More details, please ...

Are you sure the locos are shorting out on turnouts or just hitting a dead frog?

What kind of turnouts? Are you using dead frog or live frog turnouts?

Do you know the difference?

By shorting out, you mean the locos throw sparks at the turnout and then the power pack/booster resets?

Or by shorting out, do you mean the locos stop dead and won't move past the turnout unless you give them a nudge?

shure thing joe. 

shure thing joe.  whats going on is i opperate the mrc prodigy express on my small 8x10 i use atlas number 5. ive been useing this layout wile ive been in the army. now as i run the loco over the turnouts in my yard the cab resets its self or i loose all control of the loco. it dosent derail. and i hear one of my sound locos chirp every time they short . this isnt all my sd9s doing this only a few. and with my starting of my coos bay branch and me useing sd9s as the main power i want to make shure my whole fleet is running right.

thanks

oregon native and combat vet

dale kathrein

Atlas doesnt make a #5 turnout ...

Dale:

Atlas doesn't make a #5 HO turnout - so those are either an Atlas #4 turnout, an Atlas #6 turnout, or a Peco code 83 #5. At any rate, if the short happens regardless of which way the loco is travelling, it sounds like the loco wheel tread is bridging the two diverging rails close to the frog point. The two rails are opposite polarity so if the wheel tread connects the two rails briefly, that will cause the behavior you describe.

You can temporarily fix the problem by painting the top of the diverging railheads for say 1/4" past the frog. A more permanent fix is to grind down the inside edge of the diverging railheads where they meet. If you watch segment 4 of my DCC good, bad, and ugly clinic you will see where I mention how to fix this problem on Peco turnouts.

The fix should be similar on Atlas turnouts, if indeed that is what you have. Can you post a good photo of one of your turnouts so we can get a good look at it?

hey i checked