Always mark your wires

[overall]

One of my block power controllers has gone bad. The contacts a frozen in their last position and will not move. Consequently, I cannot turn those blocks on and off. So just buy a new one and swap it out, right? Well if I had marked which terminal on the controller was connected to which block I could do that. Unfortunately, I have three of those controllers and without knowing which one goes to the blocks I have lost control of, there is no way to know which one has gone bad. Now I have to take each wire loose and trace it out until I run across the right one. Do as I say do, not as I did. Go to the Rat Shack and buy some wire marking numbers and PUT THEM ON.

George

[daan]

George, I'm in the same problem, only my layout is still working. I started with a few wires for the tracks, but while building, more wires where added and more relais came under the layout. Now I have a huge mess of all sorts and shapes of colored wires and relais dangling under the layout. The only thing I can do to make problems you have now not happening to me, is removing the old mess and rewire the layout on a decent way.
I'm thinking of a electricity box where all relays and electronics are neatly organised and a few wire routers (plastic halftubes with a cap on them) to keep the wires from hanging under the layout. The wires then all have to be coded (small plasic numbers which can be clicked on the wire) and to finish it off, a wiring plan of the setup is needed.
I figured that I would remember which wire goes where, but after a few months I forgot about it, and have to find out the purpose of it again.
It even results in some cut wires from previous parts which I broke down, simply because I didn't feel like tracing them down to their origin between all the other wires crossing under and over it. And that's still on a very simple and small layout.

[otftch]

I use colored electrical tape to mark my wires.If you use white,lt green,lt blue or grey you can mark each wire with a sharpie pen.I cut a four inch piece and put it on a piece
of plastic.Then I write on it (ie; TRK 1 BLK 2)using only half the length.I peel it off and wrap it over the wire like a little flag.I do this about every two feet along the length of the wire run.Granted after a few years I have about a million little flags under my layout but I can trace the wires.
Ed