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I experimented with all eventualities and don't remember what precisely caused the short. But the boys are 2 and 4 so anything can and will happen. And these controllers seem very susceptible to shorting which is a real shame and the biggest issue I have with the whole setup really.

Hello everyone I just wanted to update progress here for anyone interested. Thanks to all your help things have progressed fairly quickly (by my normal hobby standards at least!) and we now have a finished contoured baseboard and today I anticipate finishing all the cork underlay. I'm happy to report that aside from a small adverse camber issue (location circled in red) that was causing carriages to tip off at high speeds the rails and trains work absolutely fine over the contoured board and as for the contouring itself it was very easy to do with 9mm ply even over these quite aggressive gradients. As you can see from the image, I started with large (3/4") holes at the transition points which give the wood a lot of leeway to bend without risk of splitting. Once screwed down to the frame wherever the board needed to be flat, I then flipped the board over and screwed in "risers" wherever they were needed for stability, spaced out across the gradients. In this way I let the plywood dictate the curve it would take between the high and low points and simply reinforced it as necessary meaning all parts of the board are strong enough to be walked over. The adverse camber issue has since been fixed by forcing the riser underneath to correct the angle, and applying an extra layer of cork below the track which was angled with sandpaper to create an opposite camber (these "cambering" layers of cork are shown here before and after being sanded down - and in the middle of being hoovered!) From an electrical perspective with apologies to @BroadLeaves I have decided to insulate the loops entirely with insulated joiners at both crossovers, at the cost of some flexibility. In the end I just did a few tests of what happens when you power a rail with both controllers and what happens is the controllers cut out and you have to give them some "down time" before they'll work again. This also happens sometimes when trains crash or derail so I assume this is some sort of built in "trip" feature in the controllers. Anyway, I am keen to minimise this down time as much as possible as it leads to loss of interest from the boys, hence the decision to fully isolate the loops. The next steps are to complete the underlay (which are just 35mm wide strips roughly cut from 1.5mm A4 cork sheet) and then ballast along the edges of these strips only, with cork I have ground up to a fine rubble in a blender. This is my compromise between leaving the simple cork strips as is, and a proper ballast job filled in between the sleepers. The former being functional but not really satisfying the modelling itch, and the latter being scenically perfect but which requires applying lots of glue up to the rails and around the sleepers which in my head risks electrical connectivity issues and makes it much harder to alter the layout in the future (and affects any resale value the track has). Once the cork is secured we will paint the cork and do a basic paint layer over the rest of the board so it at least isn't bare wood until we get around to the more advanced scenery.

Obviously my understanding of this isn't right then, because I drew this arrangement when trying to understand how the power flows and came up with this, which doesn't have any conflict. Obviously my understanding of how the points work to stop or allow flow is too simplistic. Where have I gone wrong? Thanks for the continued help everyone, I'm following along but a bit busy to craft individual responses and thank yous. A fuller response in due course!

I think I’ve come to an important realisation about why your arrangement works BroadLeaves - am I right that current never flows up a facing point? I heard this mentioned in a YouTube video yesterday and it dows seem to make everything click into place!

