Ground/return Bus

Your LED's need to be connected to the DC power supply terminals only. The ground bus for your trains and accessories is not the ground for your DC power pack. I personally would not tie the AC ground together with the DC ground.

Larry

It is my understanding that you can use one common for your LED circuit and for the neutral for track power.  I have used it for occupancy circuit using DC and LEDs.

Happy railroading,

Don

The 60Hz AC we run our trains on does not conduct via 'skin effect', ie along the surface of the wire.  This phenomenon does not occur until much higher radio frequencies like UHF and microwave.

As far as a common return, using one for AC train power and DC LED power will not present an issue while running conventional.

Cliff,

The 60Hz AC we run our trains on does not conduct via 'skin effect', ie along the surface of the wire.

It's not the 60 cycle AC that's the issue. It's the much higher frequency DCS data packets that are the issue. They do, indeed, travel on the surface of the wire.

Thank you to all for your replies! As always, this is a great place to learn new things! It's not that much more effort to run two more dedicated bus wires. I didn't know that there was an advantage to using stranded wire so is there a recommended gauge? We're probably talking 18 to 20 feet end-to-end. Also, I plan to connect the transformer at the mid-points of the bus(es) if that makes any difference.

Rick;

I would avoid Romex simply due to the excessive stiffness of it.

I use heavy duty speaker wire, woven and flexible but able to carry large current without dropping a lot of voltage.

Rich,

I didn't know that there was an advantage to using stranded wire so is there a recommended gauge? We're probably talking 18 to 20 feet end-to-end

For those short distances, 16 gauge stranded wire is fine.

That works for me!