PECO electrofrog question

[Bob]

Well, I am pretty confused.  Since I am replacing one of the helixes on my layout I am taking the opportunity to add a few more staging tracks (and making them longer).  I bought some PECO electrofrog turnouts and have watched a number of videos on how to use these things, and I am rather befuddled.  So, when befuddled, I ask the Railwire community!  First question concerns the tortoise switch machine.  In the left-hand image below, do I use the existing hole in the throw-bar to hold the wire from the switch machine (arrow 1), or do I drill a hole in the middle to the throw-bar and use that for the wire instead (arrow 2)?  Maybe it does not really make a difference?  The switch is on the lower staging deck so appearance is not important.  I understand that I drill a 1/4" hole beneath whereever the wire is attached and I clip the little spring that snaps the closure rails back and forth in such a satisfying manner.  Now, what really confuses me is what I have to do for wiring, if anything.  In the right hand image I have an arrow pointing to a factory-installed wire.  It seems that I need to remove that, right?  But do I then need to add other wires, and if so where?  I run mostly 6-axle engines (with a few 4 axle units).  This seems kind of like a lot of work!

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[NtheBasement]

Existing holes will work fine.  I find the built-in spring to be helpful for electrical contact point-to-rail (see below) and to prevent derails.  The OOTB wire that comes with Tortoises is not stiff enough to throw against the spring but a heavier gauge piano wire does the job just fine.

There are many descriptions on how to wire them.  If your switch leads to dead end spurs then you don't need to do anything because the switch will route power to either the main or diverging track's inner rail depending on which way the switch is thrown, just avoid feeders on them.  I gap the two inside rails somewhere on the connecting track.  This involves cutting the rail with an Atlas saw (hold the rails tight or they can rip out of the ties) and inserting a small piece of plastic into the resulting kerf.  If you leave the spring in the points get good contact and you don't need to power the frog.  You can for insurance use the Tortoises' built in switches to power it.

[Bob]

So I don't have to remove that wire?  I have plenty of feeders on tracks around the turnout, so I am not really worried about the switch routing power.

[nkalanaga]

No, you don't have to remove that wire.  All it does is connect the points/closure rails to the frog.  On most handlaid turnouts, the frog and closure rails are soldered together.  Peco embeds them in plastic, so they're insulated from each other.  Thus, the wire to reconnect them.

[TW877]

I would be careful about just clipping the spring as it's not reversible. Rather try to remove it. All you need to do is bend the two small metal tabs upright, that will release the metal cover on the bottom of the switch and then you can remove the spring.
Why? It seems that PECO has or is changing the tooling as to how the switch points are held in place. Not sure if this is just an issue with the newer unifrog versions or also with newer runs of all switches, though. There have been some reports here on german boards that the point rails have slipped out of the throw bar or at the hinges without the spring, as it applies some force to the assembly. Some suggest to weaken the spring action by rebending it in a way that the snap action is almost gone, but it still applies some minimal pressure on the throw bar. Another solution that's been mentioned is to add a small shim into the gap where the spring was so that the throw bar can't move away from the frog, restricting it to just the sideways sliding movement.

Chris

[peteski]

I would not remove that spring or drill a hole in the center of the throwbar.  Leave the throwbar as-is. As mentioned, the spring will assure a good point contact with the stock rails, even when using Tortoise machines. Also do not  snip any of the turnout's jumpers.

As delivered, the frog, closure rails and points are all wired together. The simplest wiring is to power the frog and closure rails/points using the Tortoise contacts.  Wire the center contact of one of the Tortoise switches to them and then wire the outer contacts to the stock rails.  You also have to put isolating joiners on both rails exiting the frog because the frog will always be opposite polarity from one of the track connected to the frog end of the turnout.

