Example Output Picture

Stub Switch Turnout Template

In the early days of railroad construction, the stub switch turnout was prevalent. It was durable and simple, but suffered from several disadvantages compared to the split switch turnout. It needed frequent servicing and adjustment, and would derail equipment passing through it from frog towards switchrails when set wrong. By the time that the American Railway Engineering Association was formed in 1899, stub switch turnouts were no longer being constructed, so there are no AREA stub turnout data.

The stub switch rails are actually unspiked ends of the straight stock rails, tied together and literally flexed from one route to the other (thus the term "bending the rails".) The turnout is a simple circular curve from the beginning of the switch rails through the frog point.

The file (English units) presented here provides a printout of stub turnout templates on PostScript printers. It is based equations from the 1904 book Notes on Track Construction and Maintenance by W. M. Camp. Currently, there is no gauge widening, and no guard rails are drawn. Crosstie usage and placement will be at the user's judgement.

Flangeway specifications may be found in 2mm Scale Association, P87 SIG, Scalefour Society, and NMRA websites, among others.

The file is plain text, which can be sent to any PostScript-compatible printer. The user settings, which are shown in bold below, may be changed for the desired turnout, using a text editor. After editing the user settings, save the file (be sure to use plain text mode) and copy it to the printer port to which your PostScript printer is connected. The program takes care of pagination and, for multiple-page printouts, prints alignment tick marks at the corners of the page.

To preview the program output on your computer screen, or to translate PostScript output to other printer languages (e.g. Canon Bubblejet) or PDF files you may use a PostScript interpreter such as the excellent freeware Ghostscript available at the Ghostscript WWW page. Executables are available for Unix, DOS, Windows, OS/2 and Mac.

The template

STUB.PS is the file to download (generally right-click and "Save target as..." or "Save link as..." or equivalent.)

Starting in line 15, edit the "user settings" for your desired turnout:


%user settings:
/number 6 def        %change 6 to your turnout number
/gauge 1.772 def     %change 1.772 to your gauge in inches
/flangeway .118 def  %change .118 to your flangeway in inches
/head .100 def       %change .100 to your rail head width in inches
/base .195 def       %change .195 to your rail base width in inches
/lefthand true def   %change "true" to "false" for right-handed turnout
%End of user settings

I have made a few sample PDF files: #4 in 1:20.3(45mm gauge), #6 in 1:20.3(45mm gauge) (using Llegas Code 215 rail) and #10 in fiNe (finescale N using Railcraft Code 40). In the Acrobat Reader print dialog, make sure that "Shrink oversize pages" and "Expand small pages" are unchecked, and that "Auto-rotate and center pages" is checked, so the printouts come out the right size.

This template is definitely a work in progress, and I'd appreciate any feedback on it!

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