Wiring Tortoise SMAIL's in crossover


rjstill

New Member
Trying to figure out how to wire/control a single crossover using Tortoise SMAIL's (built in decoder). DCC system is NCE Power Cab. The NCE manual goes into setting up Macro's to control more than one device with a single input. I just don't know how or what to do. i just started with DCC last week and I'm in a steep learning curve! Someone advised me to use NCE Switch It's but that doesn't make sense since I don't need a decoder (right?) Thanks for any help.
 
Trying to figure out how to wire/control a single crossover using Tortoise SMAIL's (built in decoder). DCC system is NCE Power Cab. The NCE manual goes into setting up Macro's to control more than one device with a single input. I just don't know how or what to do. i just started with DCC last week and I'm in a steep learning curve! Someone advised me to use NCE Switch It's but that doesn't make sense since I don't need a decoder (right?).
It should be a simple matter of programming the two SMAILs to the same DCC accessory channel number. The manual you should be reading is the one from the SMAIL. Connect the DCC bus to pins 1 and 8 (see page 3). Programming with an NCE system is covered on page 4.

Yet another option would be to hook up a physical linkage between the two turnouts and control them with a single tortoise.

Having said that, is there some specific reason you want to control your crossovers with the DCC system? In my opinion, DCC is great for the trains but rather overkill for controlling accessories. It complicates otherwise simple things, not to mention adding a great deal of cost.
 
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