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I completed my new Christmas layout pretty much on Christmas Eve.  I used a combination of Gargraves track, switches and a couple of Ross curved switches.  The Ross switches are on the main line for the bigger stuff where the minimum track diameter is O54.  The Gargraves switches are all O42 on an inside loop.  The inside loop was designed for lower end stuff, older Lionel General Christmas engine, my Grandson's Thomas and friends collection, etc.  I wired the Gargraves O42 switches for anti-derailing to make it more kid friendly and save my fuse budget.  The problem I am having is with many of the smaller engines, they seem to loose the outside rail connection as they are going through the switch and stop.  I think it has to do with the placement of the traction tires on the engines and the Gargraves switch having a plastic frog.  Does anyone have experience with this?  Advise on fixing the issues?  At this point I am considering going back to FasTrack for the inner loop just to get the reliability back.  I do like the fact that the Gargraves is significantly quiter than the FasTrack though.  But the kid doesn't care about the noise, he just wonders why Percy will run on the layout and Thomas won't...

Tony

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Are you using the Gargraves switches back to back? If so put a section of straight track(one to two inches) between the two switches and supply power to both outside rails because the Gargraves switches are not designed well for electrical contact. I have Gargraves switches and had to supply power to the outside rails as the one rail is plastic from the frog to the end of the switch. A cure when using the anti-derail feature for Gargraves is to move the section of track that activates the anti-derail to one or two sections of track after the curved section of the switch.

Some older Gargraves 072 switches loose power to the center rail, as the center rail power comes in the one side and stops at the switch(no connection) causing you to wire any center rail after the switch both sides after the entrance of the switch.

Personally I wish that Gargraves would issue an instruction manual for use with their switches or have a website FAQ for their switches and problems.

Another track system that needs an instruction manual is E Z Streets and Super Streets.

Lee Fritz

Last edited by phillyreading
phillyreading posted:

Are you using the Gargraves switches back to back? If so put a section of straight track(one to two inches) between the two switches and supply power to both outside rails because the Gargraves switches are not designed well for electrical contact. I have Gargraves switches and had to supply power to the outside rails as the one rail is plastic from the frog to the end of the switch. A cure when using the anti-derail feature for Gargraves is to move the section of track that activates the anti-derail to one or two sections of track after the curved section of the switch.

Some older Gargraves 072 switches loose power to the center rail, as the center rail power comes in the one side and stops at the switch(no connection) causing you to wire any center rail after the switch both sides after the entrance of the switch.

Lee Fritz

Lee, Thanks for the response.  None of the switches are back to back and all have power connections on all legs.  I think you are right about moving the insulated rail away from the frog.  My insulated section is the first 3" of track right after the frog.  That's probably a good 5" with an isolated section.  I think I can fix it without tearing it apart.  I will post the results here.

Thanks again.

Tony

Tony,

We would like to know how you made out with your O-42 switch concern. One thing we wondered about is whether or not you connected both of the outside rails to common. This would have maintained the common connection needed to keep the train running. The isolated rail for non-derailing would still work as designed.

GarGraves posted:

Tony,

We would like to know how you made out with your O-42 switch concern. One thing we wondered about is whether or not you connected both of the outside rails to common. This would have maintained the common connection needed to keep the train running. The isolated rail for non-derailing would still work as designed.

I did connect both outside rails to common everywhere I did a power drop.  This is only a 5x8 layout and I have 6 power connections on the loop with the O42 switches.  This was more than my original design but when I realized the switches did not carry power through them, I added a couple of drops.  

I believe my problem with the smaller locos is due to the way I did the isolated rail for the non-derailing feature.  I isolated the frog rail 3" beyond the switch so there is roughly a 6" gap for common on the frog side of both the through and turnout.  This gap coupled with the placement of the rubber tires on smaller engines seems to be the issue.  You should be able to see what I mean looking at the attachment.  If you zoom in on the frog rail, you can see where it is isolated.

1 switch did actually have a failure.  One of the points was misaligned and most everything I tried to run through the switch derailed.  The point actually broke off the slider.  I epoxied it to the slider to get me through the holidays and my dealer ordered me a replacement.  Fortunately, the turnout for this switch was a siding that I really didn't need to do anything with except put something on it.

I appreciate you checking in!  PM me with contact info if you would like any more info.

Tony

IMAG0302

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Gargraves switches can be made to work but require soldering quite a bit of jumper wires around them and occasionally some filing to make them run smooth. Ross can supply with full switch connection continuity and always work perfect out of the box..

I've worked with both brands and they have their merit.  My layout is 50% Ross and to be honest they are my favorite switches. If you don't mind adjusting and soldering a bit Gargraves are less expensive, but still good .

Dennis LaGrua posted:

Gargraves switches can be made to work but require soldering quite a bit of jumper wires around them and occasionally some filing to make them run smooth. Ross can supply with full switch connection continuity and always work perfect out of the box..

I've worked with both brands and they have their merit.  My layout is 50% Ross and to be honest they are my favorite switches. If you don't mind adjusting and soldering a bit Gargraves are less expensive, but still good .

Dennis,

I used both Ross and Gargraves switches on this layout.  And believe it or not, I had issues with both.  This was my first layout with Gargraves track so I had no experience with either.  I used Ross on the outer loop because they have an O54/O72 curved switch which is all that fits.  I chose the Gargraves O42 switches for the inside loop for similar reasons.  The Ross O42 is bigger and didn't fit in my limited space. 

I am not unhappy with either.  Both Gargraves and Ross have worked with me to help resolve the issues.  As you can see by this thread, Gargraves reached out to me.

Tony

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