Improving signal strength on long section

I hope you have both ground rails wired together.  Did you take the black off the center rail?  How close are your drops?  How long are your blocks and do you have only one drop per block?  

Have you placed a locomotive on the section of the layout that has the worst signal and  take a light bulb with wired leads and go around the track touching the rails to find a sweet spot that boosts signal?  

Thanks for your response Marty. You have some good suggestions to try and I will work on them tommorrow.

I do not have the ground rails tied together. I will try that.

Did not take the blackenning off the center rail surface. Trains have run on it for longer than i have the DCS so wondering if all the wear from rollers might have done that over the years. Certainly worth a try.

Blocksa are created naturally between the Gargraves switches. The twisted pair home run is generally wired to the center of the section . Most blocks are 6-8 sections of Gargraves . I have one block that is about 12 sections long and strength is 9s and 8s in that one except at one end where i saw a 6. Where there are short sections such as at crossovers, i have jumpered these together and treated the group as one block.

with the last suggestion, I am asuming that the placement of the lamp where it gives max signal strenght to the locomotive, ie the sweet spot is a location where a lamp should be added permanently. Is that correct?

Thanks for your ideas, I will try them out and see how we do.

Do not remove any blackening on Gargraves track. It has absolutely no effect on the DCS signal. My layout is all Gargraves with no DCS signal issues.

The only caveat with Gargraves or Ross trackage is to remove the oily protective coating that's on the track when its new.

On the other hand, dirt on the track will adversely affect the DCS signal. Clean the track and see if things improve.

I have a short section of track maybe 6 feet that has its own pair and the signal strength is like 5's and 6's .Its adjacent to the long section described above.Not sure why this is happenning as it seens wired properly.

That's a good question,, It seems sometimes longer blocks are better than  a number off short ones,  I'd bet money (if I had any) that if you removed the one Hot track feeder from the short block at the terminal strips and jumpered the insulated joint with alligator clips the signal would improve. On the other hand both blocks might go south  . You never know until you try it.    Easy to try.

Gregg,

    In reality it is not the length of the track that matters so much, it's the track joins that really degrade the DCS signal, I use the 36" long FasTrack pieces to help eliminate signal drop.  If you use the 12 track join rule, and use Marty's magic light trick in isolated areas, you can have 10's thru out your layout, even on multi-levels.

PCRR/Dave

 Hi Dave. I hear you and it's  probably a good place to start. However I can give you an example,, 3 short blocks about 10 feet long yield a dcs signal of 4s 5s 6s . Make 1 30 foot block (now more track joints) and get a perfect dcs signal of 10. Yes there were other blocks on the same channel with a good signal.  Go figure.

Barry, we will have that conversation at York.  It does help.  I have proved this many times on large layouts.

Marty,

What you've done is remove the oily protective coating that comes on new Gargraves and Ross track. When you took off the blackening, you took off the coating. It's the coating that destroys the DCS signal by covering the pickup rollers.

My layout is all Gargraves with blackened center rail,. It operates just great with DCS, because I wiped the coating off every piece of new track I used to build it.

Marty,

That's my point.

Earlier, you posted that you removed the blackening. As I surmised, what you actaully did was clean the track.

The blackening can stay. It's the protective oil that must be cleaned off.

We are in agreement!

A Scotch-brite is my weapon of choice.  I clean the top of the rail.  I take the black off.

Marty,

I take the black off

I use a rag with Life-Like track cleaner, or sometimes Isopropyl alcohol. Takes off the dirt and the oil, and leaves the blackening intact.

Precisely what material composes the blackening?

Robert,

Precisely what material composes the blackening?

I haven't a clue, however, it's benign as regards the DCS signal.

However, the blackening on both Atlas O track and MTH RealTrax (older product, MTH no longer uses center rail blackening, I believe), should be completely removed for use with DCS as it can interfere with the DCS signal.

Someone said that.

Guys. Thanks for all the comments and suggestions. I had some eye surgery this morning and as soon as my Vision gets back to normal , I am going to try the rack cleaning suggestions followed by the jumpering of the common rails and a strategic light bulb placement and see how that works out. As for the short section with poorer signal, I think iam going to try and combine it with the longer section behind it which is giving 9's .

Any thoughts about upgrading the tiu with a rev L as a means to enhance the signal strength ?

Thanks guys you are the best.

Back in the early days when  DCS was released I stumbled across the lightbulb trick.  Having been involved with the guys who were building big layouts many bulb tricks were used to obtain perfect DCS signal.  Here is my favorite one I made and used often.  It is an 18 volt lightbulb mounted on a truck with a pickup roller.  As mentioned earlier, stop your locomotive on the spot on your track that is giving you the lowest signal reading.  With the locomotive under signal test, roll the truck with the bulb slowly around your track.  When you hit the (you will) sweet spot that kicks your signal strength to 10, that is the spot you want to attach a bulb to your track.  On tubular track a lighted lockon works great.  I hope this helps.

If you go to rev L you can do away with the lightbulbs.