Yes, people cut the jumpers and rewire the turnout so the points and closure rails are always the same polarity as the adjacent stock rail, but we wired about over 20 Electrofrog turnouts the way I described on my friends layout (running DCC) over 30 years ago, and we never seen any problems with the wheels shorting the open point to the opposite polarity stock rail. The gap between the stock rail and open point is so large on Pecos that this just doesn't happen.

Also use Tortoise throw rod which is springy enough and/or adjust the fulcrum not to put too much pressure on the throw bar to prevent the throwbar from breaking. Just enough pressure to overcome the throwbar's spring tension to throw the points.

Keep it nice and simple.

[robert3985]

First off, are you running DCC or DC??  Second off, are all of your new turnouts going to be for staging tracks, possibly in a hidden location??...or a hard-to-get-to location?

Frankly, it really doesn't matter if you're using DCC or DC, EXCEPT...that when you get a short, DCC has a higher, constant voltage running through the rails, and the possibility for damaging either or both trackage and/or engines/rolling stock is much greater than with DC.  Wiring protocols and short protection virtually eliminate these problems with DCC, but, having shorts isn't a lot fun when you're running your layout.

Also, relying on the closure points of a turnout to direct electrical current may sound like a simple, good idea on paper, but in actuality, this spot on turnouts gets oxidized, carbon build up, paint, dust, dirt, ballast chunks, cat hairs and bug parts all the time that come between the stock rails and the point rail toes...and is a source of a lot of frustration among modelers who rely on this method of "wiring" (or not wiring) their layouts.

This means that it's a good idea to be able to quickly reach your turnouts to restore electrical conductivity to the point rail toes/stock rails when something happens that insulates the rails from each other...which happens quite often.

Placing turnouts that rely on point toe/stock rail contact/conductivity will be a major headache if placed in a position that's hard to get to...such as in hidden staging trackage...or hard-to-get-to staging trackage.

You need to know that restoring conductivity to the point rail toes/stock rails is not a simple matter of burnishing the tops of the rails, but of clearing and possibly cleaning the rail webs where the contact is being made.

When my friend Nate Goodman was alive and I was working on his layout weekly, we would often take a break and run some trains.  Nate had Peco Insulfrog turnouts everywhere, which directed voltage to whatever section the points were directed toward...and in every running session I had to clean several turnouts to get the layout running...and sometimes, it was a royal PITA to get a turnout to have proper electrical continuity.

Nate ran his layout with DC, so we never had huge problems with shorting, and the shorts we did have were usually easily found.  However, on the local N-scale club's layout, which I ran on frequently as a guest, they had DCC and one turnout on the mainline was troublesome...and my set of Kate F's shorted it (a Peco Electrofrog Wye) and I lost the lead truck because it melted.  Not a DCC friendly turnout evidently.

On my layout, with hand-laid turnouts exclusively, I made them so that they were DCC friendly way before I decided to actually run DCC.  I figured that if they were DCC friendly, they would also be DC friendly, which was the case.  None of them were manually thrown, and I used the Tortoise's underneath to switch power to live frogs, with closure/point rails picking up current from the adjacent stock rail via the PCB ties the rails were soldered to.

Peco realizes that turnouts that are not DCC friendly can be potentially big problems, which is why the gap between the point rail toes and the stock rail is so much wider than NMRA Recommended Practice...and also why their new Unifrog turnout is DCC friendly.  Unfortunately, I believe they only have a single Unifrog turnout...their "medium" which is a #6.

If a #6 is the size turnout you need for your new trackage, then, I would not use your Electrofrogs and purchase Unifrogs, which can be easily installed as live-frog, non power directing, DCC friendly turnouts without any major wiring mods or cutting gaps in the rails.

You've made the correct decision to use Tortoises underneath and using these motors' electrical contacts to direct power is a near-ideal way to power your turnouts.  Why not take advantage of your Tortoises and do it the "Gold Standard" way??

If you decide to mod your electrofrogs, here's a good YouTube video explaining how to do it and why... 

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Cheerio!
Bob Gilmore