Inexpensive HO Passenger car and Caboose illumination?

[siberianmo]

My HO layout has 36 passenger cars and 4 cabooses that I would like to provide interior illumination for. My pike is not DCC - I power it the "old fashioned" way with common rail wiring and cab control for four loco's running independently of one another (two MRC Tech IV 280 dual power packs).

I want to stay away from battery power - really not interested in that method. Constant lighting appears to be what I should pursue. And, yes - I have researched this topic - endlessly! - and have come up with:

(1) really an expensive option when talking about a large inventory
(2) all materials really not that easy to locate

Let me elaborate:

(1) Walthers recently ran a sale on their lighting kits for passenger cars - but, one size does not fit all - even though one of the telephone reps assured me that I would have no problem with my inventory. I checked out a couple of the "kits" at my LHS and found that they would not fit into some of the cars I have without some drastic cutting to the circuit boards. My on-track passenger cars are made by Con-Cor - Trainline -Rivarossi and LifeLike(powered RDC's). When it came to the powered RDC's - forget it! No way would those boards work.

(2) Metal wheelsets - insulated of course on one side - for my passenger cars seem to be either manufactured on Saturn with shipping dates unknown, or I'm just too fatigued to find out who makes what I require. My Walthers cataolog is dog eared on those pages ...... Specifically, my Rivarossi and Con-Cor cars need the wheelsets, along with the cabooses. The Trainline inventory is fine as is.

What I am trying to achieve is really for effect only while the passenger cars are sitting in their respective platforms at the terminal - eight consists in total. Ultimately, my cabooses should have lanterns hanging from them too - but I'll save that for a later date with just interior lighting my immediate objective.

I must have e-mailed over a dozen different places that advertised the availability of products to meet my needs, only to find out that they either really didn't or what I required wasn't in stock or even made! It was quite an exasperating experience, one that I'd rather not repeat. Sometimes it's like speaking Engli***o someone from - yeah, Saturn. Just doesn't work out.

Any thoughts and advice will be appreciated - and please, please, please - understand that I am not a complete novice with this stuff - just no expert.

[mcouvillion]

siberianmo,

Your restrictions on how you want to do the lighting and your track power situation probably are incompatible. With DCC it is easy. With batteries it is easy. With variable voltage to the rails and no battery power, I think you are asking a lot to have lights on in the coaches standing at the station.

I would use a small constant intensity, bi-directional lighting circuit that I have used for engine lights running on DC power with 1.5 volt bulbs. If your engines don't start before about 3 volts are applied to the rails, it should work fine. You will need insulated metal wheelsets to pick up the track power, but you should be able to buy the rest of the stuff for a couple of bucks per car either through Mouser or Digikey. If you are interested, send me an e-mail and I'll spend the time detailing it to you. Same thing for the cabeese lights. You will probably have to modify your throttle to stop with a couple of volts still applied to the track to get it to work all the time like you want, but that is doable too.

Mark C.

[siberianmo]

For mcouvillion:

Appreciate the response. While it appears that I am intransigent, let me put it this way - I built the RR the way I wanted it to be and it was all accomplished in 18 months - finished about one year ago - including construction of a trainroom. I'd rather not get into DCC for expense and perhaps too much destruction of what I've built .... So, that leaves me with battery power. Can't convince myself that changing out batteries on that many passenger cars makes sense - PLUS - I just don't want to have to pick them up each time to slide the switch - or other mechanism - to do that. Yes, I do know about those micro switches that a magnet can be passed over, but that still leaves me with changing out batteries. Constant lighting is what I want to achieve.

I will send you an e-mail once I've had the opportunity to review a few more replies and I THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR RESPONDING WITH INFORMATION THAT MAY BE OF HELP.

[ndbprr]

No matter what you do there will be cost. The big factor in my thinking is do you break down your passenger trains or are they fixed lengths? If they are fixed legnths I would just put insulated metal wheels on the baggage car or RPO only at the head end and put the constant intensity circuitry inside. Then I would run jumpers to each car with micro connectors in case you wanted to remove one. They could be super glued or epoxied under the end ofthe car and the wires would look fairly realistic as hoses. You will have to use really fine felxible wire though between the cars.

[siberianmo]

For ndbprr: That's an interesting option for fixed length consists. I'll have to give that some serious thought, for 99 times out of 100, I keep the same consists for my eight passenger trains.

Costs? Surely I didn't say or imply that there would be no costs! I just don't want to have to mortgage my Siberian Husky to pay for this. Then again, with $11k sunk into my "Can-Am" RR, what's a few more C-notes?

