Hi Folks, Problems with my O72 Atlas switches again. I have a dead spot in 2 of my O72 switches. Is there an easy quick fix I could do? All and every reply will be greatly appreciated!
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it would help some if you can identify where the dead spot is---
If the dead spot is on the center rail a jumper from your power buss to the center rails on the switches will fix it. More info is needed as stated.
Ron
We put that jumper on every atlas switch for our club, that's a very common problem spot.
RailfanRon & gunrunnerjohn does that mean 3 jumpers per switch? I'm pretty sure that is where the problem lies but I'll check again tomorrow. One of my Atlas switch motors decided to overheat and I now have a fried switch motor! Of course it's not one of the two with the dead spots. That problem took precedence over the dead switch problem.
Usually, it's only one jumper for the center rail, but I'd take a meter and verify what is connected to what and proceed from there.
gunrunnerjohn, I assume then that all center rail pieces are interconnected underneath the switch unit. Do you recommend bringing a wire directly from the power source or from one of my feeder wires?
One end of the wire goes to the offending center rails, where do you recommmend I connect the other end?
The the center rail on the other side of the frog is where I connect them.
Well, I use something a bit larger, though you don't need a drain pipe between them. 
I'd suggest #18 or #20, it's only going a short distance. I suspect #24 is a tad small.
MilwRdPaul/gunrunnerjohn
I had this page bookmarked about issues with Atlas Switches, that i thought would be useful to both of you.
http://www.welchpoint.com/atlas/
*EDIT 3/ 27/14* seems this link no longer works... But I saved the original PDF. if you'd like a copy, email me and I'd be happy to forward it on. I am not the original author, I just saved it
I've had issues with the small wires on the underside of the switch burning out, but I have not had the other issues described there ( which may have been fixed with the "newer" Atlas switches.
This isn't good to see since I was thinking of changing the track selection of my future layout from FasTrack to Atlas...
Matt, that's an excellent page, I saved that one. It details issues I've yet to trip over, but I'm sure they're coming! 
Thanks Matthew, I added this to my favorites also. As I stated earlier on this thread, I had one motor burn up also. I'll check to see if it was caused by the same problem that you had.
