News from the Yahoo front: Both the scale and hiral Fox Vally Models #5 turnouts are now available. Rail height is compatible with MYH/SHS S-Trax and Lionel FasTrack
Contact DesPlaines Hobbies.
Rusty
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Photos posted by Ron on the Facebook group if you want to see them. I'm putting my order in soon.
All sold out! Additional turnouts are due to arrive in October.
Bill $ posted:All sold out! Additional turnouts are due to arrive in October.
Crap... I guess that's good news though. We are starved for product.
So 12 days since these were sold out and nobody has a review? I did see a blurb on the S-scale list that they look nice…
Tom Stoltz
in Maine
Apparently Ron still has Hi-Rail #5's in stock at DPH.
Yeah, I saw that he did get some more, but I guess no one is willing to give a report...
Tom Stoltz
in Maine
There were quite a few of them on display at Indy 0 & S show Saturday. Real nice, Nice proportions. Frog can handle most anything. I believe the price was around $34. One third the price of Atlas O 2 rail and much better appearing. Copper straps embedded. All rails electrically connected, frog tab for powering off to side. Properly insulated frog, rails can not jam into frog. Secondary frog milling for increased compatibility. Just a real nice piece. Goes perfectly with their flex track. Great time to be in S.
An email I received from one of the guys on the YaHoo S Scale board indicates folks might try contacting Fox Valley Models directly for the availability of the turnouts.
According to what I read over there, FVM had a bunch Fed-X'd in for the O/S show.
Rusty
An email I received from one of the guys on the YaHoo S Scale board indicates folks might try contacting Fox Valley Models directly for the availability of the turnouts...
Rusty, it’s not so much availability of the turnouts, but rather no one is commenting from a user’s point of view. They appear to have a mixing of the metals in the rail department, similar to AMs turnouts. I would like to know what will run through the Hi-rail model. I’m guessing that the scale turnouts will not allow for Hi-rail operation though I’m not sure why not. A scale/Hi-rail turnout is easy to make, the problem is getting Flyer to cooperate, too. Conversely, a Hi-rail/Flyer turnout is also easy to make, but then scale won’t play.
I’m only talking about open frog turnouts, I am aware there are other ways to get all 3 to play nicely together.
Tom Stoltz – in Maine
Tom Stoltz posted:
I’m guessing that the scale turnouts will not allow for Hi-rail operation though I’m not sure why not.
Tom Stoltz – in Maine
Well, here's a crop from a picture I took at last year's S-Fest. The scale version is the upper, hirail the lower:
As can be seen, the frog and guardrails have more generous clearances on the hiral version. Fox Valley had a pair of SHS trucks there, one scale, one hirail. The SHS hirail truck won't make it through the scale frog, but bounce and usually derail.
How well the Fox Valley hirail turnout will play with Flyer wheels is anybody's guess because there's a certain lack of consistency for gauge and flange depth on Flyer wheels... I have some Lionel/MPC cars that the flanges bump on the molded spikes on AM's track.
AM and SHS/MTH wheels should have no problem.
I'm not in the market for track right now, so I haven't picked up any of these to play with.
Rusty
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Based on personal experience any open frog turnout that will work with scale and high rail wheels is unforgiving of incorrectly gauged high rail wheels. There might be a customer satisfaction issue if a commercial product were offered with a combination design.
Here is a picture of some of my turnouts during fabrication. the spacing looks wide in the picture but the guard and wing rail gaps barely pass a Gilbert or Lionel high rail wheel. Slightly off gauge they will jump up and usually derail.
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Tom,
Those turnouts look great. Nice work!
Do you have any more pictures and info on how you build them?
Thanks, Mike A.
I did not build these myself, I had them custom built for me using modified FasTrack jigs. I have neither time, patience nor skills to build 46 of these at this quality level. I unfortunately do not have pictures of the actual assembly. Below is a picture during layout construction that was emailed to me. It is low resolution but the four cuts for isolating the frog are visible as well as the frog insert to pick up the wheel flanges. The spike heads are not quite visible. The uncoupler and custom made sensor track are also in the picture. After weathering and ballasting they exactly match the rest of the track.
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Two more construction pictures. First shows the relative sizes of the #5, 6 & 8 turnouts. All turnouts are one of these three sizes. The second picture is the crossing where main line 1 crosses the turntable approach track.
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Tom, your turnouts are really beautiful. I really like layout shots, do you have more you could post?
Tom Stoltz in Maine
The Fox Valley turnouts look good and I sure hope they do well in the S gauge market. Two years ago when I needed turnouts there was no source that could supply the quantity in the time we needed them.
Tom Stoltz, here are two of your turnouts, not my layout. These are really nice. Below that is a closeup of the frog area of one of the #5 turnouts on my layout.
I do not want to get off the subject of the turnouts here, so I will do a separate thread on layout pictures
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Tom,
Thanks for posting the pictures! You may have already mentioned it somewhere, but what code is all your rail (148, 138 or other)?