I'm building a small layout for my boys, 2 and 4. I have never done any model railroading before but am confident with the modelling aspect - but wiring and electrics is way out of my comfort zone. RMweb members have been incredibly helpful in helping me design a track layout that fits my needs and providing a few different options for wiring, over on my Layout thread below. They advised me to come over to here to get my questions on power answered and arrive at a final plan for the electrics. --- My needs are: Two separate controllers allowing both boys to drive trains at the same time (one on each loop). Safe! Strong preference to use the 2 basic Hornby DC controllers and plug in power feed track sections that came with the boys Percy the mailtrain sets Would rather avoid all wiring and soldering On the balance of flexibility in routes vs simplicity I favour simplicity but do want it to be possible to transfer trains from one loop to the other (otherwise, what's the point in having crossovers, right?) @BroadLeaves was kind enough to kickstart things and after a couple of evolutions we arrived at this: In this, blue is one power feed for the central loop and orange is the other for the outer loop. Green represents point springs - the one at the bottom to provide power to the left hand branch when the upper right curved point is set to left, and the one on the right to provide power to the kickback in the right hand branch. Red lines represent insulated fishplates. Just when I thought it was an open and shut case there were a load of alternative suggestions. First a couple of people advocating for moving the insulated fishplates to both crossovers. There is no picture of this but you get the idea. The idea being, I think, that the operation is simpler for the boys and, possibly, risk is reduced (though I hasten to add I get this from the subtext of the alternative suggestions - nobody has pointed out explicitly how BroadLeaves suggestion is dangerous). Two people suggested that the blue power needs to be moved to the right of the top crossover (I don't understand why). Then @Chimer proposed a version that sounds seductive in it's operational flexibility but sadly requiring some switches and wiring. In my last post in the other thread, tried to summarise the pros and cons of these three broad options as far as I understand them: The BroadLeaves plan, which maximises flexibility of routes but, if I understand correctly, still might have the possibility of powering the same bit of track under certain configurations. As above, I'm not sure anyone has explicitly come out and said this, but there certainly seems to be an implication this could happen. Something with breaks at both crossovers, which eliminates all possibility of powering the same track but means a crossing train needs synced/swapped controllers, so it's less flexible. I also imagine there is an outside risk of causing a big crash and/or engine damage from one loop being set to forward and the other reverse, and the engine being driven across? Something with more advanced switches and wiring such as described by @Chimer - best of both worlds (flexible routes and no chance of powering the same track) but at the cost of needing wiring and soldering. BroadLeaves is right I am very keen to avoid this as (if you couldn't tell) I have no idea what I'm doing and it means I'll probably not be able to use the kit I already have. I am erring towards option 2. I think syncing controllers is a pretty simple operation to teach them. I think it also keeps things neat - the bottom controller is for the inside, the top one for the outside. Now on to my actual questions... Is my summary above right? Can anyone say for sure if option 2 is safer than option 1? Regardless of option 1 vs 2, why does more than one person advocate for moving the blue controller to the right of the crossover? What are the actual risks of one bit of track being controlled by two controllers? Someone mentioned the potential disaster if one is on and the other is unplugged, that the 12v current of the first controller could be transformed back to 230v by the second controllerwhich would then be live at the loose plug of the second controller. In option 1 and 2 I think there is a point in time where the pick up wheel could be touching both circuits. Is this true? If so, what are the actual risks of this to the trains or layout if both controllers are on but not synced, say one is set to forwards and one is set to reverse? And ultimately what do you think is the best option from above, given my needs, or is there an even better one? Many thanks in advance!

Kris used 12mm OSB to achieve a similar effect on his layout and I’ve dropped down to 9mm ply. I’m quietly confident but will certainly be following a rigid order - flat layout first and lots of testing. Then trace the track layout and from this deduce the necessary holesaw and jigsaw cuts. The actual bits being bent will be relatively narrow, which helps. I shall then begin the bending systematically working around the board but if it doesn’t work there is no reason I couldn’t get a thinner sheet of ply or just revert to flat again. Assuming it does work, the track will then be screwed down. Looking forward to it - I admit most of the motivation for varying elevation is to maintain my own interest and give me a building challenge, but I do think the boys will appreciate some hills too. Indeed. Many of these will have to be removable - the aforementioned drawers built into the frame can hold some of this (trees) once removed and the rest will just have to be placed on the lowest part of the board during downtime.

