A good weekend!

This Thanksgiving break was really nice - very relaxed at home. I had good time w/ the family, and also some time for layout work. And on that front, I was able to complete all of the electrical work at the Vance Jct wye - turnout motors are all in, panel and LEDs are wired and functioning, the reverser relay for the wye (actually, for all of Telluride) is in and operational - it's all good!

My first tortoise install

I've FINALLY finished wiring all the detector and force-red circuits, and panel LEDs for them, all that stuff. My dwarf signals are complete and ready to install, but aren't in yet.

But - one of the panels also needs to control some of the turnouts for a wye remotely, and since I wired all the LEDs and switches for that, I thought it was finally time to tackle a Tortoise install - for a code 75 small-radius Peco wye turnout.

I used a method from Rich's methods, using some metal tubing and spring wire. I like this because I got to lay track w/o worrying about drilling large holes under each turnout as I went.

So - I've got the first one done now, but not wired; it seemed to go pretty well. I underestimated how difficult it'd be to actually get it screwed into place upside down - and this was the probably the easiest of the places I need these!

Oh well - challenges are good, right? I'll try and get a photo posted eventually.