Wiring troubles

[T-Lloyd]

I recently purchased a atlas ho-roundhouse (item #709) it work great with the atlas turntable.
1 Problem! there is no way to wire the 3 roundhouse stalls!
i think im gonna haft to solder wires to the sides of the rails only problem is i gotta get a soldering iron and figure out how it works. anyone know another way to wire the stalls?

[jayl1]

Try Atlas terminal joiners.  They are rail joiners with a short wire already soldered onto the joiner.  Place it inside the roundhouse, drill a hole on your layout & connect the wire to a power source.  You will need one pair (3 packs) for the three tracks. 

[SteamGene]

Sorry to be blunt, but model railroaders really need to learn to solder.  It took me a bit, and I'm still not as good as others, but I can do it. 
I'm not familiar with the Atlas roundhouse, but I'm not sure how the rail joiners will help.  Where are you going to out them?
Gene

[Jim Banner]

I have to agree with Gene on this.  Sooner or later something on the railroad will have to be soldered.  There are numerous soldering primers on the web.  You can visit one of them by clicking on the link below:

http://members.shaw.ca/sask.rail/model-book/soldering/soldering.html

For soldering feeders to rails, installing decoders, adding lighting to buildings, and that sort of thing, a soldering iron rated at about 25 watts and equipped with a 1/16" tip is a good choice.  A soldering iron stand with sponge holder is nice but a sardine can with a piece of viscose sponge works just as well.  Dampen the sponge with water and wipe the soldering iron on it to clean off the dross (dead solder.)  Tin the iron with a bit of small diameter rosin core solder.  The 1 mm size is a good choice.  Use this solder for soldering wires as well.

[Running Bear]

You just slide the terminal joiners onto the ends of the rails, drill some small holes through the roundhouse floor (same as you'd have to do if you soldered wires to the rails), pass the wires down through the holes and connect them to whatever power source you're using. When you learn to solder don't forget that a little paste flux (non-acid) is a great help.

[rogertra]

I agree with Gene.

It's a basic requirement that all modeller must be able to solder.  This is especially true once you get away from toy train 'set track' and into more scale modelling using flex track or hand-laid track.

[SteamGene]

KCS,
You mean the Atlas roundhouse comes without rails and you have to install them yourself?  How unlike Atlas! 
Gene

[Running Bear]

The one I had back in the early 80's didn't come with the rails installed.

[Santa Fe buff]

Soldering is probably to best way to do it. My friend has that exact item, and I think he was able to drive it in the stalls without any connection (guessing it jumped from the turntable?), but soldering is THEE best way. The plastic base makes for easy drilling. I found out soldering was needed not to long ago. Our neighbor past away, and the daughter who was clearing it out, knew I was trying to learn, so she gave me a Craftsman soldering gun. As well as some tooling that came along. But I'm still waiting to find time for me and my dad to practice using it. Until then, I can't solder, and can't reconnect needed power wires in one standard Bachmann EMD F9 (ATSF warbonnet), and one Life-Like standard GP38-2 (ATSF Blue/Yellow warbonnet). But you could possibly use what Life-Like Power-Loc System uses. Instead of standard connectors that leveled track and Bachmann E-Z track uses, Power-Loc uses a copper connector that instead of sliding, it's bent downwards so they meet flat to flat, and not rail to rail.


Look completely to the left, the track piece with the black base, note that is Power-Loc, see. The joiners are flat ended and just meet face to face.

Hope this helps with your Roundhouse, and may spark any ideas to fix your problem. 

[Jhanecker2]

The Atlas Roundhouse comes with stalls angled at 15 degrees to match there turntable that indexes at 15 degrees.  I don't believe it comes with ready laid track .     Please don't use a soldering gun , it has a excessive amount of wattage .  Use a small soldering iron of approxiamately 25 watts , remembering to clean , flux , and pre- tin  both parts and the iron .

[Running Bear]

I use a 140 watt soldering gun with no melting of ties or structure pieces at all, but someone not as experienced as I am will probably have a bad time of it.

[SteamGene]

Making a search for "soldering" yields many sites with good instructions and diagrams to help learn how to solder.
Gene

[Yampa Bob]

I have been soldering electronic components for 50 years. Like KCS my favorite tool is a Weller 100/140 soldering gun, but I also have 15 and 30 watt pencil tip irons for fine work.

For that 3rd and 4th hand often needed, I use a tool called the "Third Hand".

http://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/001212.php

For heat sinks I use GC Electronics part number 9077-1 small clamps, and H3-388 tweezers (the kind you have to squeeze to open).

http://www.gcelectronics.com/order/catdisplay.asp?CatID=16

Download the PDF in the "soldering tools" section. 

I use only "Savbit" and "Kester" multicore solder. The only time I use paste flux is for sweating copper water pipes (which requires no-lead solder and a torch).

Like all skills, soldering requires a technique learned by practice and experience.

[Guilford Guy]

My club's modular staging yard uses aligns the track with an ingenious contraption that can be adapted for your use, but still requires soldering. They took a very small diameter pipe, and soldered that to the the outside of each rail ending 1/2" from the end of the rail. They then bent a piece of a smaller diameter brass rod into an L shape. When the turntable is aligned right. Slide the brass rods, already positioned on the table, across the gap, into into the brass rods on the Roundhouse Tracks. This routes power from the TT to the Roundhouse tracks, and also maintains the alignment.  Although In your case you should probably hard wire the roundhouse tracks as well. You can never have too many leads.

[T-Lloyd]

I got 1 of those cold soldering things and soldered wires to teh track and drilled holes through the base of the roundhouse, just gonna be hard to cover the wires with ground n stuff when i get to the point. (the way i happend to solder it)