I prefer turnouts that do NOT have both point rails tied together. It's not a "dcc friendly" thing - it's a "wirign for anything friendly" thing. By the simple expedient of isolating the point rails from each other, you can use a narrower more prototypical flangeway between the stock rail and adjacent point rail, and you can also permanently tie the closure rails and point railsto eahc other and the adjacent stock rail to insure solid power distribution. Just makes more sense to me to isolate them, even most handlaid methods do that.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
In my 11 years using Shinohara/Walthers turnouts with DCC I never had to modify switches to the extend discussed in "Wiring for DCC web site". My only modification consist in cutting the tabs that slide underneath the closure rails. I have seen in those years many ruining perfectly good switches trying to follow these instructions. Caution must prevail.
Jack W.
Converting the turnout to 'DCC friendly" per the instructions shown on Allan Gartner's Wiring for DCC site will solve the problem without modifying the Tortoise, and make for a more reliable turnout, power-wise.
http://www.wiringfordcc.com/switches_walthers_old.htm
This is very interesting, although I never had problems with Tortoise contacts, I will mark the link for future references.
"Relation"?
The problem stems from the contacts in the Tortoise. They overlap in the center of travel. For your use you should consider modifying the contacts as outline here:
http://home.roadrunner.com/~mrwithdcc/Tortoise.html
Good luck with your upgrade.
Dave
From Mt Pleasant, Utah, the home of the Hill Valley and Thistle Railroad where the Buffalo still roam and a Droid runs the trains
If they are the non DCC friendly type, the small copper bar that slip underneath the rails to provide points contacts, most of the time gap both rails for a brief time and shorts the system. I always cut these strips off when using a Tortoise machine. A #11 blade will do the job. Simply scribe both side the number of time required to cut them off without breaking the throw bar.
I am modeling in HO scale in DCC useing Digitrax Chief control I took the contacts out of the Walthers switches and put gaps in to isolate the frog then wired in the Tortoise switch machine I checked with a test lamp and when I switch it it works the way it is supose to power goes from one leg to the other my problem is while the Tortoise is switching from one route to the other it shorts out the system then when its there it resets itself and everything is back to normal I must have the switch wired to the Tortoise wrong I have a couple of these that are doing the same thing thought I had a bad Tortoise but don't think so now Please Help Thanks