Here's the highly abbreviated history: These manual ground
throws were originally developed in the early '60s or so by Fred
Baumgarten, owner of Baumgarten's Hobby Shop in Santa Bar-
bara CA and were part of his Ribbonrail line of products. The
Ribbonrail line was later picked up by another manufacturer,
but the ground throws soon went out of production and were
sold to another entity who did little with the product.
“Soon after I started Bitter Creek Models, Lee Nicholas
convinced me that I should try to bring these units back
out on the market,” said company owner Jeff Stone. “I finally
located the original tooling and stamping dies and purchased
the project from the owner. They are now back in production
and available again.”
The B-4001 compact manual ground throw
is an all-metal unit made up of a base-
plate, bellcrank, spring, throw lever and attaching rivets. The
base and bellcrank are stamped out of sheet steel and the
throw lever is stamped from brass sheet. There is no provision
for electrical power routing. All parts are made in the USA, with
the stampings done by a company in Clearfield UT. Stone fin-
ishes forming the basic stampings, then assembles the ground
throws, paints them, and packages them at his shop in Afton
WY. One pair sells for $9.95. The package includes two ground
throws, formed linkage wires, four mounting screws, and an
instruction sheet.
The maximum points throw of the unit is approximately 3/8".
In addition to use with HO turnouts, they have been success-
fully used with O and N scale turnouts. The over-center design
and spring provide sufficient tension on the bellcrank to keep
the switch points tight against the stock rails, with the solid
positive contact between the rail segments solving a lot of
Bitter Creek Ground Throw -
MRH-Mar 2013
