Probably most folks will be

Probably most folks will be choosing to operate their turnouts with some sort of 'automatic' controller. I recall doing that years ago with a CD power unit, a single solenoid, and some sort of linkage I dreamed up. I can't recall the details of that linkage.

There are a wide variety on single and multiple motor ideas for operating our crossovers. Some will likely get presented here, and/or are available on a number of other internet sites.

I am particularly interested in manual control, and remote manual controls. Part of this interest is generated by the challenge of the situation, and some of it by non-electrical/computer simplicity.

Manual Control of Single Crossovers

bell cranks

you can have a rod mounted under the layout with guides at each end and 3 bell cranks: 1 for each throw bar and a 3rd to move the rod from the fascia (or other means)

Keep it simple Brian

Hi Brian,

It is a whole lot easier controlling each turnout in the crossover individually on your layout. Trying to throw both turnouts at once mechanically can be done, but even the real railroads at mechanical interlockings (aka signal boxes) had a lever for each turnout. They never threw two turnouts simultaneously unless they were power-driven and controlled by a single electrical switch from the panel.

Keep it simple. You've got a lot of other battles to fight along the way to getting your empire up and running yet.

Take the easy wins where you can, 

Linkage Idea

Linkage Idea

Here is what I have in mind for a linkage to coordinate the operation of 2 Peco turnouts together. It's basically a stiff piece of metal strip that would be a little bit longer than the distance between the holes in those Peco throw bars . It would have two vertical 'post' of music wire welded at that exact distance between the throwbar holes, and they would be long enough to reach up thru the plywood deck (and roadbed) to operate the turnouts when the metal strip was rotated slightly. The rotation center of the metal strip would be the exact center between those vertical post.

The rotating metal strip would bear against the underside of the plywood deck, perhaps against a very thin plastic shim for friction purposes. It would only need a single central screw mounted into the plywood deck to rotate about, and it would only need one push rod attachment to operate its rotation,...one control rod / cable to activate 2 crossover turnouts simultaneously.

 
(that vertical pin would be centered in that metal strip & firmly anchored)

Experimental mock-up

I think I am going to have to build a mock-up to experiment with this idea of mine.
 

I've discovered that I have at least 6 crossovers planned for my new track plan. I would much prefer 6 control rods verses 12,..if possible?

PS: I'll likely do that experiment as soon as I get finished with laying tracks and turnouts in my staging areas.

pressure

it would be good to have some pressure on either position of the control arm.   one approach is to link it to a toggle switch which of course will hold its position as well as provide a contact to power a frog

Surprised?

If you designed the plan with any deliberation, why would you be surprised to find crossovers?

Most switches and tracks are built for a specific purpose, and likewise I would have assumed any crossovers added had a reason or purpose.

first attempt failure

Decided to play with this idea late today. My initial attempt to drill those very small holes for the vertical piano wires in the steel beam was a failure. That steel beam is to tough for those vary small drills,...broke several drills already.

I've several new ideas that I will try out tomorrow.

Half a crossover

It seems that you started out using a double cross-over for a reason and then changed to only a single, or is there more to be added to the singles photo?

@oldmanep

I started out using a double as it was a compact, sexy choice. I knew very little about them at the time, particularly their use on a DCC layout. As I began to study the situation in more detail I became more concerned about their reliability (shorting etc,etc), and making them work all the time.

I discovered that I had the room (track length) to utilize two single crossovers in lieu of the double,...and that I could make up those single crossovers using the large size Pecos. So that became my choice of two 2 single crossovers where I had planned the double originally.

I then decided to look around my track plan and discovered a number of other single crossovers I had designed into it,....some with a curved turnout connected to ordinary turnout, and a couple with curved connected to another curved.

Since I am very interested in manual control for as many of my turnouts as possible, the next step was how I might control BOTH turnouts making up the crossover with a single control rod. That's my goal with these next experiments.

