HP and Sackville Railroad


Smudge, do you use insulators at all?

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Smudge617 said:
No, and all three legs have feeders either on them or within 6" of them, and I've never really had a problem yet, I've had shorts on points, but that was my fault for not checking the wheel gauge on the loco.
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Even the picture I showed is incorrect in my opinion, that short white rail should be red in my op8nioninion with power coming from the other direction? Hard to get reliable accurate info at times.
 
I'm using insulfrogs:

I don't use insulators either, and I have 3 sets of feeders per turnout. 1 for each leg. I have not experienced any issues at the turnouts as of yet. If for some reason I do, I will just take my Dremel and cut gaps.

Don't know what the right answer is. It is a widely debated topic on a lot of forums when insulfrogs are used.
 
BigGRacing said:
Even the picture I showed is incorrect in my opinion, that short white rail should be red in my op8nioninion with power coming from the other direction? Hard to get reliable accurate info at times.
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No, it's correct, it's called power routing, the white rail in the frog itself isn't carrying any power, because the switch is carrying power from the other track to the bottom blade, if you switch the blade the other way, the white blade in the diagram will then become powered (red) and the blade shown in blue will then be unpowered (white) that's how Insulfrogs work. The author has simply used white to differentiate the unpowered blade, but you're correct, the track side of the frog should be red, not white

If you look at where the end of the blades touch the relative track it becomes obvious, as that's where it takes its power from so the loco doesn't stall
 
Smudge617 said:
Electrofrogs simply have the blade powered all the time, apparently having the blades powered helps with power conductivity, in case the blade doesn't throw correctly and connect to the relative rail, causing a stall.
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There are a few good videos on the tube that show how to solder jumpers underneath to essentially make the insulfrog more electricly reliable. I thought about doing it, but chose to go with the 3 feeder approach.
 
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Slowly getting back at it as fall is slowly getting here. A complete fluke this week as I came across an old picture of the train shed that I want to eventually build. There was not much info on the roof until I posted to the local Facebook website this week. (Maritime Federation of Model Railroaders). Will have to draw it up and then start building eventually.


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Three and a half years later and still tinkering with the track plan……until today. I wanted a track plan with minimum flex track as I already had the track for many years. Finally happy with my track plan to start putting stuff together knowing that some of the key components are where they will end up. Retirement in one year so I am still ahead of the game. Don’t know if I will ever put a turntable in but it is historic so I likely will, but I think I will build a gantry type one that I have seen others do. Might be a track or switch added here or there but the two mainlines were the hard part.

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BigGRacing said:
Three and a half years later and still tinkering with the track plan……until today. I wanted a track plan with minimum flex track as I already had the track for many years. Finally happy with my track plan to start putting stuff together knowing that some of the key components are where they will end up. Retirement in one year so I am still ahead of the game. Don’t know if I will ever put a turntable in but it is historic so I likely will, but I think I will build a gantry type one that I have seen others do. Might be a track or switch added here or there but the two mainlines were the hard part.
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Great looking track plan!

Lots of great scenery and operations potential!
 
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