GGD 20th century lmtd cars

Well why not start another project just to make it more fun? I haven't even finished the Niagara.

I finally got one of these cars started up on the bench. The 2 rails wheels are a little sloppy so I added nylon washers. This is my attempt and making power pick-ups. I'll have to test and see if it will work before I do them all. I will need to get one LED strip going first up inside. I wanted to order some mini bearings and see if I could install them inside the trucks. I forgot all about it!

I put in 12 volt strip LEDs. I turned them down to 9.5 volts and they are still very bright. The camera makes them look even brighter!

A very interesting, thread, Joe.  

A trick with LEDs is to paint them over (yellow or similar).  It can dim them individually to create a better "feel" when you're looking at the car from the side.

Cheers

Joe  While you have it apart for lighting upgrade you may want to consider the upgrades John Sethian's  made to the lighting in his Sunset Congressional cars.  He replaced the old lighting strip with LED's and uses a capacitor circuit to eliminate flicker.  When I made similar changes to my Sunset Broadway Limited  Observation I played with resistor values to reduce lighting intensity - different values for the tail sign than for the ceiling lights.  Below are my notes for my upgrades. As you'll read I played with the upper half of the 2 piece floor bring it in to a more prototypical height relative to the windows.  The height mismatch was most noticeable in the dining car as the table top should be below the window.

Sunset 48 Broadway Limited Observation Car upgrades:

• Paint furniture & floor – recommend unscrewing wall sections to facilitate painting the floor
• Add people and furniture as desired
• Lower the interior floor (.077&rdquo in the body
  • Remove the six .097 mounting bushings between the plastic interior floor and the steel sub-floor.
  • Cement .020” Evergreen plastic strips to top of the sub-floor
  • Address any protrusions > than .020” above the sub-floor
    • Counter sink holes in plastic floor for wall mounting screws
    • Drill clearance holes in plastic floor for truck bolster assembly screws and any other screws coming up from below protruding > .020”
  • Reinstall interior floor to steel sub-floor with existing screws (6)
• Add hand rails to interior of windows along aisles
  • .02” steel wire piano wire for lightweights – brass for heavyweights
  • Install with dab of hot glue beyond side of glass
• Frost bathroom window glass by sanding interior of plastic window with fine emery paper

Lighting upgrades (factory lighting does not fully illuminate the car, is too bright, and flickers)

• For matched appearance, use a spare GGD lighting strip to provide pre mounted LED’s - 1 LED section for “regular” cars, 2 LED sections for the observation car (the lounge needs full lighting)
• Chop the LED section(s) of the printed circuit board so when spliced the LED’s will be spaced uniformly along the length of the car.
• Splice the new LED (s) to the original light strip.
  • Epoxy the two together with a plastic or PCB lap plate
  • Scratch insulation off the circuit board traces and solder jumper wires across the gaps
• Solder a 1K ohm resistor (820 for an observation car) in series with the track input to the GGD LED . This can be done either in the lead from the board to the underside of the car or by “interrupting” the trace on the printed circuit board to the track input side of the voltage regulator (the small black can) and soldering the resister directly to the interrupted trace.
• Install capacitor and resistors to eliminate flicker (circuit compliments of John Sethian)
  • Install a 2200uf cap in series with 100 ohm resistor across the output of the GGD strips’ voltage regulator (the small round black can). A solder connection can be made anywhere downstream (the LED side) of the voltage regulator by scratching some of the insulating film off the printed circuit board trace.
  • The cap and resistor were soldered side saddle to GGD lighting strip - note the observation car required 4400 uf (two 2200uf caps in parallel) to eliminate flicker due to additional current draw of the marker lights and tail sign
• Power the tail sign and marker lights off the GG LED board voltage regulator output
  • Solder a polarized (red/black) miniature female connector leads to the top side traces of the GGD board. As with the Cap & resistor above, anywhere to the LED side output of GGD voltage regulator
  • Add series resistors to the leads to the tail sign marker LED’s to reduce intensity
    • 1k ohm for markers
    • 2200 ohm for tail sign
  • Solder the marker and tail sign leads in parallel to a male miniature polarized connector. Adhere to the LED polarity requirements when making the connections through to the GGD board.
• Test the lighting to see if light is coming into the inside of the car from the tail sign LED (mine was). Apply black paint around the area of the LED inside the car to block the stray light.
• Re-route the feeder wires to the overhead strip to better hide them
  • Drill a wire pass through hole in the floor of a “closed” room (like washroom) near the end of the car. The hole is best located above (and hidden by) the truck bolster assembly plate.
  • Removed the connector on the GGD LED strip so the floor assembly walls can slide into the car with the light strip pre- installed
  • Solder the track power lead wires to the GGD strip
  • As you slide the floor into the body pass the lighting leads from the GGD board through the access
  • Solder the red/black under floor lighting wires to overhead power feeds in the area of the truck bolster assembly – allow plenty of slack and push the excess into the car body when re-installing the truck bolster assembly. (An alternative to soldered wires would be to drill the wire pass through hole large enough to accommodate a miniature connector)
• Add steam, air, and signal lines on rear of obs. (PSC parts)
• Replace diaphragm(s) with taller ones from Keil Line
• Painted wheel set faces, backs, and axels

Ed Rappe

Wow Ed, those caps could probably keep the lights on if the car fell off the tracks!

I posted in the electrical column about the upgrade. There was a 470uf cap already in this car. I re-used it and the bridge rectifier to provide power to a boost board from ebay. That powers the 12v LED self stick strips.

 I will use your post on the end observation car whenever I get to it. I'm doing six things at once. I got the urge to see one of these cars roll on my tracks.

 Your window handrails are seen from the outside? I need to find a real picture.

 I got sloppy with a wire and I can see it going up to the roof. I should have used the partitions to mask it better.

I saw a small package fell out of the box with 2 air hoses? I think they're for that end observation car? This second set's box is a little tattered from wear. No paperwork in either set.

I found John's cars. I can't find a post of his alterations?

https://ogrforum.com/t...arrived-on-my-layout