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Cobalt Slow Action Point Motor

Cobalt is a high quality DC motor driven actuator created
to be the best product available for turnout or signal control in any
modelling scale from N to O.
Cobalt is smaller yet much stronger:
While it is only 45% of the physical volume of its nearest competitor, it has
a much higher gear ratio, superior throw strength and far greater stability
than any other similar product at the end of throw.
Cobalt is quieter and more robust:
The design has been made much stronger than all of its competitors yet it is
quiet in operation. We did this by choosing higher quality plastics and
specifying a heavy walled internal design that adds to stability while
lowering mechanism resonances. Gears are specifically tooled for Cobalt and
are made with the best available material which is fibre reinforced nylon for
quiet operation, incredible reliability and long life.
Cobalt is voltage tolerant & low current:
Even at its maximum, at recommended voltages it draws only 30mA (that is a
tiny 30 thousandths of an amp) yet it works well at 6v and very, very
strongly at anywhere between 9 volts... and 15 volts DC.
Cobalt can be powered via a small “wall wart” type power supply and it can be
switched by standard latching type switches, short term power such as
pushbuttons or it can even be automated simply via use of DPDT relays.
Cobalt is totally comfortable with DCC decoders and any of the low power
“stall type” accessory decoder with reversing power ability can be used.
Additionally, by adding diodes, AC output DCC decoders with adequate supply
voltages and adjustable pulse length can be used.
This power supply versatility, combined with very high gearing and variable
fulcrum make it as tough or as gentle as it needs to be yet allows it to
remain far more stable than any other turnout motor at the “end of throw”...
whether the power is left on constantly or turned off once the work is done.
Cobalt is very, very versatile in use and includes two SPDT switches
Because it will not relax even a bit at the end of throw Cobalt can be
powered by almost ANY method that can deliver DC power and is compatible with
almost every DC output DCC accessory decoder ever made.
Cobalt has two inbuilt SPDT “break before make” switches for frog power
switching, panel lights, feedback or any other related control need. They are
able to handle higher power than competitive products and are exceptionally
reliable even under adverse conditions thanks to very positive and strong
pressure formed phosphor bronze wipers and gold plated wiper contact areas.
Because of the very high gearing it is even easy to stop Cobalt mid-throw for
control of 3 position semaphore signals and 3 way stub turnout operation!
Cobalt has also been designed from the ground up for either horizontal or
vertical mounting which Makes it the perfect device for railway crossing
barriers and proper control of delicate semaphore signals too.
Cobalt has a positive but gentle and almost totally silent Action:
Because of its extremely powerful high ratio gearing it is equally effective
when used as either a stall type or short term power device and does not
relax at all at the end of throw.
Incredibly powerful as it is, it’s also designed to be gentle when needed and
so the degree of pressure and range of its throw has been made easy to adjust
over a wide range... Therefore extremely positive and silent action is there
by design - whenever it is needed and consistently gentle treatment of your
turnouts, signals or other items is absolutely guaranteed by design.
Cobalt is easy to install.
Each Cobalt turnout motor comes complete with everything needed including the
screws needed to fix it to the baseboard (We even supply 5 just in case you
lose one). ....and we have also created a wide accessory range including
pre-prepared switching.
Cobalt has been designed to be installed vertically for turnout operation or
horizontally for semaphore signal or for things like vertical crossing boom
actuation.
The actuator wire is of the correct stiffness for reliable turnout throw and
has been pre-formed for easy mounting.
We’ve even designed a template that makes it dead easy to get it right the
very first time in any scale... Used from above, with the drill kept
vertical, it will result in the creation of ready-made accurate pilot holes
for you to use when mounting Cobalt.
The fulcrum bar has a series of offset holes too, so if you DO manage to get
it wrong... You can easily adjust the left/right bias of the throw simply by
changing which hole the wire passes through!
Where a turnout or signal is close to a layout brace or if a standard direct
linkage is not possible, it is simple to arrange Cobalt so that it provides
an offset drive via a simple cranked wire arrangement (shown in our “tips”
pages in the downloadable manual).
Cobalt needs NO soldering.
Its no fun soldering under the baseboard... and edge connectors are hard to
find and always expensive.
Cobalt has a very high quality 8 way solder-less connector that doesn't even
need a screwdriver to give you a perfect connection in moments. (you may find
a small blade type driver or similar tool a handy tool for helping with the
“Push to insert” connector though)
If you DO prefer to solder... You can of course - And to make even that an
easy and safe task...we have purposely chosen a connector which uses TWO
solder points per connection point, so you can solder to one of these with no
risk to the integrity of the connector or point motor, and the solder resist
over all parts of the board other than the solder pad mean there is little
chance of bridging connections.
Installation template available
A metal template is available for precise installation for turnout control in
all scales. The template allows you to establish perfect position &
create pilot holes for mounting screws from ABOVE the baseboard with zero stress.
Its even supplied with the correct size of pilot drill to use with it!
Cobalt is incredibly reliable.
High quality engineering plastic, top quality gold plated 1.6mm fibreglass
PCBs and very careful design make it bulletproof... So we can very confidently
give Cobalt the best warranty ever!
Cobalt is Guaranteed for Life!
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