05-03-2010, 06:43 PM
I think that some modellers saw a big control panel as a bit of a status symbol, too - the more lights and knobs and switches, the more impressive it looked. Of course, in those days, much of that hardware was necessary to make the layout function properly.
For my layout, the only complicated (at least for me it was complicated) wiring was to enable throttle choice by flicking a couple of switches. My solution perhaps wasn't the simplest, but it drove me nuts (I'm close enough I coulda walked
) for several months, as I couldn't get my newest acquisition, a PWM throttle, to work. I even took it back to the manufacturer to have it checked out. One day, as I was fooling around with the wiring (well, just sorta poking at it, hoping for some divine intervention, I suppose) it suddenly started working. 
After running trains for a while, I switched over to one of the other throttles, and then back to the PWM. Nothing!
That's when it finally dawned on me that one of the brand-new, DPDT, centre-off switches was defective. By switching the power feed from the fixed DC terminals to the AC ones, I was able to wire it in with the circuit for the SCR throttles, and it's been working fine ever since.
Wayne
For my layout, the only complicated (at least for me it was complicated) wiring was to enable throttle choice by flicking a couple of switches. My solution perhaps wasn't the simplest, but it drove me nuts (I'm close enough I coulda walked
) for several months, as I couldn't get my newest acquisition, a PWM throttle, to work. I even took it back to the manufacturer to have it checked out. One day, as I was fooling around with the wiring (well, just sorta poking at it, hoping for some divine intervention, I suppose) it suddenly started working. After running trains for a while, I switched over to one of the other throttles, and then back to the PWM. Nothing!
That's when it finally dawned on me that one of the brand-new, DPDT, centre-off switches was defective. By switching the power feed from the fixed DC terminals to the AC ones, I was able to wire it in with the circuit for the SCR throttles, and it's been working fine ever since.Wayne