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Digitrax Question- Direct Home Wiring and Detection Journals/Blogs
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Active Member 86 posts Dustin Active Member 86 posts
Dustin

I plan on purchasing the 5A Super Chief Duplex system for running my layout. I also plan on using their BDL168 detection boards for my hidden staging and DS64's to throw my turnouts.

When reading the pdf manual for the detection boards, Digitrax states that Home wiring is the best method. This makes sense to me, but their diagram doesn't make sense (or at least it isn't clear). It shows a typical installation for a detector board with Direct Home and Whole Layout Common wiring. I can't understand (from their diagram) where the differnce is between the two. See below:

20wiring.JPG 

20Wiring.JPG 

 

My layout is small. It is in a 10 x 10 room with 35 linear feet at most of run around the walls. My plan was to only have one booster as I don't need any more power than that for this size of a layout. I was debating on whether or not to sub divide this single power district into smaller power districts. On a two operator layout, short detection isn't a huge deal for me.

This has all gotten me confused from reading those diagrams. Can I hook several DS168's up in one zone by continuing the Zone Common along to the next board using diagram 1 above? The diagram on the bottom is confusing because it is drawn more like what I imagine doing. I am assuming in the bottom diagram, multiple boosters are hooked up in series in one big power district rather than multiple single booster districts?

I only need one district as my layout is small. The BDL168 manual also says to keep the Zone common to less than 10' using 12G wiring. That would mean I can't get my boards far enough away from my booster without having to get another booster which I dont need. I need to go at least 20' on either side of the single booster...

Somebody please help!

Thanks a million,

 

Dustin
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Brian Clogg Regular poster 277 posts
Brian Clogg

bdl168

That is a good question.I just reread that part of the manual and didn't notice that before.You could ask the Digitrax Yahoo group.

digitrax@yahoogroups.com

 

Brian Clogg

British Columbia Railway

Squamish Subdivision

http://www.CWRailway.ca
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jarhead Prolific poster 1,734 posts
jarhead

Digitrax

I know that the thing in vogue is to add boosters to the DCC system.  My old On30 layout which was part of the tour for the NMRA show here in South Florida. I had 300 feet of mainline plus heaven knows how many more feet of yard and switching areas. I ran three trains continiuosly plus did swithing on the side for more than 5 hours consecutively using my Digitrax Chief connected normally. Using feeder wires every six feet and I never had any issues with lack of power. The reason I chose dcc for the simplicity. Now they are coming out with boosters, blocks, power districts,etc. It seems that we are using DCC with the analog mentallity. The biggest advantage of DCC is to minimize the amount of wires and switches on the layout. Keep it simple. I've been using DCC since the 80's and that is what makes it so great.

 

 

Nick Biangel 

USMC
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kleaverjr Prolific poster 2,853 posts
kleaverjr

If you have a very small

If you have a very small layout with not many locomotives, perhaps.  But if have a large number of locomotives, not breaking the layout up into seperate power districts and train blocks can cause problems.  What ends up happening is one train that derails can shut down the layout.  Now even if it's for a few seconds, it really does spoil the fun.  i should know, having operated on such a layout with only the one booster with the command station.  One train would derail, and the whole layout stopped working.  Things are further complicated if you have multiple sound equiped decoders, which draw signfiicant amounts of current.  And finally, if you want block detection, you are going to have to seperate the electrical/wiring into at least train blocks.

The idea of only needing two wires to hook up DCC to the track is more a "sales slogan" than practical application with the exception of smaller layouts with only a handful of locomotives. 
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Shenandoah New member 14 posts
Shenandoah

Direct vs. Whole wiring

It appears from the diagram posted a difference is the use of a 10K ohm resistor in the whole wiring on the detection common.

According the Digitrax web site, you can use the RD2 Remote Sensing Diode to eliminate long runs of heavy gauge wire from the track to the detection unit.  See: http://www.digitrax.com/prd_statdec_rd2.php

The use of the RD2 would be cheaper than having to purchase another booster.

I use the the DCC Specialties power shields to sub-divide for power districts.

I haven't begun detection/signaling on my layout yet so I am interested in others' experiences, especially using the Digitrax components.

Jim Brewer
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