wire

[Anonymous]

alright you know the good saying when you look for something you will not find it well i am there. what gauge of wire is best for wiring to the track for power. also what would be the base line rating for the wire as i was at the hardware store and i know in one of my books i have it book marked. well needless to say cant find the good ole book or the book mark. the track will be directly connected to the power pack controller.

[ARTHILL]

Welcome to the forum. You have questions, we have answers, some of which are useful. On wiring - I have DC and do short runs with 22. For long runs I use 18. I also cheat a little and nothing really bad has happened.

[Seamonster]

It depends. For DCC, the thicker the better. #14 would be good, #12 for a basement sized layout. For a small DC layout, #22 should be okay, but I'd go to #20 or #18 for a larger layout, for both track and turnout wiring. The feeders from the track to the buss wires underneath can be #22 solid wire because they're only a couple of inches long. For signalling, #22 would be sufficient.

Either solid or stranded wire is okay. For the same gauge they both have the same current carrying capacity. If it's going to be subjected to a lot of bending and twisting during or after installation, go with stranded.

This is just my opinion on wire sizes. Different people have different opinions, and I'm sure you'll get a lot of replies from people on the subject.

Oh, and welcome to the forum. It's a great place to get help.

[Anonymous]

thank you for the quick reply as i was cleaning track in the good ole garage lol. seamonster enjoying the mild manitoba winter so far i am not all that far from winnipeg myself.

[Seamonster]

You're welcome, dj. Hope it helps. I should also add that colour-coding your wiring helps--one colour for track power, another for turnouts, another for structure lighting, etc. And, after reading another posting on this forum just now, it was brought to the forefront how important it is to do things like check for power-routing turnouts that are facing each other frog to frog (and gap between them), not depend on turnouts to route power, provide feeders to tracks beyond turnouts, and make a diagram of the layout and mark where the feeders are--or ought to be.

Yes, it's a beautiful, but unseasonably mild winter, isn't it? Ran into a former co-worker today who has retired to Victoria. He said he was returning home in a few days, "getting out of here before the cold weather hits." I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop. January and February aren't January and February in Manitoba without -30 and -40 degree weather!

[howmus]

dj_bartender, [#welcome][#welcome][#welcome] to the forum. Great place to get info! What scale are you modeling? Is this for a 4 x 8 layout or? What size? The answer that is the best depends on what you are doing. If you are operating DC in HO, OI would say that #18 would be heavy enough for a 4 x 8 layout. I assume from your post that you are direct wiring from your power pack to the track. If you are using DCC, then you will want to do a bit more (actually a whole lot less than a larger layout in DC). If DCC is your plan, check out this site: http://www.wiringfordcc.com/ Alan has the best information I have seen on DCC wiring and why! Good luck and stop by often!

[claycts]

My $.02 is follow the color code for DCC if that is what you are doing. If you creat your own colors keep a record for problems later.
Welcome to the forum.

[tomikawaTT]

Seamonster pretty well covered the waterfront on wire sizes. I want to add an all-too-often overlooked consideration.

DOCUMENT EVERYTHING!

If every terminal and connection is marked, and if you have a complete, current electrical schematic of the circuit you're concerned with, troubleshooting is a breeze. Without that info, finding a short on a large layout is in a class with trying to unscramble an egg. (If you assume I had to learn this the hard way, you're right!)