Hi Gang, I'm new at this so hold on. I purchased a Digitrax Dcc Empire Builder system. The bus wire should it be stranded or solid? I was going to use solid but I read about connecting the feeder wires to the bus by T Tap (suitcase) connectors. Would these seaver a soild wire? Also should feeder wires be solid or stranded. From what I'v seen solid is use as it's easier to solder to the track. Is this true? I read that 50' should be the length of a bus wire. As my layout has two main line tracks about everywhere for direction of traval can the same bus line feed both direction being cautious not to cross them and cause a short. How many bus line can I run from one power source. I should have 3 trains running the main plus two or three running on sidings My layout is 22' long across the back with a circle at one end about 12' in diamiter.
Thanks
First, welcome aboard
Second, I will admit that my opinion is influenced by my profession (aircraft mechanic.) There are only two suitable types of connection, soldered and fastened with a threaded fastener. Any suitcase connector that finds itself within my arm's reach will take a short ballistic trip to the nearest trash container. While they might be satisfactory in fixed-wiring use, they are the most expensive alternative for making electrical connections. I can make a terminal block from stock hardware (#6 screws, nuts and washers through a styrene base) for a lot less, and the price of one pack of Scotch-Loks will buy enough solder and flux to wire the whole layout. Since I'm fully retired (and have learned patience) I am more than happy to spend time rather than money.
Third - in the matter of wires, there's one basic rule. If it will never be twisted, flexed or bent once installed, use solid wire. If motion is to be expected, use stranded wire. Since model railroads don't vibrate or undergo maneuvering or landing stress there is no need for stranded wire for most of the harness. Connections between fold-down control panels and the fixed frame are an exception. OTOH, if you have stranded wire on hand, there's no reason not to use it. My main around-the-layout bus started life as a 100 foot outdoor extension cord formerly use to power an electric chain saw.
I'll let the DCC gurus answer the rest. I'm one of those who prefer analog DC to things that rely on microchips.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - with 1964 control technology)
I'm strictly a believer in using stranded wire for everything. 14 awg for the DCC buss and 20-22 awg for the track feeders and switch control wires. I use European style pass through barrier strips to secure the DCC buss and to connect the feeders to it. No soldering under the layout, except to tin the wire ends.
I use stranded for the bus. It's a lot easier to pull heavy wire throught he benchwork when it's flexible, and stranded is a lot more flexible than solid.
I use small size solid for my feeders, because there's less chance of a stray strand not getting soldered to the track. Plus with feeders you are generally poking them down through a hole in the surface, and the extra stiffness of solid wire helps with that.
I solder my feeders to the bus. The good Ideal or Klein wire strippers can strip back a bit of insulation int he middle of the wire with no trouble. The end of the feeder is cut to length and stripped. The end of th feeder gets wrapped tightly around the short bare section of bus wire. If you wrap it tightly it's makign good connection already, but will loosen up over time, so I go back with a 150 watt soldering gun and solder them all. The good mechanical connection is made by the solid feeder wrappign the stranded bus, stranded feeder wouldn't make as good a mechnical connection. Practice a bit and you won't drip solder on yourself - with a high power solderign gun to heat up the large size wire (a small solderign iron won't do here), the joint gets hot quickly and the solder flows easily. The only time any solder drips is if you feed too much. If you do it right, it will soak into the strnaded wire and partially coat the solid wire wrapped around it. No need to make the whole thing a giant blob of solder - that's when the excess ends up drippign off onto the floor or your leg.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
Thanks for your comment they help. The use of suitcase connectors was given to me via one of the dream plan build videos.
Thanks, I don't know what European style pass through barriers strips are.
Thanks Randy, What about using the same buss for two different track mains?
I, like Randy used stranded for the bus and solid for the feeders. I am not a fan of under table soldering so I made a harness at the workbench. I ran the buss, marked the places for the feeders pulled the buss and soldered all the feeders at the marked spots, and reran the buss I have three bus lines, each are split with sections running left and right. the overall length of each run is about 15 feet. Each line is wired to a breaker
With four casters, scrap wood, some 1/4 inch hardware, a little ingenuity, you can make of of these. You can make the back support adjustable to suit your position under the layout.
I use one of these at our club a lot.
Rich
If you ever fall over in public, pick yourself up and say “sorry it’s been a while since I inhabited a body.” And just walk away.
I'm using 12 AWG stranded for the bus and 18AWG stranded for feeders. On a previous layout I tried 12 AWG solid and ran into a few minor problems with command signal loss, which degraded decoder performance at long distances from the command station/booster, like 50' or more. There is no problem using the same bus to feed both main tracks; just ensure you don't create a short at any crossover or other connection between the two.
Stranded wire works fine for soldering feeders. I strip insulation from the last 1/2 inch, then tin the exposed wire to solidify it before bending the tip at a 90-degree angle to fit against the rail, and finally trim the bent wire to approximate a spike shape before soldering to the rail itself.
I've spent enought time crawling around under layouts soldering onto bus wires and just don't bother anymore. I use Scotchlok 567 suitcase connectors. The cost is worth the savings in time and aggravation for me.
Rob Spangler
Thanks Rob, Sctchlok connectors is what I heard in a dream plan build video tape but wasn;t sure about them, I'm having a hard time locating them, Home Depot diesn't carry them except in 2 packs. The Electrical supply house in my area don't carry them at all. Is there somewhere online that I can get them?
