Would one of you electronic guys please check out my wiring design so far. HO scale NCE Power Pro
1. All detector boards, signal driver boards.power supplies, dcc accessory booster power pro booster and controller, reversing psx-ar`s and the NCE CP6 for limiting current to the 5 power districts are all located at 1 point,
2. Quad pics ( stationary dcc decoders) for servo control of turnout points from the cab and are located near the turnouts along with the dc optional controllers.
3. A total of 10 detector blocks which are double gapped.
4. all track feeders are #22 solid and EVERY piece of track regardless of length and turnouts (insulfrog) have a feeder soldered to them. Every feeder is terminated at a terminal block so no feeder has more than a 15" run to the terminal block with a # 18 solid jumping out the terminal block positions. The Terminal blocks have 6 red & 6 black positions on each one although on some blocks all positions are not used. From the #18 red (+) I ran a #16 back to the central point where it will connect with the detector mother board for that particular block. No run is more than 15 feet of wire. The only areas blocked for detection is the main line. and the entire mainline forms 1 power district with yards, engine servicing areas and switching terminal locations forming the other power districts. The two reversing loops have a twitsted pair #14 running directly underneath the track and feeder drops soldered to them directly (no terminal blocks) then run to the central point. Here come the questions.
1 I SNAKED (ran haphazzard) a #10 around the layout in 2 pieces so as to catch all terminal block - #18`s and joined the #10s at a central point with a single 5 foot run to the booster. I did not parallel any of the + leads with this #10. I soldered all my black leads (-) from the terminal blocks and this includes all the undetected parts of the layout also.Did I do wrong by not parallelling the track bus wires? If wrong what are the consequences?
2. I want to run an acessory booster bus for the quad pics. Can I run this in the same bundle as the track buss? The DCC signal for the servos is fed along the track booster output bus when using a cab to control the servos.
3 I want to run a +12 volt buss for dc power to the other layout power consuming devices. Can I run this buss in the same bundle? If not how far apart do each of the busses have to be? If I have to make corrections I will make them now while it is easy so that is why I need a critique now
Tkanks again
Bob D As long as you surface as many times as you dive you`ll be alive to read these posts.
Bob.
If your track buss is working good like it is wired already and passes the quarter test everywhere on the layout then your good to go with that part. As for the ACC buss. I would not bundle it with the track or cab buss. It will also be DCC so twisting the buss wires together will limit or even prevent cross talk or interference with other signals near by. A 3 to 5 inch separation is good and farther is better. The DC buss for layout accessories and lights should also be separated from other buss lines. But you do not have to twist them up.
The early DCC standard was to keep buss wires separated until it was found that a single wire carrying a digital signal was prone the pick up interference from outside forces such as cordless phones and even key fobs. Twisting the digital carrying wires together actually cleaned up the signal and almost eliminated the interference from outside forces. Some will say the rails are separated and not twisted but the bare nickel silver rail is not as conductive as copper wire. There are still some interference problems sometimes even with twisted buss wires. Half way down abouts on this page is all about twisted pair wiring and why do it at all.
http://www.wiringfordcc.com/track_2.htm#a49
Hope this helps in some small way.
Pete
I pray every day I break even, Cause I can really use the money!
I started with nothing and still have most of it left!