The Atlas Turntable

With all the work rebuilding and retrofitting the turntable at Marceline, I figure it wouldn't hurt to take a moment and discuss the product that the turntable started out as.  

The Atlas HO scale turntable, as seen right from the box.

The Atlas Turntable has been around since, I dunno, the 1650s. There's some drawings of it on a cave in France. Over the years it's been updated and upgraded. The original turntable, for example, had 30-degree indexing between the stall tracks, while the current crop has 15 degree indexing. As a model, it's reliable and rugged. It can be turned using the massive handle, or it can easily be motorized with an available kit. The motor kit mounts simply and easily, and the new one has been perfectly reliable so far. The turntable itself automatically accounts for track polarity as you turn it, so you don't need a separate reverser if you're using DCC. Some other turntables do need one. If you do run DCC, you will need to reacquire your loco when the polarity flips, and, although I don't run sound, I've heard that the sound has to be restarted, and that would make sense.

Also, but not mentioned, the indexing is spot-on every time. The thing about the indexing is this; it uses a cam lock type mechanism with a genevieve gear, which means you stop for a moment at every position as you go around, whether you have a track there or not. This can get aggravating after a while.   

So, all that being said, if it's so reliable, why did we break not one, but two of these sucker? Most of the objections are about the looks. It is a type of turntable not used a lot on the prototype. A decked over turntable pit is a rarity, although not unheard of. These would usually be found in places of heavy snowfall, as shoveling out the pit would be a time-consuming and labor intensive activity. As it come right of the box, the hand-crank is massive and obtrusive. A glaring real world addition to an otherwise model world. Many people like the mechanism though, so, like we did at Marceline, they make a pit and modify a bridge and mount the whole thing on top of the Atlas mechanism. Others dress up what's already there.

For me, I'll take bulletproof every time over bells and whistles.