I was looking at Peco turnouts and came across a “Hand Catch Turnout” and could not find an info on them. I don’t think I have a use for one, but was just curious.
Umm, that's a "Catch point", which comes in "right hand" or "left hand" varieties. A.K.A. "derail" It's just the points (or, really, one point) of a turnout, used to derail a car that's wandered off out of control. One might install one at the bottom of a graded siding or spur in order to prevent loose cars from rolling downhill onto the main and causing an accident.
Johnny, I do not know the answer to your question. However on my unfinished layout it could be the switch mounted close to the edge without any track on the diverging route. One that a gransdon may have turned to diverging route. See the GS-4 and Daylight consist make the turn and run for the "hand catch". Oh boy - close call.
Oh yes, I forgot the Right or Left hand Peco Catch Turnout . Here is a photo. http://www.some train store.com/PhotoDetails.asp?ShowDESC=N&ProductCode=PEC-SL384 I was woundering if it was part of a humpyard,
It could be, but prototype humpyards are usually built in a bowl shape, so gravity keeps the cars from wandering off... One of the 1:1 scale railroaders around here would probably know much more about that than I.
Now that’s interesting, I never thought of a bowl. I wanted to build a hump yard a while back and I didn’t know how to stop the cars. I didn’t want them crashing into other cars. And then when I saw this thing, I thought maybe “Catch” meant to catch a car by its wheels like I’ve seen at the Barstow hump yard and was confused by right or left hand. Well anyway I guess this turnout is useless to me.
You can see a set of catch points on the track diverging to the left in this photo. They direct anything running away in the yard away from the mainline, or occasionally a crew shoving back not keeping an eye on where the end of their train is.
Howdy! They are also known as TRAP points, because that's what they are supposed to do - they stop a train in a siding from wandering on to the running line against a signal. Regards
According to my Armstrong book(s), hump yards use a combination of things. Gravity, from the car being pushed over the hill, gets the car rolling into the bowl. In the old days, a brakeman would literally ride the car and adjust the hand brake to ensure a smooth "landing" (my word) at the end of the track or the car to be coupled. More modern yards use a braking mechanism in the track similar to what you see on roller coasters (except against the wheels, not against a dedicated brake bar) to adjust the car's speed. It's all computer controlled based on the car's weight and speed and estimated distance to roll. It would be an interesting challenge to model this in (pick yer favorite) scale, from the weighing of the cars to the automated braking mechanisms to the calculations required to get it just right. Especially since the operating mechanics of model cars are NOTHING like the real thing...
Ok thanks Wesfalen and Viper, I got it now. The photo definitely cleared it up. So I’m assuming that the runaway car just stops and is recoverable by opening the switch. I think maybe I can use one after all. Well, I don’t know about weighing the cars, but I was playing with some ideas on another forum years ago and just got a lot of negative advice against it. The first time I was interested, people were telling me about others using air from fish aquarium pumps and some tried using magnets, all without success. I tried to use the magnet idea and it caused other problems so I gave up. Last year I went to the Barstow hump yard to check out a real operating yard and was very surprised to see how steep the hump actually was. It was fascinating to watch and I took a lot of photos with my cell phone, but was run off by railroad security. The photos I got with the cell phone were terrible and no help at all. I did however have a very good look at the operation of the braking system and I think I could build one by adapting a section of track with a moving inside rail to act as a brake and a turnout motor to operate it. I had to give it all up because I just did not have the room.
