Connecting Bus Bar to 00 gauge rails.

[rhubarb]

Good Evening,

Half way through wiring layout and now getting very tired of wiring Bus Bar wiring to underside & sides of rails to provide power to track.

 

Does anyone have another method of connecting wire to track other than soldering? System is DCC (this does not matter for connections) twin main line appx 23m in a loop with engine sheds etc. I've still got a long way to go and would just like another method slightly faster and does not involve melting sleepers

 

Thanks in advance.

[96701]

Nope, sorry. More practice can lead to fewer molten sleepers, but you'll just have to bite the bullet and be glad when it's all over.

[Softvark]

Soldering is far and away the best option - especially if you want your connections to be concealed.

 

Listening to music whilst soldering helps me

 

Julian

[Donw]

I find it helps to tin the rail before trying to fix the wire if you can get a small blob of solder onto the rail then hold the wire against it and apply the iron. The wire seems to melt into the solder.

Another possibility ( probably too late now) is to solder lengths of wire to the underside of rails before laying.

 

Also in order to hide the wires I solder to the far side of the rail using a mirror propped up. The mirror I use is a shiny piece of metal in a plastic frame that was the reflector in a lantern. I had to do it because of the sloping ceiling but once you get used to it it is much easier than leaning over.

 

Donw

[rhubarb]

I find it helps to tin the rail before trying to fix the wire if you can get a small blob of solder onto the rail then hold the wire against it and apply the iron. The wire seems to melt into the solder.

Another possibility ( probably too late now) is to solder lengths of wire to the underside of rails before laying.

 

Also in order to hide the wires I solder to the far side of the rail using a mirror propped up. The mirror I use is a shiny piece of metal in a plastic frame that was the reflector in a lantern. I had to do it because of the sloping ceiling but once you get used to it it is much easier than leaning over.

 

Donw

Thanks All for the reply's. I'm soldering the track prior to laying. I guess i'll have to 'grim and bare it' till the end. Running fault free engines will be worth it!!!

[melmerby]

A hot iron and a clean bit are essential for good soldered joints.

 

I have several irons but I find a 50W with a small pencil bit is ideal where the heat needs to be applied for as little time as possible.

 

If you can do the joint more quickly it will allow less time for the heat to spread where it is not wanted!

 

Use of extra flux can help if there is any tarnishing present. Remove any residue afterwards.

 

Keith

[Kenton]

Add droppers to the bottom of the rails BEFORE you lay the track - PLAN ahead and remove the surplus webbing (if not all of it) before you add the droppers. Tin the wire and the rail - joins will then be quicker with less hanging around near the bits that can melt.

 

Doing this makes it easier to avoid melting sleepers. Doing the wiring sitting at the bench rather than peering and reaching over the layout.

 

Chocblock connectors can be used to connect to the main bus wire. Trim off the sleeving over a short length and thread on (no need to cut. insert the end of the dropper wire and tighten the screws. Easy to disconnect for testing when (IF) you fail to read your wiring diagram correctly. .... you do have a wiring diagram don't you ?

 

Wire small sections at a time - especially if it is a big layout - don't be in such a rush ... there is always something more boring to do later - ballasting - scenic work

 

Oh and don't forget to test test TEST.

[cobbjn]

I tried using metal compression springs once to reduce the amount of soldering.

 

With a spring around 1cm long and 1.5mm diameter, drill a hole around 1/2cm deep in the baseboard beneath the track and then a smaller hole all the way through. Solder or thread the dropper wire onto the spring and drop into the hole. Place the track on the spring(s) and fasten down.

 

It worked reasonably well and was hidden once the ballast had gone down. The biggest problem I found was that it was quite fiddly to get right and in the end, I went back to soldering the dropper wires because it was quicker !!

 

Jim.

[smokebox]

Wouldn't it be wonderful if there was a manufacturer who would take note of the problem of soldering dropper wires to track and provide solder tags already fitted. It should be quite easy for them to do by spot welding or some such.