Use aluminium

Brian, aluminium is the way to go. Light and easy to work. Use a length of angle to prevent it bending. I've done something similar with my N scale Peco crossovers.

Tony in Gisborne, Australia

One thing you may have missed, Brian,

is that for crossovers, for the straight through position you want to pull one set of points towards you while pushing the other set away from you, and reverse for the crossover position.  So you can't just pull the bar towards you, or push it away - you need it to rotate.  But first, you have to solve that vertical pin problem. 

Here's an idea - thread a hole through an aluminum bar; choose a suitable diameter, maybe a #6 hole.  Find a 2" long #6 bolt.  on a lathe, turn the last 1" or so of the bolt down to your desired pin diameter.  Thread the bolt through your hole so the pin sticks straight up.  Now do the same at the other end.  Half way along the bar, put in a third hole, large enough to serve as a clearance hole for a screw.  Screw the bar to the underside of your plywood, such that the two pins operate the turnouts when you rotate the bar.  You rotate the bar using a push-pull rod attached to one end or the other of the rotating bar.  This whole mess is going to be devilishly tricky to set up, and vulnerable to misalignment, but it should work.  Now repeat it for all your single crossovers.

I really don't see why you would want to do this, especially multiple times, when two tortoise (or other) machines properly wired to a DPDT switch will solve your problem.  But hey, you seem to want to create walls purely for the pain of climbing over them, so have at it!

Blair 

Dual turnout control fixture

Dual turnout control fixture experiment

Since I was unable to drill that very small hole into the steel beam I began to think of of ideas of how I might attach the piano wire to the steel beam. I thought of a several that might be very possible including cutting off the tips of that beam and adding on dense plastic tips that could be drilled out for that piano wire.

But before cutting that beam and adding on tips I thought why not put a short piece of tube in those holes that could hold the piano wire. The holes for that tube fixture would be larger and thus easy to drill, and I could solder the tube in, then solder the piano wire inside the tube. I would make the tube fixture flush with the upper face of the steel beam so it would have no problem rotating while facing the flat plywood face.

Wait a minute, why would I need a flush fixture tube when it would only be rotating a very small amount,....and inside the confines of the hole in the plywood deck needed to project the piano wire up to the turnout throwbar? No I could provide a tubular piece in that steel beam that could be a decent length to hold that vertical piece of piano wire, and it could project both up and down from the steel beam.
 
 

 
(BTW for this experiment I drilled little elongated holes for the vertical pin to operate in. In the future just a slightly bigger round hole would be fine)

Wait a minute, why should I have that vertical piece of piano wire firmly attached to the steel beam? How about if the piano wire could be dropped down from the throwbar into that tube fixture. Wow, that means I could install the turnouts to the deck above, not worrying about their height (with or without cork roadbed, then come along and drop the piano wire thru the throwbar , then down and engage the tube fixture.

YES, ... it works !
 

some friction ideas

Concurrently, I began to think of simple ways to reduce any friction of that connecting bar,.... just plain low friction plastic shims attached to either the plywood surface or glued onto the metal beam.
 
 

made of plastic food container scraps
 

BTW for this experiment I drill little elongated holes

Electrical control

I'd agree with electrical control- put each turnout on a Tortoise and wire them together. Then, each can be adjusted individually. If you want to control them via DCC, many DCC decoders can handle two Tortoises on one output. If not, just using a regular DPDT switch will do the trick. I believe the US modern prototype has eliminated double crossovers, with a few exceptions in major east coast passenger stations and terminals.

simplify

i think your idea of using a single pivoting metal bar to control both switches requires 3 accurate measurements to work and requires equal travel at each end.   do you really want to have to do this for each cross-over?

i think an easier approach is to build a separate mechanism for each switch and then link them together.   You then have several simpler problems to deal with.

using   Eshleman turnout linkages separates accurate placement of the linkage from the control of the linkage, both in terms of travel and angle of the controlling linkage under the benchwork.  while the longer lever arm under the benchwork requires more travel, it provide mechanical advantage requiring less force

the Eshleman linkages also allow multiple turnouts to be controlled from a single driver, whether a switch machine or push rod.

