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7mm King Street Goods


Barnaby
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Off out to my hobby shed to add some more choc-block terminations for the continuing wire up.

The bulk of the wiring is on board 2 which has 4 of the 5 points on and is the one I'm working on just now.  All the boards have their droppers installed I just need to link them to their termination points.

I'm using multi different ways to terminate all the connections, see below.

1600169536_terminationblocks.jpg.3c8faf7b96e0030dd80384788225df31.jpg

 

…...all have their particular uses.

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22 hours ago, Barnaby said:

I'm using multi different ways to terminate all the connections, see below.

 

…...all have their particular uses.

 

I'm just getting to this stage on my layout now so I would be interested to know what the particular uses are. I can't quite work them out from the drawing in a previous post.

 

I recognise most of the connectors but are the blocks on the left Earth bonding blocks? The wire loops in the choc block connectors to allow for soldering droppers is inspired :D

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Hello Richard, thanks for calling by.

 

The blocks on the left with the red & black "shorting" link perform the same function as the wire loops blocks.  They arrive with the shorting link separate which you can cut to suit, I chose the have all 12 terminals linked together.

IE you drop a Red rail dropper  down and connect it to the block it instantly makes all the other connection live for you to add the other droppers too.  The same applies for the Black one.

 

The pluggable version on the right hand side are where my boards will connect so I can separate them.

 

The choc-blocks do have many uses:- the insides can be used to join rods and adjust their length quickly,  when secured to the base board with the screws backed out they will support spoke/wire push rods for mechanical point work operation. 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Just 2 wires they said, DCC is easy?

267962470_just2wirestheysaid.....jpg.210485eda9a820b1aafa7e0c9f4615c6.jpg

 

It is the main BB #2 and has 4 points on it but I got 24 wires so far.  Maybe I wont put track droppers to each piece of individual track next time.

BB #1 will have 8 pairs off DCC feed wires running down into a single pair to plug into BB #2.

BB #3 will have the fiddle yard with 1 pair of DCC feed wires and 5 pairs of DCC feeds + 3 wires for frog switching for the Lower East side industries.

Also 1 pair of DCC feed wires to plug back into BB #2

They should be quick and easy to wire up. :sungum:

 

Still undecided whether the DCC control will mount off the front of BB #2 or sit in a hanging tray underneath the BB.  Favourite at the moment is a mixture of them both with the Touch screen control unit on a small shelf mounted off the BB side frame and the remaining parts under the BB on a low shelf. 

 

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Well the middle BB #2 has now had all its points and track wired in.  I test drove my Fowler over all the rails to prove it all was working correctly; it was.

Under the BB just need to be spiral wrapped to make it all neat and tidy but I think I'll wait until the other 2 BB are wired up.

 

BB #2 IS ALIVE...………...

 

Onwards we go.

 

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Hi Barnaby

 

Just catching up on your thread. You've done a great job on all those droppers and it will certainly make things more reliable. No more problems with loose fitting rail joiners. Which cosmetic rail joiners will you be using?

 

It's all looking good so far.

 

Stephen

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Sorry people I did the vid post in haste just as we were leaving to gown down sarf to tour around Cornwall for a week.

 

Simon has the correct answer so I'll be doing that later after we've unpacked and had tea.

 

Best.

oops forgot to press submit :laugh:

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  • 1 month later...

It's all gone a bit cold on here as my PC has blown its hard Drive..

I've recovered 95% of the HD data and am in the process of applying it all back in.  Still got to import my emails and IE Favourites back but they are proving to be a little awkward.

 

But...………………………… something early for my Christmas stash.

Dapol.jpg

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  • 1 month later...

…….next thing was my PC blew its power supply so new one fitted and back up and running...…..again.

Still got 1 more board to wire up, no points on it only shunting track so should be quicker to do.

 

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Decided to check over the electricals on the 2 boards I have wired and uh oh I have a short.

splitting the boards showed that board 3 which fortunately only has 1 point and 2 lengths of track in view was causing the short.  Further investigation showed that the fault lay within the point so a simple slide in with a knife blade popped the point up.  I had only fixed it with a hot glue gun and no ballast laid down yet, thankfully. 

Turning the point over I could see that I had not isolated the frog so a quick snip sorted that out and I repositioned the point again.   Phew!!!

 

Just on my way out to my hobby room to give the 2 boards a dcc loco check before I make a start on the last board which only has plain track on it so will only require droppers to be done...…..simples..

 

I have ordered some of these Magclic swing couplings to have a play about with >>> https://www.magclics.co.uk/

This article interests me particularly the ref to only fitting one swing unit to each wagon.  The chain off the blind wagon gets attracted to the swing-magnet and couples up. 

I want to have a play to see how the chain links respond to being pushed and also look at what I can do to remotely uncouple them.  It should be simple to set up a mechanical push/pull mech that lifted a wire pin to go behind a wagon  wheel axel to hold it while the rest of the train reverses away to break the link.  It will depend on all the magnetic swing-links holding with the same grip or the weakest link could separate where I don't intend it to.

Nothing new as Dave John RM member has shown his electrical version see his post >>>  https://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/134893-my-version-of-the-magnetic-coupling-hose-connections/

 

Lots of fun ahead.

 

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21 minutes ago, Barnaby said:

Decided to check over the electricals on the 2 boards I have wired and uh oh I have a short.

splitting the boards showed that board 3 which fortunately only has 1 point and 2 lengths of track in view was causing the short.  Further investigation showed that the fault lay within the point so a simple slide in with a knife blade popped the point up.  I had only fixed it with a hot glue gun and no ballast laid down yet, thankfully. 

Turning the point over I could see that I had not isolated the frog so a quick snip sorted that out and I repositioned the point again.   Phew!!!

 

 

Barnaby,

What a great lesson here.  Check everything electrical before going forward.  You had a short and were able to fix the problem with minimal effort.  I don't even want to think how difficult that would have been had you already ballasted.  What perhaps you and I know because of experience (and I seem to be always forgetting), someone new to the hobby might not know.  Thanks for sharing this . . . I'm sure at least one person gained some knowledge (and I, of course, need these kind of reminders too lol).  Of course "testing" is a great reason (like we need one) to kick back and "play trains a bit." .  :)

Dave

 

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OK just reporting on my test drive through all the frogs in both point directions with my locos.

I'm pleased to report that all went well so that's 2 track boards working with 1 more left to complete.   I'll be doing the last board tomorrow, should only take a couple of hours. 

:D:P 

 

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It may only need a couple of hours work to complete the wiring on the last board but the station mistress, swmbo had other ideas.

 

I hope to get out there later today.

 

I saw these the other day, they're meant for loco and coach use but they have been fitted to stock on a shunty plank layout with some success so I thought I'd have a play.

They are magnetic couplings by MagClic  very simple to fit by just remove the existing hook and replace with the swing MagClic ones, we'll see.

The small neodymium magnets hang down and swing upwards to connect as the wagons draw close together.

I'm impressed with their build quality and they are very neat so may not be very obtrusive when fitted which is what I'm after.   They will connect automatically but don't have delayed or an uncouple means out of the packet but I have a couple of thoughts on the uncoupling requirements from a basic shunters [coffee stirrer] pole up to using a degaussing transformer to mash the magnetic field causing decoupling, yer right that will be fun. :laugh_mini:

 

MagClic swing couplings.jpg

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