03-31-2012, 07:16 AM
I had a situation where there was an obstruction beneath a turnout preventing me from using a motor beneath. My track is laid on 1/2" homasote, so I left a slot beneath the throwbar, and a length of 20 gauge copper wire which was soldered to the throwbar. I handlaid turnouts at that point in time. Many years passed before I recently completed this. Priot to that, I was able to pull or push the wire to throw the points, but I had the frog wired for the main route so I would get a short when metal wheels crossed the gap into the siding. I wasn't using it much! I finally decided to finish it, using a slide switch as I had planned. I slid a length of styrene tube over the 20 gauge wire to keep it from bending, and epoxied the tube to the plywood. The wire was not long enough to reach where I wanted teh switch, so I used some telescoping brass tube and solderd the wire inside. The tube in turn was pushed into a hole in the slide switch handle, a press fit reenforced with ca. You see a piece of homasote alonside this wire/tube contraption. There will be another on the other side, and a piece of .010 styrene sheet will bridge the gap, keeping future scenery out. I hope to use a flagpole as a handle, so far the only possibility for a flag I've found it a Microscale decal. Others are all printed flat and would look silly, imo.