Fast Tracks

I don't know, but from my view,  the Fast Tracks system of turnout controls & Control rod kits are pretty darn simple. I hooked up my cross-overs with their controls. Throw both switches at the same time & power the frogs.    I realize that throwing both at the same time is not prototypical,  but a sacrifice I was willing to make.

The "u" shaped rod is controling the cross-overs.....

@Jerry

If I am reading you correctly, you have that U shaped cable connected to both switchs,...switch-to-switch, thus coordinating them,...then whatever one wants to move either one of the singles...moves the pair.

That's a good idea, but a little bit more complicated than mine in that you have to get a cable connection up to the throwbar.

Accuracy of Measurements

 Thus far I have found the installation even more simple than I first thought. The PRIMARY dimension that needs watching is the location of that center rotation hole on the steel beam as close to center between the vertical tubes at either end. This means that the throwbars of those 2 turnouts move exactly in unison with any rotation,...as you said "requires equal travel at each end".

This is how I image the installation of one of these 'systems'. I have the paper templates of the turnouts located on top of the deck. Simply drill a small dia hole down right under the hole in the throwbar. Then on the bottom side of the deck draw a line between these 2, and locate the exact center point along that line. A pilot hole drilled here will be the rotation center for that connecting bar. Then simply drill out those small holes in the plywood deck to a little larger size that will allow for the vertical tube/piano wire to move ever so little horizontally when throwing the turnout.

So I only have two measurements that require accuracy, and both of them involve location of a center hole,...1) along the steel beam,...and 2) location of the center hole in the plywood deck.

using  Eshleman turnout

I thought about using those Eshleman type linkages, and likely will on my other non-crossover turnouts. But as you can see I have found a way to eliminate those linkages with this new arrangement. I did become concerned with 2 other aspects,
1) Friction:.... between steel connecting bar and underside of wood deck. Can be solved very easy with plastic shims, ..and even well after initial installation.
2) Limited movement detection:.....will my control rod that controls the steel bar move enough to be detectable by the operator. There is a very small rotation motion of the connecting bar so this becomes a concern as 'detectablity'. On my experimental model the steel beam extended an extra length beyond one of vertical pins,...thus that movement was exaggerated and more detectable.
Another option that came to mind was to detect that small movement with a small slide switch powering an LED.

BTW one could connect a small servo to that connecting bar.

Rocking bar

Hi Brian,

my first thought was along the same lines as Greg C.'s very first post: two bell cranks (with one of them doing double duty as control rod crank).

However, I like your idea of that rocker bar. The only thing is, the rocker bar runs along a radius, while the turnout control linkage needs to go on a secant (a line intersecting the circle but not the center). It will be aligned in one position, but not the other.

To deal with the alignment thing, I'd have the rocker bar parallel to the tracks. I'd then use Z-shaped linkage wires (going through the throwbar and baseboard, turn 90° towards the rocker bar, turn 90° through the hole in the rocker bar). That will allow for small errors in alignment and will provide some springiness to keep the turnout points against the stock rails.

Hopefully that is clear?

Have fun!

@dark2star

I know exactly of what you speak, and it had me a little concerned when I first thought about it. BUT I then thought that the horizontal movement required for that rocker bar was so small that it was likely not going to need to be compensated for,...particularly considering the very fine tolerances that would need to be taken into account. With just a little bit of 'springiness' in the vertical piano wire, all sins would be forgiven.

Another consideration is that I am using spring loaded Peco turnouts, so I just have to give them a nudge to go to the correct position, and the Peco springs do the final 'adjustment'.

@dark2star

The Z-shaped linkages are a good idea,...but I thought I would first see if I could get along without that additional complication.