Changing frog polarity on non-motorised points

[SteamingWales]

Hi all

 

Currently building my first DCC layout and have a conundrum with frog polarity.

 

The layout has 2 electrofrog points (yes it's only small), one of these in in the scenic section so easily enough to wire up to a point motor, with the other in the non scenic section and this can be operated by hand.

 

The question is how to wire up the point so that the frog polarity can be changed? I DO NOT want to use a point motor unless absolutely necessary

 

Cheers

 

 

[Tony Cane]

One option is to mount a small micro switch beside the point such that it is operated by the tiebar.

The picture below shows one I recently installed.

If you ar interested I may be able to locate the source of the switch which was via Ebay.

[tender]

If they are Peco Electrofrog points and you don't make any modifications to them (i.e cutting the links on the underside) then the switch blades will automatically switch the frog polarity for you.

[ColinK]

I have lots of hand operated points, worked using piano wire rods - simple, reliable and cheap. More fun than point motors too.  I use Tam Valley Frog Juicers to change polarity (I think Gaugemaster do something similar).  There are polarised views on frog juicers (there has been a long debate on them recently), but for people like me, they are a fit and forget device with no moving parts.

[Andy Reichert]

I haven't looked lately, but I have feeling that it's a economics toss up between buying a Frog Juicer or buying a point motor that includes a frog contact.  Personally I prefer the ability to change the points with a switch (and eventually a computer) rather than make up a mechanical hand operating linkage. But then I tend to have dense and complicated trackwork

 

The one place a frog juicer really comes into it's own is a trailing spring switch.

 

Andy

[Oldddudders]

The OP wants to avoid motors, he says. As Colin says, the Frogjuicer/DCC80 kit provides affordable and reliable power to a live frog, which most of us prefer. I have a number of these and like them. 

[Crosland]

Define "operated by hand" If it's directly on the point tie bar t hen you need something  like Tony Cane suggests.

 

If you have some kind of linkage then connect a switch to the linkage. A common trick from the analog world is a slide switch to switch the frog with the linkage fitted through a hole in the slider.

 

As tender says, for a single point in a non-scenic section I wouldn't bother. Assuming you're not ballasting or painting the non-scenic track, electrofrog reliability should be quite good.

[SteamingWales]

Thanks for the help everyone.

 

Just be doing some reading around and it seems a frog juicer is the ticket. TIme to open my wallet!