Understanding DCS Wiring practices

Ray,

  I am planning on starting a layout later this year (after I move into the new house) so I will be following the answers to your questions closely.

  I have to say however, wether you like the customers on your sidings or not, there is no reason to have insulting sidings!!  In fact if I know the railroad called my spur an insulting siding I might just want to ship my goods by truck!

Just having some fun - pretty sure you meant insulated siding.

Have a good day,

JZ

Insulated sidings are needed for holding conventional engines.  trust me, very  good chance you will buy at least one "special" engine which is only available  conventional.

The larger the layout the more important insulated blocks are for finding shorts.

Finding a shorted circuit on a layout without the capability of turning off insulated blocks could be a nightmare. tt

Since you have DCS, this will be for command control. If you want to run conventional, maybe someone else will be along to explain that as I don't have any conventional. I am also fairly new to this, but I'll give it try.

For your 12 x 8 layout, I would think blocks of about 8-10' would be ok. So you would have approx. 4 blocks per track loop. Wired in a star setup as per your DCS book, which I would refer to as the proper way to do things. If this post deviates from the that, I would go with the book method.

Command control uses a fixed 18 volts so for power so you could use 2 Lionel 180 watt power bricks, 1 for each TIU input, Fixed 1 & 2. Or you could use  a couple MTH Z1000's. Other power sources would do as well, but these are modern types and have good breakers built in, unlike some of the older transformers available. TVS diodes across the outputs are recommended for each loop also. The power should be properly phased also. This is important with blocks & separate loops.

You would isolate the center (or power) rail for blocks and/or sidings. You would isolate the center rail between the turnouts connecting your 2 loops, giving you 2 separate loops. From your TIU use Fixed 1 Out for 1 loop and Fixed 2 Out for the other. It would be nice if you had switches or relays to kill power to your sidings as the MTH engines keep the usage clock ticking even when shut down, unless you power down the track they are parked on. 

I use Atlas-O track and have no idea what MTH track uses for centers. Atlas is 4-1/2" and Lionel Fastrak is 6" centers if that gives you an idea. MTH should say somewhere what their track is on centers. With O-42 as your largest curve you are limited to smaller engines with tighter turning ability so You should be able to use closer centers. I know some of the folks that have the large articulated steamers requiring O-72 curves say minimum 6" centers. I don't have any steam so can only say what I have read here. I have no test track yet either, so maybe someone else will be along for that as well.

Hope that helps some and doesn't further confuse things for you.

What scale engines will you be running on 031 track?  With PS2/PS3 engines you really don't NEED any isolation between the loops, as each engine can be controlled from the DCS handheld.

I've been using a piece of Gargraves flextrack for my programming track, doesn't need to be hooked up to the layout as long as the TIU can be connected to it.

Bob D sent this to me: "What scale engines will you be running on 031 track?  With PS2/PS3 engines you really don't NEED any isolation between the loops, as each engine can be controlled from the DCS handheld."

Bob, I have both PS2 and PS3, might run some conventional but only one engine at a time. Not certain what you mean by "What scale engines...." I have some F7's, and 0-8-0 and a 4-6-4 from MTH Railking. The boxes say that these will operate on 031.

I like you idea of programming engines on a separate track not associated with the layout. Great idea. Thanks

Ray,

Thank you for purchasing The DCS O Gauge Companion 2nd Edition.

Have you read Part III - DCS Implementation closely and in it's entirety? If you do, it should provide enough information to allow you to make intelligent decisions regarding your block wiring and power demands, and should also suffice to answer most, if not all of your questions.