DCC and running locos from overhead traction wiring

That's a beautiful layout. Really nice photography as well. I'm curious about the two houses sited between the turntables at Remiseanlæg. Is that based on the prototype? Must be a story there somewhere...

If you double click on them, do they come up pilsner size? :)

Thanks for the nice site.

Dale

Reply to
Dale
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David Nebenzahl skriver:

You can call it AC. If you call datatransmission on a RS485 network for AC too.

Klaus

Reply to
Klaus D. Mikkelsen

Dale skriver:

Thanks

The 2 in the middle og this picture ?

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Yes there is a story behuind theese, and no I cant remember right now. I think it is officebuildings for a factory, but let me check up o.n it monday. When I have the maker of the building (couldn't find it in one og my catalouges at home, so i have to read underneath the buildings).

Our large model railway is showing a "selv invented" part of south Germany. Germany was originally a lot of small "länder", who grow and became Germany. They were fightinh 2 wolrd Wras and during wartime a lot of new is invvented. They have had a lot of different trains and We are showing trains dating back from the 1890'es

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up to modern high speed trains
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and locos of today
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On another setup We have build the by that we are situated in - Hadsten. The Dansih Railways opend the track in scale 1:1 back in 1862. We have chosen to show Hadsten in the late 1950's, so everything is build up as is was then. We got the original track layout, pictures of houses and so on. The train station in Hadsten is hand bulid in scale 1:87
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as the rest of the buildings. There is no overview picture of the "længdebanen" on our homepage (yet!).

DOH ! (Homer Simpson style) You know what I mean :-)

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Klaus

Reply to
Klaus D. Mikkelsen

Common enough on our tramways! ;-)

Reply to
mark_newton

I have no idea what RS485 is...but DCC is still Alternating Current...otherwise it wouldn't work. To quote from Digitrax.com: "Each bit is divided into two halves, which are "mirrored" around zero volts. The bottom half of the signal (below zero volts) is a mirror image of the top half, but shifted over half a bit width." Also: "The DCC signal is symmetric around 0 volts." If that doesn't describe AC, I don't know what does. Sure, it's not a sine wave AC, it's a square wave...but then DC has no wave at all. The booster does not rectify the AC to DC. Honest. At least, not for NMRA DCC.

Paul A. Cutler III

************* Weather Or No Go New Haven *************
Reply to
Pac Man

Not at all. Just saying that is what *we* did to get a diesel under our old DC analog live overhead wire...and that as silly as it sounds to have a diesel switcher with a pole on it, that really happened on the prototype in the USA.

Paul A. Cutler III

************* Weather Or No Go New Haven *************
Reply to
Pac Man

Well, you still have to have an auto-reverser with 2-rail DCC...just not with live overhead with both rails the same polarity. Put it this way, live overhead with both rails the same polarity is just like old 3-rail Lionel in that reverse loops pose no electrical problems. Why? Because the inside and outside rails never change polarity.

Paul A. Cutler III

************* Weather Or No Go New Haven *************
Reply to
Pac Man

How long has it been for a good ON TOPIC thread on r.m.r? Seems like forever... LOL

Your welcome. :-) And it should work *if* you spend a lot of effort on your wire. You should try to get good wire (I think we used Nickle-Silver wire) and stretch it tight when soldering. The NMRA should have a bunch of trolley info in their Standards and RP's on their website (of course, USA practice, but still should be good).

Are you going to be running standard equipment under the wire? Ie, steam, diesels, etc.? Or just trolley?

Wow. An interesting solution. But I think I'd rather a big toggle, as when the pole pops off by accident, wouldn't it keep the trolley running? Or short it out if you've wired both wheels on the trolley the same polarity.

OK. We're just getting into the rail laying stage and getting to the point where we can add catenary to our first section.

Paul A. Cutler III

************* Weather Or No Go New Haven *************
Reply to
Pac Man

Pac Man skriver:

Serial communication.

Klaus

Reply to
Klaus D. Mikkelsen

That why it's stored until I get the other guy back or I sell it. The other guy had lots of trams, I were more interesting in the layout as such.

Trams & trolly 99%. American or Aussie, the guy had a few models. Todaty it is stored. Until I get reconnect with the guy it is stored, for if I try to sell it, he get 55% as he put money into it as well, ie it is not mine, I'm the custodian.

Regards, David Head

Reply to
dthead

Hmmm... I think that we are discussing different pantographs. I'm thinking of a standard electric loco pantograph, not a trolley pole.

Standard pantographs have flat pickup shoes (no notches) as the pantograph's position is fixed but overhead wire is not always centered.

V-notches are present only on trolley poles as they can swing laterally to follow the overhead wire.

Peteski

Reply to
Peter W.

True. Sorry about that.

Also true. However, many pans have double shoes so there is two points of contact there.

Yep. Fun to watch...

Paul A. Cutler III

************* Weather Or No Go New Haven *************
Reply to
Pac Man

I suppose that we could beat this to death Paul...

What you stated about dual shoes on a pantograph is true. But the shoes aren't the only place of intermittant contact. Unlike the real pantographs, models do not have a bypass wire at every mechanical joint. So, there is no solid connection between the overhead pickup shoes and the base. Every movable joint can be a source of intermittant contact.

I rest my case. :-)

Peteski

Reply to
Peter W.

Isn't that we are supposed to do? ;-) If no one ever argued any point, we might as well give up and surf the 'net for train pics.

Well, yeah. However, it's never been a problem for my club's old layout. Or let me put it this way... If we had a trolley that wouldn't go, first we'd clean the wheels. If that didn't do it, we cleaned the track. If that still didn't work, we'd clean the wire. If we still had intermittant contact, then we'd open up the model to see if there's anything internal that's wrong before we'd check the pan. IOW, the mechanical connections of the pans were never a problem on our RR. I even used a NH brass EF-1 under our wire that I custom painted. I sprayed right over the brass pans that were on the model, and I never had a problem with intermittant contact with them. Sure, I had problems with the model staying on the rails (mainline electrics don't like trolley curves), and the pan staying on the wire, but if the wheels, track, and wire was clean, my engine ran without stalling. Besides, I thought that the while point here was that a pan has only (at most) two points of contact to an outside power source vs. the 4 or more for the equivalant wheels that one would be replacing. Since when did this become a discussion about the internal mechanical/electrical connection of a pan?

BTW, most if not all of our trains rely on a mechanical connection at some point for electrical contact, and I'm talking above the wheel-to-rail contact. Athearn BB relys on nothing but, from the wheel journals to the commutator. Kato uses end bearings to carry current, and on some of their models use wipers from the motor to the trucks. Overland uses bent pieces of wire to rub on the backs of the wheels to pick up the juice, while every P2K I can think of uses mechanical "clips" to force the bare wire against the circuit board.

Doing trolley right (and that means live overhead) is part of the challenge of it. It's why I like it. You may as well tell some narrow gauger to broaden his rails because it's easier... LOL

Paul A. Cutler III

************* Weather Or No Go New Haven *************
Reply to
Pac Man

Paul, I couldn't ignore this nice writeup. You're right of course. Some peple like things easy and simplified, others like a challange.

Enjoy running the trolleys!

Peteski

Reply to
Peter W.

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Reply to
David Johnson

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