Arnold N Electric Turntable, Anyone have any experience?

[VonRyan]

Hi all, I have sitting in its box, an Arnold Electric Turntable. It is all assembled and what not, but i was wondering if anyone has any experience with one. Also, i was wondering if anyone has a source of more of the track pieces plus their associated contact wipers, and perhaps one of the turntable controllers that the manual has pictured. I'd like to possibly use the turntable as a mainstay for an N-Trak layout, probably as an addition to a yard. As an important question to go with that, how would i wire the turntable for DCC power to the tracks, but without possibly effecting the turntable's own detection circuitry with the controller and such?

Thanks All!

-Cody F.

[peteski]

I have one of those dinosaurs . Bought the turntable and fully automatic preselector in the early 1990s.  I only took it for a test drive (um, turn) and never installed it anywhere.  At leastI think I have it on the bottom of one of the boxes in my stash.    I did contemplate selling it on ebay (after buying the Walthers TT), but I now don't recall if I did that. 

Anyways, going from memory, this is a design going back to early 70s and it has no electronics in it whatsoever. The operation is purely mechanical: motor, gears, switches, solenoids and all sorts of contacts.  Detection is doen by metal wipers contacting metal strips placed around the perimeter of the pit.  It was fun to watch it automatically travel to the track I selected (with the bridge position indicator in the preselector moving along with the actual bridge showing its real-time position). Quite an impressive feat for a mechanical device.

IIRC, the track power is totally isolated from the rotating mechanism so there is no worry DCC causing any problems. Also IIRC the bridge polarity is automatically switched after it rotates 180 degrees so you probably won't need an auto reverser.

Other than that, I remember it being very noisy.  I don't know where one would go for things like additional tracks as I think these are long out of production. Maybe some hobby store in Germany would still have some old stock?

[Frisco Larry]

I had one years ago.  The wireing was simple (must have been, I figured it out), loved the way it worked.  Far too short for most of my steam locos, sold it.

[keeper]

You could get the controller and additional track pieces on ebay.de

Thomas

[VonRyan]

I have one of those dinosaurs . Bought the turntable and fully automatic preselector in the early 1990s.  I only took it for a test drive (um, turn) and never installed it anywhere.  At leastI think I have it on the bottom of one of the boxes in my stash.    I did contemplate selling it on ebay (after buying the Walthers TT), but I now don't recall if I did that. 

Anyways, going from memory, this is a design going back to early 70s and it has no electronics in it whatsoever. The operation is purely mechanical: motor, gears, switches, solenoids and all sorts of contacts.  Detection is doen by metal wipers contacting metal strips placed around the perimeter of the pit.  It was fun to watch it automatically travel to the track I selected (with the bridge position indicator in the preselector moving along with the actual bridge showing its real-time position). Quite an impressive feat for a mechanical device.

IIRC, the track power is totally isolated from the rotating mechanism so there is no worry DCC causing any problems. Also IIRC the bridge polarity is automatically switched after it rotates 180 degrees so you probably won't need an auto reverser.

Other than that, I remember it being very noisy.  I don't know where one would go for things like additional tracks as I think these are long out of production. Maybe some hobby store in Germany would still have some old stock?

Good to know. I couldn't dissect all I wanted to know from the diagrams and the texts. The system for the whole automatic selection and such is quite interesting. If your looking for a quick tax write-off (or some other deal) I'm searching...

-Cody F.

[peteski]

The more I think about it, the more I seem to think that I did sell it on ebay when I bought the new Walthers turntable several years ago. Like Frisco Larry said, it was way too small for most American steamers so I didn't see a good reason to keep it.

[nkalanaga]

"Very noisy":  The only electric turntable I can remember watching was in Hinton, WV, and it was also quite noisy.  CSX (or was it still Chessie then?) took it out a year or two later.

[UP4-8-8-4]

Arnold Rapido Self-Indexing Turntables & Controllers.

These turntables for their time ran flawless, great track lineup, reliable, but as mentioned, very noisy.
I've been collecting all Arnold specialty track section boxs as well as their switchs, flex track, Roundhouses as well as their turntables & controllers since they first appeared.
Extra turntable track entrance sections were sold four to a box with the metal wipers.
If you decide to use the Arnold, I should have some extra good used turntable entrance track sections w/metal wipers.
Don't know about using DCC with them, as i've always been DC only.




Ernie

[VonRyan]

Arnold Rapido Self-Indexing Turntables & Controllers.

These turntables for their time ran flawless, great track lineup, reliable, but as mentioned, very noisy.
I've been collecting all Arnold specialty track section boxs as well as their switchs, flex track, Roundhouses as well as their turntables & controllers since they first appeared.
Extra turntable track entrance sections were sold four to a box with the metal wipers.
If you decide to use the Arnold, I should have some extra good used turntable entrance track sections w/metal wipers.
Don't know about using DCC with them, as i've always been DC only.
Ernie

Wow, looks like you're quite stocked. I myself am always on the look out for the Arnold switches that has the small removable solenoids on the cheap. Funny this that someone was trying to sell four at $8 each and i looked at him like he just came out of the funny farm. I have about 18 of the solenoids stocked up for various uses (probably semaphore signals) that i snagged for about $1 each.
Once i have the final plan roughed out for the roundhouse, i know who to call.

-Cody F.