Loconet cable pinout

[cliffsrr]

I started DCC with a Bachmann unit. Good unit but limited. My next purchase on E-Bay was Roco. I fabricated a good network with a Cat5 6 wire cable. Still wanting more I purchased a MRC Prodigy Advance2. Not being able to handle any of these units in a hobby store left me out in left field about the feel and the guts of the units. After recieving the MRC unit I find the cable for it is 8 wire.(cat something or other) This makes my 6 wire system worthless.  My question is "what is the loconet for MRC called and what is the pinout" Sometimes in these systems some wires are not used and if this is the case maybe I could still use the 6 wire cable I have. It would be nice if NMRA had made a stantard loconet. Thanks for any information you can give! This is the greatest forum ever!

Cliff  Union Pacific Port Doom RR 

 

 

[jrbernier]

  Loconet is only used with Digitrax products(or licensed products).  Have you sent an email to MRC and asked them?

Jim Bernier

[jfallon]

Cliff,

     MRC's throttle bus (generic DCC term) uses RJ-45 plugs and jacks. The connecting cables are the same as computer ethernet cables which can be found at any electronics or computer store. You can make the jacks yourself using cat 5e cable and RJ-45 jacks, Home Depot and Lowes both stock them. The jacks will have a color chart to show how to connect the wires, just use the same chart for each jack.                         John

[UpNorth]

At bottom of page is the pn out description for the 8 wires if this helps.

http://www.micromark.com/html_pages/instructions/83362i/83362booster.html

 

[cliffsrr]

Thanks guys! I had a 25 ft ethernet cable on hand but I quess I have big feet because the cable is always under them. From the pin out of the boosters it looks like there are duplicate wires for pin 1 & 8. 2 & 7, and 4 & 5. If this is true I can wire the RJ45 jacks with fewer wires than 8. Sure would save a lot of work.

Cliff

[NeO6874]

... Cat5 6 wire cable.

Actually 6 conductor cable is generally only rated Cat3 (used for old enterprise phone systems, and early ethernet applications mostly)

...is 8 wire.(cat something or other) 

 

 

Cat 5, 5e, or 6 cable would do the trick.  Though Cat5e cabling is probably the easiest (and cheapest) to find...