing, how will you park trains in sidings and keep them from moving while you run something else?

In this scheme, power is routed to the frog and to the outgoing frog rails by an SPDT switch, so you get the live frog and the routing.   Whichever leg of the turnout is "dead" will have either two "+" rails or two "-" rails, so motors won't run on that side.  Note that in this scheme, you do NOT connect the outbound frog rails to any other power source (like the bus) beyond the turnout, or you will start creating short circuits.  This is rarely an issue unless the outbound spur is like 20 feet long, which isn't likely.  But even in a case like that, you can always run a "sub bus" wire from the turnout frog down your spur and feed it up into the spur rail at  4' or 8' intervals so you can have more feeders along that spur instead of relying on the rails and rail joiners to carry it the whole way.

[mmagliaro]

Oh... one more thing.   From the power-routing diagram, it would appear that you could save two wires and some hassle by just soldering the outbound frog rails right to the frog itself, possible bridging the gap with a little wire and some solder.

It would be nice if that worked.  Then you would only need the SPDT switch and its 3 wires.  But unfortunately, it is impossible to solder to that cast ME frog reliably.  I have tried it in the past, and the solder joint is never  reliable.  Sooner or later, it would break free, so I abandoned that and dropped the extra wires.

[chuck geiger]

Finally got after this. Used 16 for bus and 22 for feeders to turnouts. Tried to test it and nothing. When I pulled off one
of the turnouts, it did run on one section between the frog on the turnout and a section of track. Back to the drawing
board.

[nickelplate759]

I'm not sure I understand what you did, nor am I clear on what part of your track trains actually did work on.
I can't tell from the photo where your feeders are, but where they are may be part of the problem.

On Micro-Engineering turnouts, the rails past the frog are not electrically connected to anything unless you connect them.  I've marked those short pieces of rail yellow in your photo.  You can connect them in two different ways - by soldering them (via a joiner) to whatever they are connected to, or by running jumpers to them.

To make this work, you'll need feeders in a few places.  I've used red and green dot's to suggest the minimal locations you will need - but the exact location isn't critical - anywhere on that pieces of rail will be fine.  I'm assuming that the rails marked yellow are electrically connected to whatever they are joined to.

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Frogs are also not powered by default.  You can solder a feeder to them underneath if you want to power them, but if you do you will have to use some kind of power routing (such as is provided by a DPDT, or a Tortoise, or a Frog Juicer) to avoid shorts.

Does this help?

[chuck geiger]

George, thank you kindly. And others, looks like I'm headed back to old reliable, to Atlas C-55 #7's (and or #5's). I am foot dragging too
much with this turnout wiring process for a small 2x4 layout.