[areibel]

Check out these links-
http://www.mrollins.com/constant.html
http://members.shaw.ca/sask.rail/model-book/constant-lighting/
They both give you some basics on building your own C/L circuts. you can make them the size you need, the individual components will fit in almost anything HO. You'll still need to suffer through finding the metal wheelsets (have you tried NWSL?), but the rest is pretty basic.

[areibel]

Forgot something! For your lit lanterns think fiber optics- the only way to go!

[siberianmo]

For areibel: I really appreciate those web site addresses - and while I have browsed so many - these are new to me. I checked out the NWSL site and came to the conclusion that I need to document my requirements and send them an e-mail inquiry. That ought to work ........ inexpensive they ain't, but if they are the only ones in town who have what I require, oh well!

When I get to the lanterns for the cabeese - yes, fiber optics appears to be the way to go.

Many thanx!

[Don Gibson]

There is no good cheap way

If you go with multiple incandescents you'll have power drain - say 2.5 amps for 8 passenger cars (w/o engine). Got a 3 amp power pak?

1 AA battery,1.5v bulbs and a switch per car are inconvenient, but cheapest
2 AAA batteries, LED's, and a switch per car are an alternative to above.

RICHMOND CONTROLS has it all @ $35 per car -LED's and NO flicker.

I assume you already have metal wheeis

JAY BEE has a good Athern caboose lighting kit. Includes metal wheels, brass studs, and wipers

.

[siberianmo]

For Don Gibson:

Appreciate the info ...... Insofar as JAY BEE is concerned, I'd love to know just when his inventory will get updated AND the in stock availability will jive with his advertisements.

I believe there are no inexpensive options - not when one talks about illuminating 36 passengers cars and 4 cabeese. Oh well ....... one doesn't get to dance with the lady unless one asks first!

[BRVRR]

Siberianmo,
My BRVRR layout is DCC, however, I 'electrified' my Athearn passenger cars when it was still DC. I did it by making my own 'wipers' from copper wire. The wire is wrapped around two axles on each truck and attached to the truck mounting screw with a self locking nut. The screw is longer than standard so it extends 'inside' the car. Jumper wires from the screws to the weight plates and bulb in the hole in the top plate. Instant lighting. My cars don't have interiors so I spread the light with paper shades. They look pretty good in the dark. Most of my old heavyweight cars are lighted the same way.
As for lighting your cars in the terminal, How about isolating the track and using a separate dedicated power supply, perhaps with a switched dead area for the loco. Use a DPDT switch to change over to your cab (connected to separate feeders) and energize the 'dead' loco tracks. You probably have most of this in place already.
I too have had difficulty finding wheel sets for passenger cars. Fortunately most of my cars are Athearns which come with insulated wheel sets. Only my new Walthers cars are not lighted. The wheel sets aren't right for it. I'm reluctant to spring for the lighting kits, but probably will when I complete my NYC consist.
I wish you luck in your quest.

[gvdobler]

What about having an electrical contact in the station area that is only picked up by a brush contact of somekind under the passenger cars. Similar to the above post except this could be similar to a "third rail" that only the cars pick up, and only in the station area. Maybe you coud even use Marklin track in that area.

It would require its own power supply but it could be the answer to no DCC.

Good luck, let us know as I have a bunch of passenger cars as well.

Jon - Las Vegas

[Anonymous]

Have you had a look at www.ngineering.com yet? They have a superb site full of information and tips. They have an excellent selection of LEDs - right down to Z scale!Lighting is one of their specialities.
They also have a great range of other products - well worth a visit by all modellers.

[dinwitty]

real basic lighting is

ballast resistor, about 1k ohms, 4 diodes, 2 in series wired in opposite directions, and look in the ads for bulk 1.5 voltmini-lamps, or try any small 1.5 volt bulbs, or try the new bright white LED's, the lamps wire in parallel across the diodes to get 1.5 volts, that makes the constant lighting, when voltage across the diodes gets to 1.5 volts, it will stay there.

[siberianmo]

For BRVRR - gvdobler - bilby2k - and dinwitty:

Many thanx for the responses and tips.

The idea(s) about isolating the passenger cars in the terminal (as is already done) with separate power for interior lighting just may work for me. Of course, it would be great to have those passenger cars illuminated as they make their way around my Can-Am pike, but that may have to wait.

Now it's time to sort through all the advice and get going on some decisions.

Again, thanx to all!