Good morning blue.
I have been working on installing a booster for the layout for 4 days now and I finally have it working. Am I happy? No for the short answer.
I have 12-14 sound equipped units on the layout ready to run with a flip of a switch and no problems using 1156 light bulbs to protect the
districts (4). Everything worked as it should but I noticed I did not have enough current to run several 3-4 engine consist trains and they
were slowing down when running, but still running as they should. I thought the answer would be the MRC 1521 8 amp booster and more districts.
I bought 10 Voltscooters and just to get things going again I stayed with the 4 districts but instead of the bulbs I placed the
voltscooters in their place. Next were the test trips. This is when the fun began. I tripped one and everything went down. (I had left them set
at the 3 amp out of the package.) The layout would not reset and I lost the command line too. I guessed the original PA2 had tripped causing the
booster to trip out too.
I began searching for solutions. I knew I had to protect the command station from a trip because the command station tripping causes
the command line to the booster to go down shutting down everything which defeats the idea of districts. The fix, reduce the voltscooter to
that district to the 1.1 amp setting by removing all the jumpers and retest. Same thing.
The original PA2 supplies track power to one isolated district where the booster currently supplies the other 3. The only connection
between the PA2 base and the booster is the CAT cable which also carries the command buss.
So now I am thinking a short in the first voltscooter so I replace it and still the same results. So after trying and tripping each
track and everything continues to go down I think what is happening is the booster is tripping from an onrush of current trying to refill all
the capacitors of the decoders on the powered tracks. (I have yard tracks with switches so they are dead). Strange to me is with the 2.5
amp original station, 4 light bulbs for district protection and many sound locomotives on active track I never had any problems with the PA2
tripping at the base and when one district shorted the others were fine. I could turn on a switch and the layout would power without a trip. Now
with a booster I could start the layout without a problem even with a lot of locomotives but with a test trip everything went down and stayed
down until power was removed from the track. After removing 5 locomotives from the track everything works the way it should, but the
reason for the booster was to run more trains, not less. The problem seems to be the booster unit is tripping at too low a current at a much
faster rate than the voltscooters.
I somewhat fixed the PA2 base district problem by replacing the voltscooter with a 1156 light bulb and it remains up and the command
buss remains unaffected by a short. Now what started as a neatly wired batch of districts and breakers looks like a real mess.
I finally decided last night to go back to the beginning and usr the PA2 base unit and reset the voltscooters to 1.1 amp each. Without the booster in the mix everything works as it should. At the suggestion of a member on the MRC DCC group I am going to place the booster on one district with no additional circuit protection and see how many locomotives it will handle before tripping. He tells me I should be able to leave at least 30 on the layout ready to power up with out tripping. That sounds logical because I have had as many as 16 with just the 3 amp PA squared.
In other news, we have been trying to locate a male dog as a companion to our female Bonnie. She is still grieving over the death of Beck September 25.
There are not many rescues to be had if you take Pit Bulls off the list. I am not afraid of Pitties but my insurance company doesn't rate them as a good risk, and I don't think our vet would be as kind as a friends vet was 10 years ago when he adopted a pure black and white spotted pit female. She was really a sweetheart and his vet listed her as a Dalmation mix
.
We have snow flurries here but it is to warm slighty so just a little more rain.
I will be putting locomotives on track to do a test and then more than likely boxing a unit up and sending for warranty repair or replacement.
Cheers and smiles
Charlie
I have been working on installing a booster for the layout for 4 days now and I finally have it working. Am I happy? No for the short answer.
I have 12-14 sound equipped units on the layout ready to run with a flip of a switch and no problems using 1156 light bulbs to protect the
districts (4). Everything worked as it should but I noticed I did not have enough current to run several 3-4 engine consist trains and they
were slowing down when running, but still running as they should. I thought the answer would be the MRC 1521 8 amp booster and more districts.
I bought 10 Voltscooters and just to get things going again I stayed with the 4 districts but instead of the bulbs I placed the
voltscooters in their place. Next were the test trips. This is when the fun began. I tripped one and everything went down. (I had left them set
at the 3 amp out of the package.) The layout would not reset and I lost the command line too. I guessed the original PA2 had tripped causing the
booster to trip out too.
I began searching for solutions. I knew I had to protect the command station from a trip because the command station tripping causes
the command line to the booster to go down shutting down everything which defeats the idea of districts. The fix, reduce the voltscooter to
that district to the 1.1 amp setting by removing all the jumpers and retest. Same thing.
The original PA2 supplies track power to one isolated district where the booster currently supplies the other 3. The only connection
between the PA2 base and the booster is the CAT cable which also carries the command buss.
So now I am thinking a short in the first voltscooter so I replace it and still the same results. So after trying and tripping each
track and everything continues to go down I think what is happening is the booster is tripping from an onrush of current trying to refill all
the capacitors of the decoders on the powered tracks. (I have yard tracks with switches so they are dead). Strange to me is with the 2.5
amp original station, 4 light bulbs for district protection and many sound locomotives on active track I never had any problems with the PA2
tripping at the base and when one district shorted the others were fine. I could turn on a switch and the layout would power without a trip. Now
with a booster I could start the layout without a problem even with a lot of locomotives but with a test trip everything went down and stayed
down until power was removed from the track. After removing 5 locomotives from the track everything works the way it should, but the
reason for the booster was to run more trains, not less. The problem seems to be the booster unit is tripping at too low a current at a much
faster rate than the voltscooters.
I somewhat fixed the PA2 base district problem by replacing the voltscooter with a 1156 light bulb and it remains up and the command
buss remains unaffected by a short. Now what started as a neatly wired batch of districts and breakers looks like a real mess.
I finally decided last night to go back to the beginning and usr the PA2 base unit and reset the voltscooters to 1.1 amp each. Without the booster in the mix everything works as it should. At the suggestion of a member on the MRC DCC group I am going to place the booster on one district with no additional circuit protection and see how many locomotives it will handle before tripping. He tells me I should be able to leave at least 30 on the layout ready to power up with out tripping. That sounds logical because I have had as many as 16 with just the 3 amp PA squared.
In other news, we have been trying to locate a male dog as a companion to our female Bonnie. She is still grieving over the death of Beck September 25.
There are not many rescues to be had if you take Pit Bulls off the list. I am not afraid of Pitties but my insurance company doesn't rate them as a good risk, and I don't think our vet would be as kind as a friends vet was 10 years ago when he adopted a pure black and white spotted pit female. She was really a sweetheart and his vet listed her as a Dalmation mix
. We have snow flurries here but it is to warm slighty so just a little more rain.
I will be putting locomotives on track to do a test and then more than likely boxing a unit up and sending for warranty repair or replacement.
Cheers and smiles
Charlie