z500 or z1000

I believe the z500 is DC only, which I think will work fine with Lionchief engines, but perhaps not so good with other types of engines. I think any engines that have command control circuitry in them will not work with DC power supplies.

The z-1000 is a very good power supply; most here will say it is better than the CW-80 you are currently using. (I personally have used both with good results)

When you ask if you can also use one of these, are you wanting to use it instead of the CW-80 or are you wanting to run two trains on independent loops of track , or are you wanting to use the CW-80 and the other transformer on the same loop of track? The first two can be done, but I would think just about anyone on this board would advise against hooking two variable transformers to a single loop of track.

If you are just wanting to replace the CW-80, just unhook the wires going from the track to the CW-80 from the transformer and hook them up to the MTH transformer. If the bell and whistle buttons work opposite, flip the wires on the back of the transformer (or at the track if it is easier).

If you are wanting to run two trains on separate loops, leave the CW80 hooked up as is, on one loop, then hook the MTH transformer to your track with one wire going from the red terminal on the transformer to the center rail, and the black terminal going to either outer rail. If the sound buttons work the opposite sound, flip the wires as stated above.  If the two loops are connected (such as two loops joined together with a pair of switches) the junction between the two needs to be insulated at least at the center rail. If this is what you are wanting to do, tell us, as there are additional wiring requirements (called transformer phasing if you care to do a search to spoil the plot )

Wiring two transformers in parallel is perfectly fine when they have the same input and output ratings. But that's not what you have with any two of the three transformers you mentioned, and they are variable outputs to boot. You could theoretically adjust them so they have the same output voltage, and that may work for some things, but other engine's circuits may get "confused" by the two different chopped sine waves (assuming they do have different waves)

Hope this helps, or is at least a start for you,

J White

PDTrains,

    IMO always over power your layouts for expansion, Z1000 or bigger when upgrading transformers.  If you already have an old  Lionel ZW, use it, with 10 Amp resettable Breakers between the old ZW and your TIU, great old power supplies, both the 250 and the 275.

PCRR/Dave

The Z-500 is best left for accessory power or as TIU power supply. The Z-1000 is similar to the CW-80.

What you need to know is that if you want to use the brick only as a fixed power source, you should use the adapter cord (50-1017) that MTH makes. The hot and the common for track power are reversed in the barrel connector coming from the brick. The adapter cord simply provides the correct red as hot and black as common. You'll have to check the output voltage also as some MTH transformers can output 20-21 volts, which is too high for Lionel Legacy, TMCC or LionChief engines.

When using with the controller for conventional operation of trains, it won't work the horn and whistle of modern Lionel. Ok for everything else.

The Z-1000 also has the fixed 14v accessory terminals, which make it more useful. These are correctly marked.

j white posted:

I believe the z500 is DC only, which I think will work fine with Lionchief engines, but perhaps not so good with other types of engines. I think any engines that have command control circuitry in them will not work with DC power supplies.

Unless something has changed that I never heard about, the Z-500 is an AC supply, identical in operation to the Z-750 or Z-1000.  The "full" set consists of the Z Controller and a 50 watt transformer brick.

Z500 is definitely AC output.

I apologize for giving incorrect information on the Z-500. I was thinking of the Z-DC that came with my trolley. I was unaware they made a Z-500; I thought it was just the Z-750 and the Z-1000.

J White

     The Z-500 output is 18V  AC   54W

John Knapp

Erie, not Eerie