I bought a dozen or so Lionel Remote Fastrack turnouts without switch stands or controllers (got all of them for around the cost of a single turnout on auction). First question (more from curiosity): Is there any reason to remove switch stands or did someone just do this since they thought the switches were dead and wanted to save the the switch stands for replacement parts?
Anyway, I got 3 or 4 to work by simply hooking them up, installing track power jumpers, and manually completing circuits. I bought a bunch of (on)-off-(on) momentary switches so should be good to wire these up to a central control panel. I will combine with track-side signal blocks or control panel LEDs so that I can see what is going on. A number of past discussions here and in other forums have already helped quite a bit to get me to this point.
My main question is -- does anyone have information about testing the remaining 'dead' Lionel Remote Switches? I am not great with electronics but I should be able to follow instructions and check for voltage outputs etc... to see if specific parts are bad (I have enough switches that I should be able to get a few more to work by salvaging parts). I have already looked at the replacement / exploded parts diagrams / photos on Lionel but there must be some service / diagnostic guides for these tracks (particularly since they cost a small fortune).
Anyway, once I have something more attractive than an upside down test track that I am connecting turnouts to I will post pictures of the final result (basically a track layout with a number of turnouts and a yard on a tight budget).
Thanks in advance for any help or guidance!