My outdoor turntable needs to be powered. Are there any rail clamp devices that will transfer track power to the turntable when it’s turned in either direction?
Not sure if this is what you are looking for. We did a How to show a yr. ago on this small 3 ft. Turntable.
(http://1stclass.mylargescale.com/noelw/Turn%20Table/SN850467.JPG)
We just used some Aristo Rail Jointer and soldard on a pc. of coper welding rod. Then make a paper clip type handle on it. Just open up the Jointer until it slide easy and round off the end of the rail you are going to slide it on to. That’s so there’s no problem jointing up to the fixed rails. Hope this helps.
(http://1stclass.mylargescale.com/noelw/Turn%20Table/SN850469.JPG)
John,
Another option, if you are only looking to get power to the rails, would be to use a gold plated 1/4" diameter audio jack and plug for the pivot point and electrical transfer.
Bob C.
Noel Wilson said:
Not sure if this is what you are looking for. We did a How to show a yr. ago on this small 3 ft. Turntable.(http://1stclass.mylargescale.com/noelw/Turn%20Table/SN850467.JPG)
We just used some Aristo Rail Jointer and soldard on a pc. of coper welding rod. Then make a paper clip type handle on it. Just open up the Jointer until it slide easy and round off the end of the rail you are going to slide it on to. That’s so there’s no problem jointing up to the fixed rails. Hope this helps.
(http://1stclass.mylargescale.com/noelw/Turn%20Table/SN850469.JPG)
Noel, That’s a great looking turntable. I’m looking for ideas for my turntable. Any pictures of the turntable pit and the ring rail detail? How you built the pit?
Hi Gary… Sorry not get back so late, but the pit is just Homedepot plastic binder board or some call it lawn border material that is around 5 inch’s wide.
I just made a circle to the size of the turntable bridge for the swing of it. It’s about 4 inches deep with crushed gravel and moter mixed to hold the shape. Nothing spacial and the lead in and storage tracks to the bridge are screwed to a pc. of redwood fence board. Just cut pc. to the dia. of the circle to hold the tracks down.
Nothing spacial and been there over 10 yrs now.
When it get out of alignment and boarder board hits the bridge just hit it with a rubber mallet to get it back in shape again… Not much maintenance to it and its easy to step in the pit to move the rail jointer for alignment of the bridge.
Only thing that I suggest is on the truntable bridge, is use a steel shaft and put some sealed bearing on each end of the shaft and then have a plate welded so you can screw on the truntable bridge.
I use a 1/2 inch steel shaft about 12 inch long and inserted the bearing in a 1-1/4 pvc pipe. I had the pvc pipe milled out for the bearing to press fit in to it.
I just dig a hole for the pvc and put moter and crushed gravel around it after I made sure it was level. You can stand on if you don’t kill your self when it truns… lol.
This is a very free swing table. Seems like this is better that my 5 foot turntable came out. I use a sealed wood pit for that one with drain holes. Ho rails for the end of the bridge to swing on. Then set the bridge on a lazy susen idea.
The thing I don’t like is, Lazy susen idea need lubed all the time or bearing will rust up.
Hopes this idea can work for John to. but as far as powered turntable, I had to build a over head swivel for the tracks on the turntable bridge to get power to the tracks. It’s not a good idea for outdoors tho. but it works.
Another idea for powering up a powerd table is to put spring load brass plates at each alighments to tracks so the rails can slide across them. But not good outdoors either. You have to clean up the wipers due to weather.
We have tried all kinds of ways to power up bridges. Now we just use a swivel on top of our swing bridge and track wiper also. Had Hilman mill my rail jointers for mine, but its only good for 180 deg’s swing. My bridge also had to install a remote locking pin when it was aligned… You learn that after you dump an NW-2 with sound in the drink. lol
Ok …old guy talked long enough… If need some help let us know and we’ll fig. out something for you.
take a look how I did mine
http://s615.photobucket.com/albums/tt235/danielpeck/Turn%20table%20Build/
Building a 60" turntable next.
John Lafkas: Hi! I see that was your very first post. Welcome aboard! I don’t know about using a rail clamp, though Noel’s method looks pretty easy and effective. I’ve used the split-ring method for powering small scale turntables and that has worked great. On a large scale one, whenever I get around to it, I expect I’ll do something like what Noel has described here. I like the whole thing as Noel has laid it out, and his pix too… Get out your soldering iron!
Welcome John! I like the 1/4" phone plug/jack idea but I’m not sure how well even gold plated components will hold up outdoors. Something like Noel’s is a good idea. Someone else had something similar for alignment, but I don’t recall who.
Or - just go battery power and don’t worry about it 
Jon,
The alignment thing was a system I saw on the POC, but I am not sure it was original there either. A simple slide bar between the rails. I think POC is all battery power so not electrical connection is required. As for the gold plated phono jacks, I believe the reason is that gold oxidizes VERY SLOWLY. As for the durability, I have no personal experience, just the information from an article I read that touted the method. Logic says it should work well. I was thinking that a stereo phono jack (3 contacts) and a slider on the outer turntable rail would give 4 contacts, two independent circuits.
FWIW
Bob C.