[David Rickard]

I found I had trouble getting the solder to 'stick' the to rails (Code 55). I was roughing them up on the underside, which helped a lot. Not sure if there's a better way though.

[melmerby]

I found I had trouble getting the solder to 'stick' the to rails (Code 55). I was roughing them up on the underside, which helped a lot. Not sure if there's a better way though.

 

Try a little flux, even when using cored solder. It makes a world of diffrence.

 

Keith

[Etched Pixels]

Kato track comes with an option for prewired fishplates and various people do them for other brands if you are lazy

 

The 2mm SA easitrac has a nice solution - lost wax castings off the plastic sleepers so you have a much bigger object to solder.

[Gwiwer]

Soldering is perhaps the biggest area where failure to attend to detail results in disaster later. Cleanliness is everything. The rail, the dropper, the solder and the iron must be kept spotless as contamination results in an inferior bond or none at all. That is perhaps the biggest cause of dry joints which are a pain to trace and are worse to rectify without disturbing your scenery and track.

 

It's worth taking time at this stage as an investment in reliable smooth running over the years to come.

[beast66606]

Try a little flux, even when using cored solder. It makes a world of diffrence.

 

But make sure you wash it off - otherwise it will eventually eat the joint away.

 

Repeating whats been said ..

 

Use a small tip on the iron.

 

Tin the wire, about 1.5-2cm should do it, trim the end and then make it into an inverted *small* L shape.

Remove the webbing from the rail where you want to solder.

Clean the rail, for example fibre glass brush.

Tin the rail.

Solder the small part of the L to the underside of the rail.

 

The 2cm tinned wire will allow you to pull the wire through the baseboard - you should be able to pull it reasonably hard without problem if the joint is good - until taught and makes it almost invisible.

 

Avoid flux, it's corrosive and will eventually eat the joint away unless thoroughly cleaned off - even the mild ones.

Simples.

 

If you are struggling then practice on scrap, or even "donate" a length of track to the learning process, once you get the hang of it you will always know "how to do it" so one length of track, some wire and solder is a cheap price to pay.

 

Remember occasionally the solder itself is "claggy" so get yourself a solder sucker to remove any tinning which goes wrong and start again, a good joint will last forever but a bad one will fail at the wrong time.

[craigwelsh]

If you are fitting them (correctly) before laying then work on a bit of metal as a heatsink. You shouldn't need to linger long anyway but even so a little extra surface area should help you avoid the heat going into the plastic.

 

Cleaning the underside and tinning both bits before trying to join is the key though.

 

On the club layout i'm laying/wiring at the moment we have etched tags over the rivets of ply sleepers and the wire is soldered onto the other end of the tag. Connection is then buried in the ballast.

[Crosland]

But make sure you wash it off - otherwise it will eventually eat the joint away.

Use a "no clean" flux.

 

Avoid flux, it's corrosive and will eventually eat the joint away unless thoroughly cleaned off - even the mild ones.

In it's active state, yes, but the residues left after a "no clean" flux has boiled off are inert.

 

Andrew Crosland

[Crosland]

Good Evening,

Half way through wiring layout and now getting very tired of wiring Bus Bar wiring to underside & sides of rails to provide power to track.

 

Does anyone have another method of connecting wire to track other than soldering? System is DCC (this does not matter for connections) twin main line appx 23m in a loop with engine sheds etc. I've still got a long way to go and would just like another method slightly faster and does not involve melting sleepers

 

Thanks in advance.

Still requires soldering I'm afraid, but solder lengths of dropper to rail joiners. Solder the joiners to the rail on one side only. Be consistent as you go around the layout and every piece of rail will have one soldered joint and one unsoldered joint. The unsoldered joints allow for movement due to thermal expansion/contraction.