Looks easy enough Rich Thanks for the idea of the situp creeper. I'm sure it will come in handy for alot of jobs
track9910 The Electrical supply house in my area don't carry them at all. Is there somewhere online that I can get them?
The Electrical supply house in my area don't carry them at all. Is there somewhere online that I can get them?
I get mine from a local electrical supply place, but our Home Depots also have them sometimes. If you don't want to Google for an on-line source, you could try Home Depot for a special order. If some of their stores carry a product, others can usually get it.
Also check some of the online electrical supply houses, like Mouser
http://www.mouser.com/
Larry
http://www.youtube.com/user/ClinchValleySD40
http://www.flickr.com/photos/52481330@N05/
http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/showgallery.php/cat/500/page/1/ppuser/8745/sl/c
track9910,Personally, I use stranded wire on just about everything involving this hobby. The only advantage I've found with solid is that one doesn't need a crimp (spade or ring) when connecting it to an old fashioned barrier strip. The disadvantages to solid are: it's inflexible and hard to run under a railroad; it's resistant to any kind of crimp connection; and it's easy to nick with wire strippers and cause a failure. Stranded is much more forgiving.
The one issue with stranded is in it's use as a feeder to the track. Yes, it's possible to have a frayed wire end cause issues, but only if one is relatively unskilled in soldering. As Rob said above, the easy way to prevent frayed ends on a track feeder is to tin the end of the wire and to make the connection with the wire end, not the side of it. After tinning the wire end, take a pair of needlenose pliers and bend the very end of the wire (say, a 1/16") 90 degrees. Then solder that end to the rail web (which is also tinned). This also helps prevent solder blobs since one is making minimal contact.
The length of the bus runs can be longer than 50'. On my 25' x 50' layout, I have a 200'+ long mainline, point to point. My Zephyr system is located around 50' from the end of the layout, meaning that my 14AWG bus carries the power all the way to the other end of my RR 150' away. In the plan below, my Zephyr is located between the turntable and the yard above the center of the drawing:
I have no problems with voltage drop. I do, occasionally, lose control of a loco, but that's usually due to low batteries on my DT400R's or "outside interference" (according to Digitrax).
The great thing about DCC is that that power is the signal...if you have power, you have signal. So as long as all track locations will trip the circuit breaker when shorted (the "quarter test"), you should be fine.
As for wiring your layout, what I would recommend is that you string a black/red pair of 14AWG wires under your mainline track the entire distance it travels. If your mainline loops, do not loop the buss. Merely cut it at the furthest distance (as the wire runs) from your DCC system and terminate the bus in a terminal strip of some kind for neatness if nothing else.
tomikawaTT,At my club, we were buying 3M ScotchLoks in boxes of 100 for $7.50.
rrinker,How do you insulate the solder connection of the feeder to the bus wire?Paul A. Cutler III
I hate crawling around under the layout, so I have the majority of my connections on swing down boards. They are hinged at the top and swing up out of sight unless I need to work on them.
The bus connects to the terminal strip on the top of the board and all bus connections are made there including a daisy chain to the next board.
Dave
Lackawanna Route of the Phoebe Snow
Paul
I haven't insualted them - yet. They're offset - I don;t stript he bus wires directly opposite of each other, I'll strip one ot the right of where the feeder comes down and one to the left. It's darn near impossible for them to short, but eventually I'll paint over each joint with liquid electrical tape. Given that on the yard side of the layout I have 3 busses running - 4 actually but one goes to the left and one to the right and they don't run parallel - one for staging, one for the main, and one for the yard, on 2' wide benchwork and nothign has shorted yet, I'm not worried. Where there are multiple bus runs passing through benchwork joists, each bus gets its own hole, I don;t cram 3 pairs of #14 wire into a single hole.It all runs to my DCC shelf under the center of the yard where each bus terminates in a ring terminal, which is both crimped and soldered, and thence to a terminal stripThe other side of the terminal strip is connected to my PM42. I have a book of number/letter wire labels That I wrap around each bus wire at periodic intervals so I didn;t have to try and find 8 colors of wires to make each bus different. In my notebook I have recorded what each bus number connects to, ie Bus 1 is the main from the center of the yard to the north end of Alburtis, and connects to section #1 on the PM42. I may or may not remember that a few years from now so it's written down, although the bus labels 1-4 do correspond to the sections of the PM42.
After having to repalce every wall outlet in my previosu house because the originals were cheap quality and few held plugs without them falling out, let me say that I cannot STAND solid wire in larger guages - 14+. It is very inflexible, especially in tight confines like a wall box. Pulling it along the 50 foot run down one side of your layotu in a straight line - not too difficult. Pullign it around corners through holes int he benchwork - I'd rather not tug that hard on my benchwork. It may not be 'that' hard but stranded is WAY easier. Maybe if I drilled larger holes, but a 1/4" bit is plenty to feed two #14 THHN wires through and have it easily slide.
Going out on a limb, stranded ought to be better for DCC because of the increased surface area, but DCC frequencies really are too low for the skin effect to matter much. Sort of like twisting it. My bus is slightly twisted, because pulling wire off 2 large spools tends to twist together a little bit, but I don;t deliberaly twist, nor do anything to make the twists even. Besides, it's connected every 3 feet to a pair of perfectly parallel conductors.