Installing points

[iana1212]

I am struggling with a set of points on my layout. I have Pico insulfrog points and have tried various combinations of wiring/insulated joints but either end up with short circuits or no power in either the branch or the main line. I have tried to follow youtube advice re fitting but that hasn't helped. i have drawn very roughly the junction that is causing me an issue.

Questions are:
Do I need any insulated joiners? if so where (I have used letters for the joins)?
Do in need to add power to the rails? if so where (i have used numbers for the rails) and which colour?

I do have other points on my layout all of which operate without any issue (without insulated joints) either between two loops but also to branch lines similar to this turn and with power to the rails after the points but replicating what i have done there isn't working on this one!

[Walkingthedog]

With insulfrog points the power will only travel in the direction to which the points are switched. So with the top points if they are switched to the track going straight down there will be no power to the bottom rail (blue) of the track going to the right.

[cadman]

I think we need to see a diagram of the whole layout to see where your power feeds to the track are located.

[IanS]

With insulfrog points the power will only travel in the direction to which the points are switched. So with the top points if they are switched to the track going straight down there will be no power to the bottom rail (blue) of the track going to the right.

Given the limited information in the picture (more details will help as Cadman says) trace the route the power from the B blue rail needs to go and if it crosses the centre of a point then power will be switched. Do the same with the A red rail and you will see that 1, 2, 3 and 4 on your diagram get no power if the switches are 'wrongly' set. Use a coloured pen to draw out the section again - red for the red power etc and it will become clearer.

If you're intending to run DCC locos then insulfrog points aren't the best choice but can be made to work. You don't normally need insulated joiners at all if you're going down the DC route except in very rare instances.

[andruec]

As others have posted we could do with seeing more track. Not needing isolators or any clever wiring is the main (probably only) advantage of insulated frogs. All my turnouts are insulfrog (Peco N-gauge Setrack) and I didn't do anything special to them. Just connected them to the track on either side with fishplates and ignored them.

They work fine for DCC in my experience..at least initially. Unfortunately over time I've had a couple of mine stop routing power due to poor contact between the points and the outer rails. I also put too much faith in fishplates and have had to fit additional droppers here and there (not just turnouts but in general). So my advice now is to fit dropper wires to every single piece of track. But in the case of insulfrog turnouts that just means four droppers. One for each outer rail and one for each inner rail. There is wiring on the underneath of the turnout that conducts power 'across' the frog to the actual points.