88D Posted February 2 Share Posted February 2 Is there any reason why an RC loco cannot retain its pickups and then run on powered track? If so, are there requirements that need to be put in place,eg receiver switched off,etc? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wasdavetheroad Posted February 3 Share Posted February 3 Could be possible but that depends on the loco size. You would need a switch between the receiver/motor and a switch to isolate the receiver from the battery as well as the receiver (Rx) is drawing a small amount of power when the motor is idle. I think a 3PDT switch would work if wired properly. Are using a track controller for the DC rail power? Using the radio transmitter (Tx) to control the Rx on DC makes it more complicated as well as needing rectification. Others more expert than me will know more. You could try emailing Micron Radio control fo advice. 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stray Posted February 7 Share Posted February 7 (edited) Hi, I was curious about this to, I have a Heljan class 37 that has a Deltang Rx60 wired directly to the loco's positive and negative. The battery is wired to the centre pin of a 3 pin slider switch, one way off/ battery charging, the other, on. Anyway this afternoon I put it on unpowered track and ran it for several minutes on BPRC. I then switched it to off/charging and powered up the Analogue track. The loco ran fine. After another several minutes I swapped back to BPRC, to check, and all was good. I didn't dare try to run it on RC with the track powered up. If I was going to do this regularly, I think I'd use a double pole switch and use it to isolate the Receiver from the motor when running on analogue. Hope this helps. Edited February 7 by Stray 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wasdavetheroad Posted February 8 Share Posted February 8 That's interesting, is the blue circuit board a voltage booster? and the Rx60 is hiding in the black tubing? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stray Posted February 8 Share Posted February 8 Yes, the black tubing is shrink wrap. The booster is set to 10v, the 1s, 600mah lipo gives about half an hour running at a decent speed. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wasdavetheroad Posted February 8 Share Posted February 8 Wow! 600mAh giving 30 minutes of run time suggests the loco is drawing 1.2 Amps. Are Heljan locos all power hungry? My steam locos top out at 400-500 mA and range down to 110mA in my remotored Lima Class 08. I must finish my Class 37 conversions and endurance test them. The endurance test runs the loco at normal load and speed with a 100mAh battery and the time to LVC (low voltage cutoff) is used to estimate the locos mA requirements for a hours run time. I don't need an hours run time as my operating sessions are 3 hours with locos running for up to 30 miniues max and the rest of the session lying idle but switched on. An idle Rx plus booster draws about 20mA per hour so for example a 400mA loco would need 200mA running and 50mA idling for a total of 250mA. I am fitting all my big locos with 600mAh batteries from Micron Radio Control, and I even managed to squeeze a 600 mAh battery into a Bachmann 2MT 2-6-0 Micky Mouse. The loco draws 240mA so is good for 2-3 sessions before recharge. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stray Posted February 8 Share Posted February 8 Well, so much for my guesstimates. I timed the Class 37 (which is actually a Vitrains model) and it ran for 48 minutes pulling 2 coaches. It also powers up the track, so that I could see that it was running at between 9v and 9.5v. The starting voltage of the 6oomah battery was 4.1v and the battery cut out at 3.5v. I'll definitely be using double pole switches if I rewire anymore decent quality locos like this. I've got several "cheap " ringfield motor Hornby and Lima locos that have 6v cd motors fitted and they usually last a session on a full charge. Ps. One good thing about the loco powering the track. https://youtu.be/0vdc69yePk0?feature=shared 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
fallen Posted March 23 Share Posted March 23 When I started in radio control I used a two pole two way switch to change from RC to normal DC track control. One pole switched the battery positive between the receiver and the charging connector. The other switched one of the motor wires from the receiver output to the pickup. This worked fine. You only need to switch one of the motor connections, the other can stay connected to both the receiver and the pickup. Similarly the battery negative can stay connected to the receiver and the charging connector. I did this so I could use the loco as a normal DC loco when the battery ran down. I soon found the batteries lasted quite a long time and I did not need this. So I stopped doing it and went to just radio control with battery power. Frank 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
wasdavetheroad Posted March 23 Share Posted March 23 A few years ago I tried out a receiver board from BlueRail Trains that switched automatically from track power to an onboard battery if the track power failed. I only tested it on the rolling road but the change either way appeared seamless. Unfortunately it was too big to fit in any loco and used a smart phone app. No way, I much prefer knobs, switches and buttons with tactile feedback allowing you to look at the loco while controlling it. I did calculate that all the 'fiddly' bits of my layout 'dead' were about 1/3 of the length which would extend the battery life by 3x. No need for a stay alive! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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