I am following this (mostly!), thanks for everyone's input. There still seems to be a wide variety of opinions which is a little worrying. Apart from the 230v > 12v > 12v > 230v potential catastrophe (and I say that not to diminish it), what are the actual consequences of powering the same bit of track with two controllers on the running of trains or the trains themselves? If I can attempt to boil down the varying options into 3 broad categories: @BroadLeaves plan, which maximises flexibility of routes but, if I understand correctly, still might have the possibility of powering the same bit of track under certain configurations. Actually, I'm not sure anyone has explicitly come out and said this, but there certainly seems to be an implication this could happen? Something with breaks at both crossovers, which eliminates all possibility of powering the same track but means a crossing train needs synced/swapped controllers, so it's less flexible. I also imagine there is an outside risk of causing a big crash and/or engine damage from one loop being set to forward and the other reverse, and the engine being driven across? I'll call this the @RJS1977 plan. Something with more advanced switches and wiring such as described by @Chimer - best of both worlds (flexible routes and no chance of powering the same track) but at the cost of needing wiring and soldering. BroadLeaves is right I am very keen to avoid this as (if you couldn't tell) I have no idea what I'm doing and it means I'll probably not be able to use the kit I already have. I am erring towards option 2. I think syncing controllers is a pretty simple operation to teach them. It also keeps things neat - the bottom controller is for the inside, the top one for the outside. --- With 2 and 4 year old the layout has bigger issues to contend with than a dust sheet. Everything is going to need to be very robust or very cheap and easy to replace! Thanks for the ideas but like BroadLeaves I struggle to see the difference - whichever way I put it, unless trains reverse in they will end up with with the loco at the wrong end. The boys will also have 360 degree access to the board and adding some point clips seems pretty trivial, so I'll keep the layout as is. --- While the debate on the best electrical setup rages, I'm making progress on the simpler stuff. In my hobby I'm notorious for planning projects and never starting them or starting them incredibly slowly. I'm keen to avoid this fate and so I've been ordering materials left right and centre and plowing in to construction. The base board is cut and construction of the framing is well underway. I made a simple maquette to get it clear in my head where I would need to raise/lower the underlying framing and cut the base board to achieve the contours. And today me and the boys tested out Thomas and Percy on varying gradients, up, down, forwards and reverse, with varying train lengths. Happily it seems these little engines are on the powerful end of the spectrum and I won't have to worry about gradients as some of you have warned about. Percy was comfortable at 7% and topped out at 8% (just about making it to the top but with plenty of wheel spin). For his part, Thomas managed a mighty 16% while pulling the mail truck and two wagons. In reality, 7% is more than enough for me as it would allow a theoretical 7cm rise from the lowest point (north side of the board) to the south side , and then another 10cm again to the raised goods yard. And I don't actually have that much space under the bed once the depth of the baseboard, framework and castors is accounted for. I'll probably go with something like 3% and 5%, for a ~10cm total rise. This will be more than enough for the planned road tunnel under the goods yard too, without needing to notch out the frame below.

Thanks for the tips - this seems much simpler and, ease trumps cost in this case - I'd also need to buy or rent a soldering iron anyway. I have one in each set yes and was hoping to use both. Why do you say the power could be moved to the straight section of track on the inner loop, but not for the outer loop? If the top section of long straight track on the outer loop were swapped for two shorts, could one of these shorts not be the power feed section? This is useful to know thanks, particularly the difficulty of bending flexitrack on the tighter radii - I'll look at the relative cost of buying curves instead of flexitrack especially for the inner loop. Even on BroadLeaves modified version? Well, maybe so, but surely the position at which the loco passes over the rail break (your red lines), effectively means stopping it, switching that controller off, and turning on the other controller. Messy, especially if both boys are playing in any way other than each keeping to their own loop. I'm a bit confused now! BroadLeaves said that with both crossovers switched to straight, the inner loop controller controls the entire inner loop, but ITG you are suggesting that this isn't the case? To be clear @ITG the only modification you're suggesting is that insulated fishplates are put between both sets of crossover points? I can see that this literally makes the loops completely separate at all times. How does switching track work in this scenario? I'm guessing, to go from the inner to outer, say: the outer loop controller is turned off the points are switched the inner loop controller drives the engine to the point where it just about crosses the point before it loses power the inner loop controller is turned off and the outer is turned on the outer loop controller drives the train across the point the point is switched back to straight Thanks Andy. Perhaps a simple dust sheet can be found in a relevant size. How bad are we talking about though? Would a regular hoover of the points also work? I could ask the cleaners to incorporate it into their weekly routine which might keep everything ship shape. As for the locos and other removable items that are too tall to fit under the bed (trees, cranky the crane etc...), I am thinking of building some drawers into the underside of the base board which would also keep everything clean.

