Careful with MTH / Miniatronics Terminal boards

Pretty impressive. I would suggest either replacing the split washers with star washers or better yet replace the nuts with brass and solder them to the board.

Pete

Same thing can happen to MTH's TIU. I have had it happen. Had to open TIU and tighten everything up.

Yikes...will have to take a look at mine!

Thanks for the Head's  up.    I'm  guess the dcs signal  also went  south?.

    Bright Idea.. Maybe we  all should have a maintenance day  checking & tightening all connections.

Good idea on the maintenance day, I checked my TIU a few weeks ago, but no the terminal blocks. Those may get a look this evening, right after dinner.

I was putting my newest TIU back in place after an upgrade and noticed the lugs felt funny. I opened it up and all the lugs were loose inside.

 I then opened up my first version L too. All those were tight.

Maybe the new one got overlooked at the factory? I always tighten lugs from what I've learned about arcing.

The loose nuts and arching are caused by running Erie-Lackawanna equipment on a layout.  If you run equipment representing a real railroad, such as the Pennsy, you won't experience these issues.  

All joking aside thanks for the heads up!

-Greg

Ben, are you sure Vinnie didn't use them to ignite the grill??!

I think that happens with penn central equipment. I don't think layouts like the red headed step child of the railroad industry

Brian, we use the ZWL for that. It has more power.

See you at York!

Gerry

Ben, what was the load on this.

Ben, It is time to come clean.  You spilled beer on it, I know you did.

Ben, you can get a slightly used one at Dozzuer's on DeKalb ave. They're  only 4.95.

Alex

Wow, thank you. I have ten of them on the layout, maybe time for lock tight or something like it on the treads.

Thank you Ben. I have two 12 port and two 24 port terminal boards. So far I am just using the 24 port ones, but only connect up to 15 blocks on them. Nothing is running yet. But I  will check them. The layout is waiting for a fastrack order to come in.                                                                                                                                                       Fred in New Hope

On the serious side, that is a great tip that Ben is passing on.    Always listen to what he has to say.

Good thing we have a fire chief in the club!

I've also had the loose nut issue on the posts for a Z-Controller.  Seems the doctor is right and you should check your nuts from time to time to make sure everything is in order.  

JGL

Marty Fitzhenry posted:

Ben, what was the load on this.

 

Ben, It is time to come clean.  You spilled beer on it, I know you did.

We were using this block as power distribution for lighting  We were using an older syle MRC 275 watt Dual o27 transformer   No meters on that one so really don't know what the load  was drawing

Thanks for the heads up. I will check mine today.

Wow, thank you. I have ten of them on the layout, maybe time for lock tight or something like it on the treads.

I would be very hesitant to use Locktite or any other thread locker. I assume they are insulators. I would not want to impede the electrical flow.

Maybe a second nut as a jam nut, or even better, use a locknut as a jam nut. It looks like there is room.

I have two of the large MTH terminal strips - both had loose nuts. It was a PITA to get to and remove with all the wires, but I managed to get a wrench behind them and tightened the nuts. This and other people's experiences make it a good idea to keep a fire extinguisher handy - mine is a right upstairs in the kitchen, one in the basement is a good idea.

THANK YOU. I'll plan to pull them off my control panel and make sure they are tight before I start landing wires (and I am almost there). I'm thinking it would be a good idea to coat the threads with Copper-coat and change the nuts out to nylon lock nuts.