Hi guys just a quick intro Ant from New Zealand

[Antnz]

Jeff

 

Yes thank you for that i was thinking the same thing Jeff, im in a so near but so far situation and wanting to get moving but yes it needs some thought. I will however throw this at you i sat out there for a while and draw this up what do you think. Its sort of central and i can get to both sides and keep an eye on the sections with the most movement.

I had the wiring in mind as i was wanting to keep the wiring as close to the control panels from there turnout points as i could i have in my head that the length of these wires should be kept in mind ??

Yes i still haven't got a handle on the Block sections or the wiring. But i will get some droppers in and get things tidy and get some trains running.

I have plenty of wire as you saw, 18G and 20G, you said your recommendation would be 20g for the droppers feeder wires as i have plenty would you recommend i use that instead of the 22g that i also have ??

 

Ive also just ordered some insulating track connectors glad i did there as scarce as hens teeth, i have 4 packets of 20 connectors coming i hope that's enough i can see them getting used a lot in the yards

 

Cheers again Jeff

 

Tony

 

[cteno4]

Tony, 

 

How much of the track have you set out and tested yet on a temporary basis? It’s good to try this just to see if there are any changes you want to make to the plan. This is how you might best see where you want to run the rr from, in one location or in a few. 

 

Its really feeling like maybe a master control panel over in front of the larger lower yard that runs that yard system and the main line blocks all around the layout may be best as its the most complicated and having it right in front of the area you are working at doing switching may be easiest. Then a secondary control panel in front of the upper smaller yard to deal with those sidings when working on them. You probably want one of your two control panels to have control of the whole main line so you dont have to go between two control panels for all your power routing. Of course you may need to check the point positions off the whole main line when you are starting a train running out on the main line loops.

 

Having the control panels both on one side may make it hard to look at the control panels on one side then flip around to view what you are doing on the layout. I think if you have the control panel on one side it would be better to have one control panel with it all on there rather than two next to each other. Will make for a big control panel to wire, but may be easier to visualize if all in one place for the whole layout. But im thinking the one for the mainlines and the big yards and second for the smaller yard would be the easiest.

 

also hopefully having a walk around throttles eventually would also be a big help as trying to operate over your shoulder with a throttle located on one side of the layout while operating on the yard behind you will be hard. Also will be at a distance and hard to see if cars are coupled or decoupled over magnets etc. Good news is i just ordered a few wireless remote control Pwm power supplies to play with to see if they could be adapted for running a layout like this. I’m curious to see if we could do our ttrak setup like this as throttle position is always a PITA for us with rectangular layouts and it’s always something that needs to be hidden but also accessed. But to begin with you can just use your current throttles in a fixed location.

 

Even as a kid 50 years back on my first layout i was so happy when i got a walk around wired throttle on my little 3.5’x7.5’ layout as being able to be anywhere i wanted around the small layout really was fun than always being stuck at one point where the stationary throttle was and much easier when working in some of the sidings and yards that were a bit farther away from the throttle. With your big oval i can see it being very handy. Wireless of course is great as no cord to hassle with but even wired its nice to be able to fiddle up close quickly on a siding or yard.

 

Ill take a stab at the block diagram this weekend for you to then mentally noodle with on how you were thinking of operating the layout so you can do som mental operations to see if the design works how you want to operate. Should not be too hard as point power routing can help some of central blocks of points in your yards to one block, and then each siding and yard stub be a block. You can have a whole yard ladder on one block and just use point power routing on it if you want to decrease the number of block switches on the control panel. Your yard ladders are so all enough if you just feed the whole yard just before the ladder you can let the point power routing takes care of feeding only one ladder siding at a time. Yard ladders are where it can get really tight in control panels with switches and wiring space so may be best to do this. 

 

Cheers

 

jeff

[Antnz]

Jeff

Thank you again for your help and advice.

I have temporarily wired the track with the Tomix wire i have, my first few goes didn't go well and the locos stopped and started and would refuse to go through the turnouts,  but i soon found adding more feeders around the layout gradually improved things, my steam engines are all second hand and some better than others i was about to start blaming them but i can see its all about the wiring and looking forward to getting it wired up properly, i have set my two speed controls in the area we looked at but will keep practicing for a while. I have found some of my old engines are running on the sleeper rails i had a feeling that would happen, i may have to save for some new ones. I will wire up some of the turnouts and play for a while, but wanted to let you know i am following your advice Jeff.

Thank you for looking at my Block sections and control panel areas i look forward to seeing what you come up with, its very good of you to take your time doing this, i just don't have the experience you do and im shore id get into a mess or hash it up. I can see a that a control panel on one side would work better than on both sides already with less turning around, luckily both sides are very close together.

 

Tony