Legend. I'm going to print a label with those instructions to transfer between loops so it can be stuck to the side of the layout for future reference! I'm probably missing something but which one controls the right hand half of the inner loop? This seems conspiciously absent in your list! As in, both the supplementary feeds need to connect to the same rail as each other, or to the same rail as the orange controller connects to? For context the controllers that come with Percy are the attached. The pins plug in to a special port on a short straight. Assuming these are usable, will I need to splice additional wires from one or both of the wires?

As I thought then - I'll work on the assumption of no points and siding in the goods yard, and as you say, something else interesting could go up there (my eldest says it will be where all the snow and Santa's workshop is... so that might be a thing that's happening!) I'll also bear in mind a removable hill top when I start getting to grips with building this thing. It seems like it would be fairly straightforward to manufacture and would free the scenery from practical board edge constraints. I migth also move the train tunnel to the bottom left of the track so the incine goes through a tunnel - since that part of the board has relatively little going on. So the only question now is the one about insulated track/fishplates, if anyone can help? Thanks again @BroadLeaves!

Thanks both. That diagram is spot on. Yes I had wondered about the radius of the inner part of the curved point and also the accuracy of my hacked track layout programme! I like this plan a lot and think it's pretty much there. The only thing I may do is move the south platform and switching point left to allow more space for the hill and tunnel, and specifically for the full length of the tunnel to be closer to the bottom board edge to address the point I made earlier about the "access window" (is there a commonly accepted name for these?) On the point about the raised ground and road tunnel, I was taking a cue from Kris' layout where he has a combination of a modestly raised goods yard and a lowered ground level on that side of the board, making a combined apparent height difference more than the goods yard gradient alone. It's hard to tell by the photos but it looks like a hot wheels sized tunnel isn't far off fitting on Kelgh. But if that doesn't suffice, I could also notch out a road width from the underlying frame (I'm going to use 97mm timber so there is plenty of depth to mess around with) and install a separate, lower base board just for the road, in order to set the tunnel road well below the level of the base board as a whole, and have it sloping up towards the bridge over the gorge I think the points and siding in the upper goods yard are probably complicating the rise since that part (the points) presumably can't go on a transition of elevation, meaning all the height needs to have been gained before the point? In which case, I could probably sacrifice the point and siding and this would allow the track to continue rising another 25cm or so (based on my diagram and assuming a ~25cm flat bit for the goods yard itself). To be fair it was already looking a bit of a stretch to fit in a modelled bank, tunnel entrance, and stream/gorge with road bridge between the goods yard siding and the level crossing (even though your proper plan increases the distance to the level crossing by a track width or so) so this might be for the best anyway, and should push the yard up closer to 4cm in height, measured from the start of the curve). I reckon I would then "only" need to find another 3 cm between notching the frame and lowering the north side of the board wholesale to fit my tunnel in.

