开云体育

I am new to modelling and trying out wiring of points prior to
building layout.
I have read a lot about wiring of Peco points, so tonight I set up
three straights with a point to see what happens.
I did it with both Elctrofrog and Insulfrog.
With Electro I used insulated joiners on the frog rails and no other
change and all three straights have power feeds and everything ran
with no problems.
I then changed to insulfrog using the same straights and metal joiners
on teh frog instead of insulated and again no problem.
Is this because I am not using a point switch for switching the frog
power or am I just lucky that I am not getting shorts.
The electrofrog is the same as the code 55 and old turnouts in the
wiring peco turnout section of web site.
Can someone please explain why I was lucky.
Thanks
Nigel

hi
I am fairly new as well and have probably just read the same articles as
yourself and have done the same tests as yourself. The only difference is
that I am using code 75. I have gone for power routing of electofrog, to me
this seems to be the catch all except maybe thats its a little more work and
perhaps a little more expensive in that you have to provide a switch. Having
said that you have no dead spots even if you are running small shunting
locos at slow speed and no shorting problems with larger out of tolerence
locos. I have just started laying and so far think I have made the right
choice although I am sure there are many who will dissagree

Best of luck

John Churchward

Well...a combination of lucky & smart.
1. With electro-frog you recognized the need to provide insulated rail joiners at the diverging frog rails and permanently wired power for other track extensions. Good move.
2. But with a brand new switch you don't yet see a need to have the point rails and metal frog powered through extra rail feeders and a separate external switch. So far you have good connections to power those rails. Just wait until the points get dirty and internal connections start to corrode.
3. Without derailments you have not yet seen what happens when you get a wheel to opposite polarity point rail short while the point rail is being powered through the tiny contact area of the opposite point from a 5 or 8 amp booster. As soon as you burn the points good once or twice, re-read #2.

4. With insul-frog you don't need the insulated track joiners at diverging frog rails as those rails don't switch polarity. The frog itself is insulated. But now you have a known dead spot in the track. Usually works OK with all-wheel pick-up on diesels.
5. You can still have something similar to problem #3 above as connections to the inner turnout rails are bonded together be metal to metal contacts in the plastic molds rather than good solid soldered connections. Eventually you will wish you had added more rail feeder drops.

You don't HAVE TO do anything to these switches to run trains with DCC (except recognize the need for #1 above). Your luck and annoyance level may vary. Making them more DCC Friendly simply reduces the probable occurance of occasional annoying problems that takes the fun out of running trains when they keep stalling at track switches.

DonV