Mike A.
The rail is .138. It is MTH flextrack, the rail used for the turnouts was just pulled out of the flextrack.
jonnyspeed posted:Bill $ posted:All sold out! Additional turnouts are due to arrive in October.
Crap... I guess that's good news though. We are starved for product.
A month has gone by since DPH sold out of their first shipment on turnouts and still no users report on any of the S lists I am on.
Tom Stoltz in Maine
They work great . No complaints. Need moore.
randy zbaren posted:They work great . No complaints. Need moore.
Scale or hirail?
Brendan
Brendan posted:randy zbaren posted:They work great . No complaints. Need moore.
Scale or hirail?
Brendan
Or Flyer or what combination of all three?
Tom Stoltz in Maine
Still no comments about Fox Valley turnouts other than they work great? Have they been reviewed in S Gaugian? Haven't seen them in the NASG Dispatch either. Is this the wrong S list to ask about them?
Tom Stoltz in Maine
Perhaps no one feels qualified to review turnouts. There hasn't been much if anything said on the Yahoo boards (S-Scale has moved to groups.io, S-Trains is in process of moving,) since they've become available, either.
I personally have no need for any new track right now and even if I did, I'd have to shim my code 100 track to use the Fox Valley turnouts. I may pick up a pair and some flex eventually to play with, but it's not high on my priority list.
Rusty
Well, maybe. Still people don’t shy away from commenting about the Flyonel turnouts or track for that matter. Also, this might really be the wrong forum because it is mostly a Lionel site.
I did post on the S-Trains list, however I have not had a response yet. In the past new turnouts or track would have garnered much attention and evaluation. I am quite surprised by the lack of response. And it’s not like there is an abundance of Hi-rail trackage out there.
Tom Stoltz in Maine
I have a layout using exclusively Gilbert American flyer track and turnouts but, my oh my, these turnouts and crossing are great looking. I myself like the toy train appearance of the flyer track but, if I would go back and redo the entire layout I think these in hi-rail would be my choice. It is to bad that no one has reviewed these. I know some BSG members have talked about these but I don't know if they have gotten to the point of having these installed and in use yet. I will inquire about these.
Ray
Tom Stoltz posted:So 12 days since these were sold out and nobody has a review? I did see a blurb on the S-scale list that they look nice…
Tom Stoltz
in Maine
Tom, I purchased about 20 switches and as I said before they are great. I run scale couplers with hirail wheels. All brands go through frogs with ease. American Models, SHS, Lionel, and Des Plaines Hobbies cars go through without any wheel hop. Easy to connect to SHS and Lionel track with no wheel hump. Seem to be same height as the eye can see. You can feel that they are the same height. It took two layers of Des Plaines Hobbies cork to equal the height of Lionel and SHS plastic roadbed. It has an open frog design with inner guardrails. No stalling of any engines at slow speeds over frog and Lionel sound keeps going. There are switch throw rods on each side, so you can easily adapt to any switch motor. When using them manually they lock in position and do not jump out until switched again. They have solid stainless rail. Tie color match SHS and Lionel. Make sure you buy extra track joiners. You can use SHS yellow insulated joiners and they fit perfectly or you can use the Fox Valley Models rail joiners. If you have any problems with the switch you can send it back to them and get a new one. We had one that came in with a rail broken off in the box and we sent it back and got a new one. Sure beats building your own using a jig for $34.00 per switch.
A new shipment of High Rail (Code 138) Fox Valley turnouts has just arrived. I ordered 8 of them.
Does anyone know what the status of the FVM turnouts is? Did the track get sold to ScaleTrains or did it stay with ScaleAmerica (whose website is still not live)?
The track line was not sold to Scale Trains. The website I use is shopfvm.com, there is an introduction to Scale America on that site. The website shows all the FVM track items as out of stock. The turnouts and flex track are not listed as in stock at Des Plains Hobbies either. No idea when new stock will be delivered.
I had started switching over to Fox Valley with the departure of Shinohara and the closing of Scenery Unlimited. I think it’s a great line of products despite the fact that only number five turnouts are available, but the sprung points and electrical simplicity are really a plus.
Last year it was reported on the S trains I/O group that the restock of both track and turnouts had been manufactured and were awaiting shipment from China, shipping supposedly delayed by supply train issues.
I did send an email but never received a response and no further information has been posted on the group. Fox Valley is still an active advertiser in both digital and print S gauge publications, so I don’t know what to make of the situation.
This is not meant to be political just what's been going on. The term "supply chain issues" is a bit of a misnomer . World wide , many companies have been pulling production from The Peoples Republic and moving it to other countries, slowing down and stopping production. Those factories in The Peoples Republic , no matters who's Name is on the building, what foreign entity paid for it , The Peoples Republic owns the factory , decides what can or will be made there . and allocates what recrosses they can use.
