What are feeders?

[Anonymous]

what are feeders?
Thanks
Kev

[Pennsy58]

Speaking in DCC terms but is pretty much the same for DC. In DCC you have a main set of wires running from the booster (power supply) under the layout. This is known as the main bus. On my layout the two wires run in a semi circle around the platform pretty much in line with the track above.
Every so often, about 1-2 feet I have a wire soldered to each of the main bus wires. These wires run up through the platform and are soldered to the underside of each rail. The wires that run up and attach to the track are known as the feeders.

The purpose of doing this is to prevent power drop from the resistance of the metal rails. The longer the length of the rails carrying the power, the more loss of power occurs. Each set of feeder wires ensures full power is getting to that area of track. It also helps overcome a poor connection between sections of track.
One can further use feeders to section off areas of the track into isolated power sections known as districts if you so desire.

Hows that for an abridged version of wiring terms !!!

[jecorbett]

In the broadest definition, feeders are the two wires which run from the power source to each of the two rails. On a DCC layout the power source is the main bus wires as well described in the previous reply. On old fashioned DC layouts, the feeders could run directly from the power pack on a small layout, or on a larger layout, the feeders would run from the block control panel. This could be done with one set of feeder wires for each block or it could be wired with one rail as a common rail and the other rail getting a feeder wire for each block. Even on a common rail system, if you have a large layout, it is a good idea to run multiple feeder wires around your layout to the common rail. As mentioned above, track is a poor conductor of electricity and you will lose power if the current has to travel a long way through nothing but the track. Also, if you have reversing sections (i.e. a reversing loop, wye, etc.), these must be electrically isolated from the rest of the layout and wired with its on set of feeder wires. You cannot use the common rail in the reversing section.

[rrinker]

Feeders are, in simplest terms, wires that connect to the track to 'feed' power to it.

--Randy