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DCC Concepts - Working Point Rodding


mdh1950
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  • RMweb Gold

Very very very impressive bits of kit, but without wishing to start a fight, I would have thought manufacturing them to allow for the foibles of  Peco pointwork is defeating the object somewhat, wouldn't anyone building their own pointwork be more inclined to want the added fidelity of operating cranks and rodding rather than someone using non scale items.

I wish them well, but, maybe I'm missing something obvious?

 

Mike.

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I did get a glimpse of these during development and I was very impressed, possibly the cranks look a tad overscale but nice to replicate the motion. I'd say the safest approach would be to drive them from the points. Some may recoil in horror but we do drive wheels from the track.

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  • RMweb Gold

Very very very impressive bits of kit, but without wishing to start a fight, I would have thought manufacturing them to allow for the foibles of  Peco pointwork is defeating the object somewhat, wouldn't anyone building their own pointwork be more inclined to want the added fidelity of operating cranks and rodding rather than someone using non scale items.

I wish them well, but, maybe I'm missing something obvious?

 

Mike.

As I see it, you can use them for your home-built points and crossings; it's just that they have been designed to cope with Peco products as well.

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Looks very impressive. I would seriously consider using this on my next layout for the Peco code 75 Bullhead turnouts that I will be using. I wonder though has this point rodding system been tested multiple times to actually operate the turnouts ?

   Cheers,

    Chris

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  • RMweb Gold

I am utterly amazed.

 

I would never have thought that any manufacturer would prioritise something like this, certainly not in 4mm scale.

 

Many, many layouts you see at the average show (?the majority, even?) don't even have any point rodding (the ones that feature mechanical signalboxes, that is).

 

The DCC products seem, upon an initial read-through, very fine, well-designed and thought through. I wouldn't have thought that the slight overscale nature of the product would be a particularly big issue. I am assuming that it's more to scale than the Wills non-functioning product?

 

Of those layouts that do feature 4mm point rodding, very, very few have it working and I'd have thought that the number of layouts nationally that feature points actually operated remotely, using surface-mounted, scale point rodding, can be counted on the fingers of one hand, if not just the one finger!

 

I know from (limited) personal experience that installing even cosmetic rodding can end up being a real labour of love and it just takes (me) ages. I do think it's worth doing, however.

 

As to getting it working, the small amount of movement that will actually be seen by the viewing public, even assuming they are watching the right spot at the right time is not going to be particularly detectable (perhaps the layout operator will have to tell his audience 'to watch the point rodding,     now!').

 

On the other hand, layout builders might just to this for themselves and be happy with the knowledge 'that they know it's there'.

 

Personally, I tend to put this kind of thing in the same category as working inside valve gear on steam locos - very nice to have, especially if you have the time to build it and install it, but probably not worth the relatively significant additional time (and expense) when placed in the wider context of building a layout, especially if your modelling time is not unlimited.

 

But good luck to DCC and those who choose to have a go with this stuff. I'll certainly watch with great interest.

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I am utterly amazed.

 

I would never have thought that any manufacturer would prioritise something like this, certainly not in 4mm scale.

 

Partly tongue-in-cheek here, but to take this forward 'logically' then the next thing needed will be a working scale lever-frame operated by a working scale signalman :-)

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  • RMweb Gold

What you might be missing is the modeller who likes the idea of working point rodding even though he is using Peco points.

Personally I am interested in this to operate Peco points.

  

Where did I say that?

 

Mike.

 

 

 

In post #3 you said that maybe you were missing something obvious. My post indicated what I thought you might have been missing.

 

 

Very very very impressive bits of kit, but without wishing to start a fight, I would have thought manufacturing them to allow for the foibles of  Peco pointwork is defeating the object somewhat, wouldn't anyone building their own pointwork be more inclined to want the added fidelity of operating cranks and rodding rather than someone using non scale items.

I wish them well, but, maybe I'm missing something obvious?

 

Mike.

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Partly tongue-in-cheek here, but to take this forward 'logically' then the next thing needed will be a working scale lever-frame operated by a working scale signalman :-)

 

Its coming, its coming. Just give robotics, nano technology and 3D printing a chance to catch up and we will have walking DCC figures on the layout. The first set being railway gangs to lay the track for you right in front of your eyes!

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