Aristocraft Manual Switch fix

[Screwy Nick]

After 15 + years outside (no complaints) the little spring in the manual control of my Aristocraft turnout disolved. After some research found replacement springs at more than I wanted to pay and needed an excuise to play with my new resistance soldering toy. I made ground throws that I liked, but the positive position of them didn't allow for the great feature that Aristo built into them, the off center spring action. It holds the points in position that the throw put it in, but allows a train coming from the 'wrong' dirction of the points to flip the track in that dirction so it will not derail. Simple fix for the track and just as easy a mod for the ground throws I made. Will also work with a slight mod of the Aristo supplied throw mechanism.  Still havin' fun. 

[enginear joe]

nice work!

[Screwy Nick]

Joe, thank you, and they were made with mostly scrap from the brass box, and I snuck in copper tubing stiffened with brass rod.  

[Screwy Nick]

I made some progress. This spring shape was described to me on another forum, it was one of several I tried.  While holding the points in the set direction it will still allow a train coming from the other direction to move the points so it doesn't derail. I tried this with several sizes of SS spring wire, the one I had the best success with was .020. Note I removed the off center spring for this ground throw as the .020 wire wasn't strong enough to move the points with it in place. The off center spring can still be used with the modified stock Aristocraft manual control as it is a more positive movement. I also refined the switch stand.