Track Types

[trainman251]

I bought a bundle of track with both brass and nickel silver included. I think there is enough nickel silver track included to build the entire layout, but would both work well together on the layout? I know it wouldn't look the best at all, but i was thinking about using it for the yard sidings or something. Would i be able to use the rail paint to paint over it?

[selector]

If you can get them to match at the running surfaces of the rail heads, then sure they'll work together.  Note that the brass will oxidize in such a way that you'll have to occasionally remove it to run trains reliably.  The oxides of N/S track are modestly conductive, so not so much work there.  It will be organics and particulate matter that interrupt the flow in both types of rails.

One problem will be the metal joiners.  You'll have three different metals at the joints where electricity is being passed.  That means oxidation....big time. You can minimize the trouble oxides cause inside joiners, no matter what types of track they are joining, by soldering the joints, and probably most efficient to solder bared 22 gauge feeder wire ends to the joints at the same time.

Crandell

[cacole]

The only advice I would add to what Crandell said is that you should have no problem intermixing nickel silver and brass rail as long as they are of the same code; i.e., all code 100 rail and all from the same manufacturer.  The rail code determines how high the rail will be, but the rail foot may be different between brands.  Peco track, for example, has a narrower foot than Atlas track, and a Peco rail joiner will not fit over Atlas rail.

Try to keep the brass track limited to sidings that won't receive a lot of traffic and won't need to be cleaned as often as the main line.

[mbinsewi]

I use NS track for the main line and passing siding, and brass for all the yard and industrial track, because I had so much of it.  On all of the joints, NS and brass, I did what Crandel advised, and added a short "jumper" wire, soldered in place along with the track joiners.  No problems at all, in DC or DCC.  My layout is in the basement, which is a constant temperature, and humidity, so no track shrinkage or expansion.

Mike.

[IRONROOSTER]

Yes, you can paint the rail except for the top.  Either don't paint the top or else scrape off the paint top if you used spray paint.

Enjoy

Paul

[CTValleyRR]

I mixed nickel-silver snd brass track on an earier layout, and it does work. It has a minor aesthetic issue in that your rails will appear different colors. This may or may not be an issue for you; it started to bother me more and more as i completed scenery and it began to look like a quality layout. As the the others have said, brass oxidizes and has to be cleaned much more often, whereas the n/s oxide is conductive. I will say, though, that I don' t know what Crandall means by "occasionally remove it", other thsn the obvious definition of his words. I never did any such thing, and that layout was around for about 15 years. If I didn't run trains for about ten days, though, I did have to go over the brass with denatured alcohol ( my track cleaner of choice).before trains would run. Occasionally, I did hit a rail joint with contact cleaner to improve performance.

[trainman251]

Ok and when soldering the wire to the joints, that will be a place to connect the power right.

[selector]

By removing it I meant that the oxidation on the working surfaces of the rails would have to be removed, ideally prior to it becoming a nuisance and hindering electrical conductivity.  The working surfaces are the inside flange face on the head of the rails and the bearing surface, the top surface.

You can be more efficient about getting power to your rails if you solder a short light gauge feeder wire at any joint.  That way, the joint gets power issuing two ways from it down the entire lengths of two rails.  The idea usually is to leave one pair of joiners free to slide to aid expansion when the benchwork changes due to humidity, or the allow the joint to collapse a bit when the wood dries out under it.  However, on either side of that slding joint you would have a soldered and fed joint.  You don't care that the sliding joiner between them might not be good at conducting electricity because the far ends of either length of rail held together at that sliding joint will be ensured of good power by virtue of their being soldered and fed.

Schematically, it would look like this: (the open sliding joiner is represented by an "O", while the soldered and fed joint would be represented by and "X")

========O=========X===========O==========X==========O==========X=====

Crandell

[tomikawaTT]

I have a number of single-ended back-in staging tracks partially laid with brass rail.  The locomotives auto-stop on about 500mm of nickel silver rail, while the trailing cars (up to 20 on the longer tracks) end up standing on brass.  Since they're located where the sun isn't supposed to shine, I don't really care if the markers are steady, flickering or off.

My remaining stock of brass rail is reserved for scenic use - laid along the mainline, representing new rail scheduled for installation over the first weekend in October, 1964.  For an explanation of why that will never happen, check my signature.

Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - TTTO, 24/30)

[zstripe]

There You go Chuck,one of the best answers so far,,,''The Day The Earth Stood Still'',and is still,still..LOL..

Cheers,

Frank

[trainman251]

Ok so I think I have it now. I think I will need some power boosters. I have two old DC controllers with an Accesory section or something like that. Would they work as boosters?

[bogp40]

trainman251

Ok so I think I have it now. I think I will need some power boosters. I have two old DC controllers with an Accesory section or something like that. Would they work as boosters?

For DC and block control this can be done, but the wiring will start to get quite complicated, and you are still relying on an "old" power pack.  Piggy backing booster/ power suppies in parallel would need the voltage output controlled by a reostat throttle and should be block controlled. Better to use them for accessory power for lighting or for an individual/ separate cab control or a test track. Older DC systems w/ many cabs and block control relied on quality power supplies for power  distribution. If you're using DCC, I confused as to why this would be attempted, additional DCC boosters protected w/ circuit breakers for the district would be used then.

[selector]

trainman, I am only largely familiar with DCC operations, and in that field a booster boosts two things, the voltage and the signal coming from the base station.  In DC, you are only providing a stronger and direct voltage source, but no signal.  If you are going to be running DC strictly, you wouldn't necessarily need a booster unless you are attempting to power several hundred feet of rails with the one power unit.  Even so, with the proper wiring you may only need to run a bus of about 14-12 gauge copper wire and run short feeders of 20-22 gauge wire from the bus up to the rails every few feet.  I think you'll find that a single power pack capable of putting 16 volts and about 3-5 amps to the rails will have no trouble running a DC set of locomotives on a rail system with less than about 70' of rails, and maybe quite a bit more.

Again, in DCC, the signal is what counts once the voltage and amps are available.  No signal, no fun in DCC.  Accordingly, you must always boost the signal after a certain amount of rails and wiring, and boosters is what we use.  In blocked DC, you would only need to add a power pack, but that unit would need its own throttle or operator, or else it would have to be run by a computer of some kind.

[CTValleyRR]

Trainman -- I'm not sure how we got from mixing brass and n/s track to adding boosters. Simply adding power to your layout will not improve the conductivity of brass track. Feeders is what we're talking about here. You connect your power pack -- DC or DCC doesn't matter -- to a set of bus wires (I use AWG 12) under the layout. From the bus, you run feeders (smaller wires, in my case AWG 16) up to the track. The more feeders you have, the more certain you are to get powrr to very point on your layout. This especially important if you have a large layout, because the track, and especially the rail joiners, csn't be relied on to carry power more than 10-12 feet. Crandalls method above is a good way to do this. Now, if you want to divide your layout into DC blocks, you will need one power source (power pack) for each block. If you're running DCC, the amount of equipment you're running at any given time will determine whether you need boosters, and these are wired in with the whole DCC setup, notto individual blocks (these use electronic switches and / or breakers to isolate the blocks, so all feeders for a given block go thru the breaker. Confused? Don't worry. Wiring is one of the trickier aspects of the hobby.

[bogp40]

CT don't you mean one power source (power pack) for each cab?  A single cab can have power distributed through DPDT sw to control throttled voltage to each block.

[CTValleyRR]

Trying to keep things simple at first, Perhaps I should have said "you need A power source for each district" to avoid the implication that it must be a unique power supply for that district.