Accessory only power supply?

Joe Dawg skriver:

Any transformer with an 16 Volt output.

No need to pay a ot for a fine housing or nametag, just take whatever the nearest electroics dealer got on stock.

If you like to have something for lighting and others that requres DC, use an old PC power supply.

Klaus

Joe Dawg wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

All Electronics Corp is my prefered source for finding this sort of thing. They got a good selectoin of wall warts and power supplies of various types.

If you just need AC for lights and switch machines and such you can still find 12 volt transformers at Radio Shack (or All electronics or Mouser or Digikey. An old dead PC power supply will furnish a nice box to mount the transformer in.

David Starr

12 volt AC or 16 volt AC for structure lighting, etc. can be found at a number of hardware stores (and many other types of stores that sell building supplies - one of the grocery stores in our area has them), usually in the doorbell section. You would need your own 120v cord for most of them though. If you don't know how to wire that part of the circuit ask for help from someone who does and can show you.

Old power adapters from answering machines, computer speakers, cell phones, tape recorders and all that can also be used. Look at the body of the transformer and see what the output voltage is. Some of the answering machine power supplies are 12 volts AC or DC. You probably already have at least one such power supply kicking around in your house from some old piece of electronic equipment you aren't using any more. You can buy them new, but why bother if you don't need to?

If I were doing this, I would probably use 12 volts DC for the accessories, rather than the more traditional 16 volts AC. The lower voltage increases bulb life somewhat. Also, for stuff like switch machines, you can put a nice big electrolytic capacitor in the line, so that the whole layout doesn't get hit withe a brown-out when the switch machine throws. This assumes that we are not using some sort of digital control system.