hey guys, I got rail installed into my clubs 18 stall HO scale roundhouse this past month. We run NCE DCC, and the roundhouse is the Walthers modern roundhouse kit. I'm asking for advice on how to wire the tracks up, and the best way to do it. There is a turntable with a (uninstalled) reverser unit installed, so any kind of help with that would be welcome to. Thanks
(My Model Railroad, My Rules)
These are the opinions of an under 35 , from the east end of, and modeling, the same section of the Wheeling and Lake Erie railway. As well as a freelanced road (Austinville and Dynamite City railroad).
What kind of turntable is it? The Walthers one with the electronc indexing doesn't need an autoreverser. If it's a different type without a split ring pickup, it will need the autoreverser.
For the stall tracks, the easiest thing is a rotary switch, but you have to check with suppliers like Mouser and Digikey to find one with 18 or 19 positions, then it's easy to isolate each stall track and only the one being used will be selected. You can just use an array of toggle switches to cut power but then it is possible to have more than one energized at a time.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
I'm not much of a wiring kind of guy, but if you're using DCC, I'd guess that you could simply wire all of the tracks for power, as you can turn the individual locos stored there on or off as required.
For my DC layout, I used a rotary switch, with 10 positions plus off, to control power to the various tracks in the locomotive servicing area. If you want to control the power to the individual tracks, a rotary switch should work, although I don't know if you could find one with 18 positions, plus off. Perhaps someone can suggest a way to use two rotary switches to accomplish that, or maybe there's a more up-to-date device available.
Wayne
Yeah, an 18-pole rotary switch is going to be dear, if you can find one.
Another way to do it is to take two 9- or 10-pole switches and feed them from a DPDTCO toggle. Throw the toggle to power the half of the finger tracks you need. The other half will be dead and the rotary switch will throw power just to the track needed.
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
Without more in depth searching, it seems 12 poles is about the most you can easily get. What you do to link two of them is, let's say the both have 10 poles. You feed power commin in to the common of the first switch. Positions 1-9 go to the isolated rail in the stall tracks. Position 10 feeds the common of switch 2. Positions 1-9 of switch 2 feed tracks 10-18. Position 10 of switch 2 is a power off on all tracks.
DC/DCC same wiring. You can get fancy and use a 2 pole 10 position switch and isolate both rails of the stall tracks, but interrupting one is plenty sufficient to kill power.
I guess I'm really lucky to have this 17 position switch! Glad I grabbed it when I did!
Another method I was thinking about would be to set something up like an old telephone switchboard. You could have 18 jacks for each track and a plug-in cord to power the one you want.
Come to think of it, IF you jumper the two contacts in the 1/4" plug, the socket could be your switch! So you could have 18 phone jacks, one for each stall, with DCC power wired to the tip (Rail A) and each ring wired to the corresponding rail in the roundhouse. The other rail would always be common (Rail B). When you plug in the jumpered plug it would make the circuit across the tip and ring.
(Tip, Sleeve and Ring are old telephone terms, look it up) Just so happens a guitar jack is nearly the same
At a glance you could see which track the plug is in and when not in use, the plug would stay in a dummy jack. You could thread a lanyard into the plug to keep it from getting lost.
Simple mono phone jacks start at 50¢ each on ebay. You could use stereo type phone jacks in a similar fashion. Some jacks have an additional switch (these used to cut-out the speaker on old audio equipment) on the tip but I don't think you would need these unless you wanted to figure out how to have a pilot light or something. There's 1/8 jacks and 2mm jacks, too but I would want the robustness of the 1/4". IMHO.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/10pcs-Set-Mono-1-4-6-35mm-ID-Socket-Jack-Connector-Panel-Mount-Guitar-Plate-NEW/222027433603?_trksid=p2047675.c100005.m1851&_trkparms=aid%3D222007%26algo%3DSIC.MBE%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D38618%26meid%3D248889adb4f749e9b1c80b83c7120cab%26pid%3D100005%26rk%3D1%26rkt%3D6%26sd%3D112017376995&rt=nc
Let me know if you would like a sketch of what I'm talking about if you need one.
Good Luck, Ed
You guys have given me some ideas. I wanted a "kill switch" to isolate the unused tracks, so it's looking like it is possible.
thw turntable I think the old bowser one- it's not DCC friendly,regardless of who made it.
I think the "telephone board " might be the easiest for me to understand, so I'll run that by the club and see if the wiring guys could assist me when I need it. it might be a little while before I can start this, but ill keep you guys updated on it. Thank you all.
What doctorwayne said. If it is DCC just wire them all together. Turn the engines off not the track.
Steve
Choops What doctorwayne said. If it is DCC just wire them all together. Turn the engines off not the track. Steve
Problem with this at least in a club setting is someone fat-fingering an address and driving someone else's loco through the roundhouse wall or into the pit. Plus some sound decoders (not the ones I use) start making noise as soon as there is DCC power in the rails, and then you need to select the loco and mute the sound - so every time the layout is powered up, all sorts of noise.
RR_Mel I haven’t tried any of the high current reed switches so this is just an Idea. I use low current reed switches all over my layout and they all work very good. If a reed switch doesn’t work it’s bad right out of the box, I haven’t had one fail that worked after I installed it. My Idea is to parallel one rail (say left) on every track and switch the other (right) using a magnetic reed switch for each track. Mount the reed switches against the turntable wall under each track to be tripped by a Neodymium magnet mounted to the turntable. I found this 5 amp reed switch on eBay. http://www.ebay.com/itm/High-Power-Reed-Switch-/201645514774?hash=item2ef3026016:g:nRMAAOSwzJ5XUgx6 I like my idea so much I’m going to give it a shot, no switches to throw or worry about. My reed switches are on the way! Edit: If you haven’t worked with Glass Reed Switches they are very fragile!!!! The glass will break very easily with very little tension or torque applied to the external contact leads. I use Amazing Goop to anchor them, Goop stays somewhat flexible to protect the glass. The leads take solder easily but best to heat sink the leads near the glass with long nose pliers. Mel Modeling the early to mid 1950s SP in HO scale since 1951 My Model Railroad http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/ Bakersfield, California I'm beginning to realize that aging is not for wimps.
That is a rather interesting idea. It should work, so long as the magnet on the bridge was small enough to not activate the adjacent track's reed switch (it doesn't take a lot of magnetic field to pull in the contacts). Only downside I can see is that as the bridge rotates past tracks it will momentarily power each track it passes. Unless you tie a master relay in to the turntable controls so that while it is rotating, stall power is disabled.
rrinker Only downside I can see is that as the bridge rotates past tracks it will momentarily power each track it passes. Unless you tie a master relay in to the turntable controls so that while it is rotating, stall power is disabled. --Randy
Only downside I can see is that as the bridge rotates past tracks it will momentarily power each track it passes. Unless you tie a master relay in to the turntable controls so that while it is rotating, stall power is disabled.
rrinker What kind of turntable is it? The Walthers one with the electronc indexing doesn't need an autoreverser.
What kind of turntable is it? The Walthers one with the electronc indexing doesn't need an autoreverser.
Rich
Alton Junction