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Voltage would not be a problem. Current to run the engine direct would be. Solar panels with battery and a charge controller would be the way to go. I've thought about doing that myself. Mount solar panels on the roof of say a large warehouse or engine house. At the end of the stub track for the building, put a brass spring contact on each side of the bumper, sticking out so that it lines up with the ends of the pilot beam on the loco. Put contacts on the ends of the pilot beam so it will line up with the bumper contacts. Just run the pilot beam between the contacts and it charges while setting there. No wires to hook up and nothing to fiddle with. Put an indicator light on the beam to show when there is charge current going to the loco. You could easily have several setups like that around the layout. You definitely should use a charge controller to keep the batteries from cooking. Another possiblity is to feed the panels into the tracks. Then you would be charging anytime you were on clean track and the sun was shining. Hook the battery to the wheel pickups thru a bridge rectifier so that the polarity to the battery would always be correct. Your battery could charge from DC or DCC on the track as long as you use the bridge rectifier. You would need a charge controller built into the loco if you used regular DC or DCC though. For charge controllers, check the marine and yachting industry. Alot of sail boats use solar panels to charge batteries. I lived on one for 15 years and that was all the electrical power I had. Ran radios, TV, lights, and a computer off 100 watts of panels. I rarely ever ran low of juice. You could also put the contacts underneath the loco somewhere. Then use spring contacts mounted between the tracks.
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