Thanks for the hints about the curved level crossing chaps. Heavily influenced by the layout that @Kris has made (sadly the thread now seems to have disappeared?) I've now evolved towards what I hope is a final-ish layout (final enough to begin building anyway - I imagine "no plan survives contact with the enemy" is as relevant in model railways as anywhere else) and would like to get some more feedback before I take the plunge and order track (base board and timber is being delivered tomorrow). I have taken @BroadLeaves advice and put the four points in to allow switching between the loops in both directions (the annotations though assume traffic is clockwise). There are two versions here. The only differences are the location of the hill and consequently the location of the points that allow the boys to switch between inner and outer loops. Essentially I became concerned that the northernmost entrance to the tunnels in the first version would be difficult to reach from an access "window" made along the board edge, necessitating extending that access window into the actual docks, which would ruin the scenery in the docks. So hence the second version, with a tunnel that is at most ~20cm from the edge which should mean an access window along the board edge only suffices. But as a consequence I had to move the inner to outer switch onto the curved ends of the track, which seems like it would work using curved points but is one of my questions that follow. I've kept the board to 95cm wide but expanded to 180 long just to give a bit more breathing room at the docks and goods yard. While I've kept the radius colour coding I now assume I will use flexible track for pretty much everything apart from the points. The level crossing is sited where it is because I hope to build a road tunnel accessing the board from the top left under the raised goods yard, the road will then cross a small bridge over the gorge and hence to the level crossing. In addition to general opinions I have a few specific questions: Is there any issue using curved points as I have done? Is there anything more interesting you think I could be doing with the tracks at the docks? Right now it just has a sort of storage siding for unused trucks. Likewise is there anything more interesting I could do with the loco shed? Most crucially of all, where and how do I need to use insulated rail sections or fishplates to make the two loops individually controllable?

Great info thanks. Does this method (single base board) offer much more than the alternative of adding slopes on top of an uncut base board? I first thought about using 3mm MDF on a series of supports. I can imagine that a single base board creates more natural inclines though. I definitely want to have a level crossing but would move it to one of the short edges, saving the width, which means it will go over curved tracks - probably precluding the use of any commercially available kit, but making one from scratch with plasticard doesn't seem like it would be too difficult. I like your shelf idea and will bear it in mind should it prove too difficult to squeeze everything into 97cm.

Okay, that doesn’t seem too arduous? Although I’ll definitely consider if the small variation from a standard oval really makes enough of a difference to justify the complication. yes I’m definitely interested in the ability to switch tracks, I didn’t draw that as I was only getting the basics down and because it’s much more difficult to draw smooth s bends in PowerPoint than simple curves! Right, track screws it is, perfect! you’re probably right about the ballast. In this case I think I’ll use painted/washed 1 or 2mm cork for the ballast - giving the track a little height and satisfying a little of my modelling desire while keeping all track removable. Ha! Amazing. You’ve pretty much already done what I imagined! Thanks so much for the link - I’ll be reading through it carefully. Do you use standard track to do the inclines (specifically the transitions between two angles of incline) or is there some special type that must be bought? How wide is it and if you didn’t have the turnout on the long edge that necessitates widening the board, how wide would it be? Studying the slopes it looks like the approach is actually partially cutting and forcibly changing the elevation of parts of the same base board? Is this how you went about it - mount the entire baseboard on a slope from the engine shed side towards the station. Then cut and raise the goods yard branch, and cut and raise or layer a piece to bring the central sidings back to level.

Thanks. I reckon connection of the two circuits would be fun. Will cross the isolation bridge closer to the time. In the room it varies between around 16 to 21 in the winter and perhaps 20 and 23 degrees in the summer. Not sure if thats a lot of variation or not? Nice one James - good to know from someone who's done it that I'm not barking up the wrong tree. I take it buying in to those track "systems" precludes using any of the existing? I'd have to think carefully about it, looking at those two links it looks like full layout, even a small one, would rapidly get expensive. And if it proves the kids want to experiment more I'm not averse to ripping up the layout and letting them do a new one - with new track if needs be. Would pinning with small tacks as per the official Hornby starter video work, as that seems the easiest way to make it removable? Though it precludes my idea of realistic looking ballast - I shall have to live without! Amazing thanks! And your properly done version tells me my hacked together one (posted at almost the same time) wasn't too far off. Those operations sound too complex but I assume in a couple of years it would be more realistic to expect them to be able to pull it off. What do you think of my version that mixes some 3rd with 1st to achieve the same total radius of two 2nds? Is that a thing that can be done?