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I recently inquired about problems I was having with Scaletrax switches on the 3-rail site and was told to post on the electrical site. I have been having a problem with the stock switch control on the scaletrax which sticks and results in the burning out of the switch motor. So far of the 17 new switches I installed 5 of them have had problems. Although MTH is making good on the controls and motors I was told that a better alternative control would be a SPDT Momentary On-Off-On toggle switch. My question is regards to how to actually wire this toggle. The stock conrol box has 5 wires ( three which are designated as positive, curve and straight ) and a black and brown wire designated positive & negative. My problem is when I check the terminals on the SPDT toggle there appears to be in most cases 5 or 6 terminal spots. Can someone explaun specifically how to wire these. I have a problem ( brain freeze ) i guess when it comes to some electrical connections. I would appreciate some direction as I would like to install these momentary toggles to prevent damage to future switch components. At $40 a pop for these scaletrax switches I would like to change the control.  Thanks for any help! Dan

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I looked up a scaletrax picture on MTH website.  It appears from the picture there is a red, green and black wire on switch motor which I will assume is reverse (curve), normal (straight) and common respectively.  On your switch box the brown and black supply power to move the switch motor.  Cannot tell from picture if controller has LED light position indicator.

 

If your SPDT switch has six terminals then you have a DPDT switch with terminal arranged as two parallel columns of three terminals each (assuming up/down orientation).

 

My way to wire this would be:

 

Black wire from switch motor connected to transformer common.

 

If indeed you have a DPDT switch pick either the left or right column of three terminals and ignore other column.  If SPDT switch then disregard previous sentence.

Use any wire color but red or green (to avoid confusing with switch motor wires) connected to switch center terminal.  Connect other wire end to transformer hot power terminal.

 

Connect red wire from motor to either top or bottom terminal in the column.

Connect green wire from motor to remining vacant terminal in the column.

 

Apply power and when switch is toggled, motor should snap turnout one way or other.  Repeat for other direction.  Of course it goes without saying to not keep switch handle held on (Think Smoke gets in your eyes song)  .   You could get fancy by using a capacitor discharge circuit which would limit the power duration preventing motor burnouts.

 

Hope this helps.

 

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OGR Publishing, Inc., 1310 Eastside Centre Ct, Suite 6, Mountain Home, AR 72653
800-980-OGRR (6477)
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