As some of you may already know, I'm working on fixing some old Lionel standard gauge trains for someone I work for. One of those things, which I finished working on tonight, is Lionel's No.82 Semaphore.
"Automatic Semaphores will add life and realism to your Lionel Railroad. As the train approaches No.82 or No.082 Automatic Semaphore, the arm drops, the red light illuminates and the train comes to a stop. After a short interval, the arm goes up, the light changes to green and the train will proceed on its journey.
You can even control the interval during which the train stops. On the back of the Semaphore base there is a controlling lever. When the lever is set on the "fast" position, the train stops for only a few seconds. When the lever is on the "slow" position, The train will stop for a longer period.
If you don't want the train to be stopped by the Semaphore, place the lever on the "continuous" position and the train will go past the Semaphore although the light will change and the arm will rise as usual."
I've completely replaced all the wiring (exactly how it was) and gotten the Semaphore's arm to work freely. The problem is, I don't know how it's supposed to work like they say it does in the instruction book.
Wires 1 and 2 go to the constant power of the track, and wires 3 and 4 connect to a special insulated track. I don't have any good track around to test it with, so I've tried powering it with both AC and DC in the way it would be while the train is running. When there's no power to 3 and 4 (train not there), the electromagnet is off and the arm stays down and the light is red. When it's powered up (train arrives), the arm goes up and the light is green. Basically, it's exactly opposite of what Lionel describes. When the engine would be fully on the insulated track, power will continue through the outer rail but not through the inner rail, which keeps a small amount of power going through the magnet. With DC, the power's enough to hold the arm in position, but with AC, the arm drops right back down.
Setting it on "Off" (continuous) makes it work like it should (arm goes up the moment the train arrives and doesn't cut the inner rail power), but having it on "slow" or "fast" makes it work like I described before. Also, there doesn't seem to be any difference in operation between "slow" and "fast".
How exactly is this thing supposed to work? Is it actually OK and I'm just doing something wrong? And how is the delay feature supposed to work?
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I was wondering if you ever figured out how to wire your semaphore? I recently bought one and can't find much info on it. Any help from anyone would be a start.
I have an 82n and that I'm just as frustrated with.
Becky
Trains, trains, wonderful trains. The more you get, the more you toot!
This is just a guess, but the semaphore might work on the same principle as the post-war automatic station.
The station has some sort of bi-metal switch that is connected between power and an insulated center rail in the normally open state. The heater for the bi-metal switch is connected to power on one side, then to an insulated outside rail. When the locomotive arrives on the insulated center rail it stops, because the power is off. At the same time the locomotive closes the circuit between the outer rails, starting the heater on the bi-metal switch. After a short (and adjustable) time, the heater causes the bi-metal switch to close, turning the power on to the insulated center rail, thus, sending the locomotive on its way again.
Good luck.
It works with a bi-metal switch, just as 8ntruck wrote. Here is some information, provided by Olsens:
http://pictures.olsenstoy.com/cd/b123/001004.pdf
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