DC walkaround throttle

[emkay_777]

Greetings,

 

After a near miss with dangling clothing swiping a locomotive, I decided to pull out my old Troller Autopulse Transamp 1 power pack and (black square box) handhelds.  Seeing some of the posts where the pulse function tends to overheat the motor, I am wondering if this pulse function is carried over to the handhelds - ie. the Transamp 1 will be the AC power and the handheld will go to the track.  How can this 'pulse' wave be detected? 

 

Evan

[brill27mcb]

Years ago, failures of Sagami can motors in O-scale trolleys in the U.S. was linked to "pulse" throttles. My memory is that it was the Troller. Apparently the amplitude (voltage) of the pulses was so high (over 30 volts, id I remember correctly) that it zapped through the armature wire insulation varnish. It isn't the pulse function, in this case, it's the over-voltage of the spike pulses.

 

Rich K.

[kvp]

The sure way to avoid damage is to check the transformer. If it can't output more than 12V, it's safe for N. (16V for H0) Pulse power or PWM can fry low voltage (<12V) motors with even a Tomix CL pack. The absolutely correct way is to check peak voltages with a scope.

 

PWM can overheat motors even with correct voltage if it's not chopped but on-off. Modern packs are almost all chopped.

 

Regarding the original question, the design of the throttle determines the output, so if that is safe then it will be ok. The power pack in this case just acts as a dumb transformer.