Walthers track products

[soumodeler]

How well are the Walthers turnouts (both curved and regular) made? They seem to be made well in the pictures in the catalog, but I was wondering about first hand experience. I am going to be using them with Tortoise switch machines. Another question is how they work with a DCC system. Any help is appreciated.

soumodeler
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http://www.trainweb.org/mgr/

[relation]

That is all I have on my railroad and have never had any problems with them they look very nice and work excellent all the new turnouts are DCC ready it indicates it right on the box actually it says for both DC and DCC operations if you get some old stock turnouts that don't say this you may have to poer the frog through the tortoise and I also have several of these and they work great also just a little more work involved. Hope this helps you

[Anonymous]

I have Walthers turnouts on my layout, and they work fine with Tortoise machines. One thing to be aware of, though -- the ties on the Walthers are a bit thinner than those on Atlas Code 83 flex track, so you'll need to shim the turnout up with .020" styrene to get it level with the Atlas track.

[soumodeler]

Thanks for the feedback. Two more questions-- does the flextrack have the same thin ties and do the turnouts have switch stand ties on them?

soumodeler
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http://www.trainweb.org/mgr/
The Southern Serves the South!

[Anonymous]

FYI, the Walthers code 83 track is made for Walthers by Shinohara and is identical to Shinohara's Code 100 except for rail height.

[Don Gibson]

"Thin Ties'"?
"No. Walthers / Shinohara and most other maufacturers build to NMRA specs.

Atlas makes their code 83 with extra thick ties to match up with their oversized code 100 track - as a concession to the inexpertise of their perceived customer base.

Of course, it also makes it more difficult to match up with other's code 83 products.You can do things like that when you an industry leader..

[Don Gibson]

MY Shinohara turnouts have ties for switchstands. iF not, some scale sized bass wood fill's in.

[Anonymous]

Walthers track is OK - I use a mixture of Walthers, Micro Engineering and Peco on my layout. I prefer the Peco points, but until the recent introduction of their code 83 range their code 75 and 100 looked very British (not a huge surprise really as it was designed for the UK market).

The biggest draw back is the Walthers turnouts is not having a locking mechanism. Unless you use a tortoise point motor or some other spring type locking mechanism the point blades aren't firm against the stock rails making for easy derailments.

I also don't recommend their #6 1/2 curved turnouts - I found one of mine was significantly out of gauge, although I have had no problems with their straight #4 & #6 turnouts in this respect.

[soumodeler]

Darn. I was going to use two 6 1/2s. I guess I will have to hope for the best with them. I am going to be using tortoise switch machines and possibly a few ground throws.

[davekelly]

soumodeler

I have a 6 1/2 curved turnout and it works well for me. Perhaps you should get one and then check the gauge with a NMRA or Micro Engineering gauge. Curved turnouts do give one a lot more flexibility when it comes to track planning. But (and I'm guessing here) I would think that proper guage is more critical for curved turnouts given the lateral stresses involved.

[grayfox1119]

I know that evryone will defend and say their choice is the best, but I hear many users as well as some retailer's like Tony's say that Peco has the best turnouts. Any thoughts on this guys? I have not bought any track or switches yet for my layout under construction, so I am keenly interested. I am modeling HO, steam and Deisel.

[Don Gibson]

Want to see how realistic WALTHERS track and Motor driven sw. machines can be?

http://www.emporiasub.com/tourmain.html Take the tour.

'Curved' turnouts and turnouts with 'curved frogs' fit into places regular turnouts do not, however are more prone to derailments. The wheel flanges using the outside curve tend to 'look' for the gap in the track.

The spring in the PECO turnout's allows the rails to stay in place after throwing with your fingers. It's main appeal is economic - not using sw, machines - but over time and oil and contaminants, electrical contact starts to falter. Pros use additional contact points to insure electrical flow. MOST switch machines have these, and other brands of turnouts are designed for using switch machines.

If you have been following recent posts, Peco's springs seen to create some difficulties when mounting Peco's sw. machines.

[soumodeler]

I just found the emporiasub.com page a few days ago. I had no idea that was walthers track and turnouts. I was under the impression that was hand-laid track. I have not been able to go through the entire site yet, but I guess I need to. I think that is a great site with many wonderful pictures, even with only looking at the first few sections.

soumodeler
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http://www.trainweb.org/mgr/
The Southern Serves the South!

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Don Gibson


The spring in the PECO turnout's allows the rails to stay in place after throwing with your fingers. It's main appeal is economic - not using sw, machines - but over time and oil and contaminants, electrical contact starts to falter. Pros use additional contact points to insure electrical flow. MOST switch machines have these, and other brands of turnouts are designed for using switch machines.

If you have been following recent posts, Peco's springs seen to create some difficulties when mounting Peco's sw. machines.

I have some experience with Peco turnouts (in HOm, HOn30, N and HO scales) and have never had a problem with the spring whilst mounting Peco or Seep (another British manufactuer) 2 coil switch machines.

The spring is important if you use any type of control other than a tortoise sw/mchn or a ground throw with a locking mechanisim. The spring's main importance is mechanical - it keeps the points in contact with the stock rails so they don't move under a train and derail it. I do not recommend anyone to rely on the points alone to make the electrical connection (especially if you use DCC), I always wire in a micro switch attached to the sw/machine to route power to the frog.

Peco turnouts are not without their faults - the most serious of which is that the moulded plastic tie bar fracturers where the turnout rails are attached. There is no way to repair this - just take the point up, bin it, and buy a new one.

[Anonymous]

Well, I've modeled in N for about 20 years, and used to use Peco code 80 turnouts. They were bullet-proof. I never had one break or fail. But, they do have flaws.
The most serious is that the guard rails are not correctly in gauge. They
allow the wheelsets to pick the frog too much. I used to cement a .010" shim inside the guard rails to correct this. If your wheelsets are all carefully set to NMRA width, you'll see this problem more than if you leave them a little too narrow, which is how they are commonly set unless you only use Micro-Trains cars and Kato locomotives. I can't say that their HO stuff has the same problem. I used some on my son's layout, and I don't think it does.

They also notoriously build up dirt and crud in the points, and won't route the power through until you clean them out. But this is to be expected. You should use a microswitch to route the power anyway (unless your are doing DCC).

[scubaterry]

I recently installed 12 Peco twin coil machines (PL-10W digital) on Peco T/O in one of my yards. I use DS-54's for T/O control. I did find that several of them had difficulty switching so i adj the spring tension on the T/O until the switch moved reliably. So yes there is a small spring tension problem but is easily overcome with a little adjustment. I have 60 Peco T/O on my layout and all (eventually) will be operated with Peco Twin Coil machines via DS-54's and Team Digital SRC8/SMD8 combo. Now if they could just fix the wheel shorting problem at the frog I would be a happy modeler. I get weird looks from my wife when I keep borrowing her clear finger nail polish.
Terry

[icmr]

[#ditto][#ditto][#ditto]



ICMR

[tsasala]

I have both Walters and Peco turnouts on my layout. I like the Peco better, but both are high quality. One note though, the Walters turnouts and Peco flex track don't mate well.

http://www.cyberrailguru.com/gallery/ig_trackwork/DSCN2851

http://www.cyberrailguru.com/gallery/ig_trackwork/DSCN2846

-Tom