N scale Peco Electrofrog Switches and DCC

CedarCreek Mar 4, 2015

  1. CedarCreek

    CedarCreek TrainBoard Member

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    Alright Experts! I did my research on this site and other sites and I still can't come to a conclusion. I have several Peco electrofrog switches installed on my DC layout. They have been wired as per the directions from Peco i.e power to the points side only, isolated frog rails, then more power after the isolated frogs. in a nutshell my layout operates as it should in DC. several of my sidings also includes an ON/OFF switch so that I can leave a locomotive in an unpowered siding.

    Now my question, I want to convert to DCC and I thought that I had wired my layout so that I could. But I have read on several sites that in order for the PECO Electrofrog to be DCC friendly I will need to make some modifications to the switch as illustrated by Mr. Allen Gartner here.

    But I have also read that the Electrofrog is DCC Friendly as-is. So what is it? Do I really need to make the modifications or not? :question:

    I have read about the possibility of shorts occurring at the points end of the switch but I don't get any now so what makes DCC different?
     
  2. PaulBeinert

    PaulBeinert TrainBoard Supporter

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    I have 24 Peco Electrofrogs on my DCC layout and I wired them the same way you described and I have no issues with shorts.
     
  3. chessie fan

    chessie fan TrainBoard Member

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    I also used them in the past and on my current layout under construction . No modification to them with no shorts.
    Joe
     
  4. Arctic Train

    Arctic Train TrainBoard Member

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    Ditto what Paul says. I've got a ton of Electrofrogs as well. Power the point rails and insulate the diverging frog rails (just as you said you've done) and you're good to go. The only downside to this method is if your points get gunked up then you may have erratic locomotive ops through the turnout. Easy fix, just keep the points clean. The snap spring in the turnout keeps good contact with the points to the rails.


    As an added bonus, if you want you can use your Electrofrog turnouts as the power routing switch to your sidings as well. No need to add feeder wires and a switch to power the siding. Providing your sidings are dead ends, instead of using insulated joiners just solder the diverging frog rail to the inner diverging rail. When the turnout is routed to the siding, the siding is powered. Selecting the turnout to the main and the power to the siding is removed. Again, this only works if your sidings are dead ends.

    Brian

     
  5. CedarCreek

    CedarCreek TrainBoard Member

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    Good news! Then what's all the hubbub with the mods described on Allan Gartners site? It appears to be written as fact.
     
  6. hoyden

    hoyden TrainBoard Supporter

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    When a locomotive or car with metal wheels derails at a switch then the wheels often short out between the point rail on the non-selected route and it's corresponding stock rail. By cutting the rails close to the frog and then permanently feeding the point rails with power from their corresponding stock rails this minimizes shorts. This would be true with DC as well as DCC. The frog needs to be power routed since the point rails do not change polarity when selecting the normal or diverging route. I have Peco electrofrog and did not modify them. I can see the advantage but decided I did not want to go the extra effort to cut rails. I try to keep all the wheels on the rails but when they go off rail and encounter a switch then usually they short out the power. Many of the switches on my layout are 6-8 years old and have seen their share of shorts. The point rails have numerous pitting marks along their top surface. The pits are mostly a cosmetic issue, although with enough power I imagine a short could do some real damage.
     
  7. rsn48

    rsn48 TrainBoard Member

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    "DCC friendly turnouts" came into fashion early on in the DCC world. But many lazy people decided to ignore the advise and install as they had in the past. And you know what, no problems. A friend who advises many people here locally on DCC systems and resolves problems told me that DCC turnouts created some new problems but I can't tell you what they are.

    I was one of those lazy people, no problems. There's a lot of good advice on the net concerning layout construction, but some tips are re-cycled tips that some one read and just sent the tip on without really experiencing what the tip was about.

    Its kind of like wire gauge recommendations currently out there, most of it is wrong. For example, don't use #22 wire for track feeders beyound 6 inches, this is wrong; there are charts out there that will show this to be false.

    Most don't do the DCC friendly turnouts any more if for no other reason is that it is time intensive when you have many turnouts and their lazy friends who didn't go that route seem to be happy.
     
  8. CedarCreek

    CedarCreek TrainBoard Member

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    Well thanks a lot every one. The whole time I was reading about making a switch DCC friendly, I was thinking to myself ??What?? My switches don't short out now... why would they short out with DCC??? Thanks again!
     
  9. hoyden

    hoyden TrainBoard Supporter

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    I never encountered the "don't use #22 wire beyond 6 inches" before wiring my layout. By chance I acquired a 1,000+' roll of two conductor solid wire; orange and white, either #22 or #24. I wired the whole layout; feeders, bus, turnout control with it. I can see sometimes up to 2V drop between power pack and rail but for the most part it's not a problem. The bigger challenge is how to interpret the wire color to know what the wire does. The bottom side of my layout resembles a pinball machine.

    Good times!
     
  10. hoyden

    hoyden TrainBoard Supporter

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    One possible reason for "DCC friendly" is that with DCC the rail connects to a sometimes very large power source of 5 or more amps. A short can melt a lot of metal at those power levels; hence the reliance of quick acting power limiting circuitry. I have a Digitrax Zephyr that limits power to 2.5 amps so that was never much of an issue. In addition I use current limiting light bulbs in series with almost every track feed and other loads are handled through electronic circuit breaker/autoreversers.
     
  11. CedarCreek

    CedarCreek TrainBoard Member

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    I'm looking at the PowerCab for my small layout. From what I read, it only puts out about 2 amps.
     
  12. NotchHill

    NotchHill TrainBoard Member

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    Hi

    I run a T-TRAK layout in N scale, and use Peco Electrofrogs code 80 points in a number of places on the layout. Initially I insulated all the rails, but now I insulate the the rails coming of the frog. It works for both DCC (NCE PowerCab) and DC.

    I worked on a group layout in OO/HO and the newer peco electrofrogs had wiring attached so that the polarity of the frog can be changed when the switch is moved.
     
  13. locomcf

    locomcf TrainBoard Member

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    As Hoyden indicates, on "DCC friendly" turnouts the closure rail and the adjacent stock rail are always the same polarity. On turnouts that are not DCC friendly it is possible for a metal wheel to momentarily short between the two rails. With DC layouts this very brief short rarely causes any problems. However, most (all?) DCC systems will instantly shut down if there's a short. Manufacturers like ME changed the way their turnouts were wired internally, to make them "DCC friendly".

    As for Peco electrofrog turnouts: as shown on Alan Gartner's third diagram (from the top), the frog rails are wired together so they always have the same polarity, which is why they need to be insulated from the connected rails (if those rails are powered.) The result of this is that a considerable length of track (point rail, closure rail, frog and frog rail) is totally reliant on good contact between the point rail and the stock rail. There aren't many N scale locos that can bridge a gap of that length if it goes 'dead' due to (say) a speck of dust or dirt between the point and closure rails.

    The best way that I know of to address this problem is to modify the point as described in the following blogs:
    http://kdrail.blogspot.com.au/2011/08/peco-turnout-prep.html
    http://tropicalnscale.blogspot.com.au/2013/05/making-peco-points-dcc-happy.html

    Regards,
    Ron
     

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