 

Andrew Crosland

[David Rickard]

Well I may see if I can get some finer tips for my Weller iron, or try the other iron I have - it came free with a subscription to a partworks (Real Robots - no soldering required!), amd I think I had one attempt at using it, but it has a very fine tip. Plus I think it's pretty low powered, so probably a good bet.

[Bill]

I have used these thingies - "Terminal Joiners" in Canada and the US - with few problems... (They work for me!)

 

 

I don't know if they are available in the UK?

[beast66606]

Use a "no clean" flux.

 

In it's active state, yes, but the residues left after a "no clean" flux has boiled off are inert.

 

Andrew Crosland

 

The flux residues left behind by no-clean pastes are more difficult to remove from PCBs than other fluxes.

 

Which is a problem if it gets into the web of the rail and is visible.

 

A type of flux that does not require cleaning after soldering. However, it is less active than other types of flux and should be used only with materials that are easy to solder.

 

Which might be a problem around plastic if more heat is required.

 

However with clean rails and a good iron, and both sides tinned, there shouldn't be any need for flux anyway.

 

 

I would never solder to fishplates, for one the suggested solution has an inherent weakness in that only one side of the wire to the actual rail joint is soldered and more importantly, to me, I never use fishplates (well only cosmetic ones) on visible sections.

 

Use droppers soldered to the underside of the rail, and use two per rail section (if you can stand the boredom) - thats my advice.

[Crosland]

I would never solder to fishplates, for one the suggested solution has an inherent weakness in that only one side of the wire to the actual rail joint is soldered

Why is that a weakness? The rail in other side of each join is soldered at the far end. Droppers are only soldered in one place.

 

Andrew Crosland

[Crosland]

Well I may see if I can get some finer tips for my Weller iron, or try the other iron I have - it came free with a subscription to a partworks (Real Robots - no soldering required!), amd I think I had one attempt at using it, but it has a very fine tip. Plus I think it's pretty low powered, so probably a good bet.

Too fine a tip and too low power are exactly the opposite to what you want.

 

A metre length of rail is a very effective heatsink. You need enough power, and a large enough contact area, to get the rail close to the iron up to soldering temperature as quickly as possible.

 

Andrew Crosland

[beast66606]

Why is that a weakness? The rail in other side of each join is soldered at the far end. Droppers are only soldered in one place.

 

Andrew Crosland

 

 

So how many places are your droppers soldered onto the fishplate - the fishplate method has two soldered joints wheres as the plain dropper only has one - unless you rely on friction at the rail/fishplate interface.

 

Lets not get distracted, you have your view and I have a different one, I know from many exhibition layouts that "my" (not really mine as plenty of others do it) way works, as I'm sure you do with yours - and there is no risk of expansion issues with plain droppers as the joints aren't soldered.

[Lady_Ava_Hay]

I used the 'solder to rail joiners' method. I made my own. I drilled a 1mm hole in a line of rail joiners (from the top side) stuck into a blob of blu tack. Then I soldered fine wire (from the bottom) into each hole. If the hole is in the middle the rail will butt up against the soldered wire in the joiner from either side.

 

I had a failure rate of about one in fifty and, once you get a production line going, it is quite quick. Laying the track then becomes a case of laying, cutting and drilling a 3mm hole underneath each joiner to take the wire underneath to the heavy bus wire. Use an automatic wire stripper to expose a length of the bus wire without cutting it and then (this is by far the worst bit) under the layout to solder dropper to bus wire. Then the insulation on the bus wire creeps back and partly covers the join(s)

 

Apart from drilling the rail joiners there is no more work involved and no melted sleepers and the opportunity to cut the track where you want it to be cut. The track laying is actually much faster as well.

 

Once ballasted, the wires are invisible.

 

I think the method will only work on a permanent laid layout so if you lift the track don't re-use the joiners.

[Crosland]

I used the 'solder to rail joiners' method.

 

...

 

I had a failure rate of about one in fifty

Was that during installation, or after some time in service?

 

Andrew Crosland