Vista dome passenger car lighting advice

DON'T!!!

It'll be lit up like a Christmas tree, how are the riders going to see?!?!?!  It would be like turning all the interior lights on in your car at night.

If you must light the car, let the brightness from the LEDs down below do the job.

I must not be making myself clear. I'm replacing a couple of bulbs. No leds down below now. Was just gonna put em on the roof per usual, but hafta go around the dome somehow, right?  Bob, don't you light your passenger cars? TW

If you hot glue, etc. one wire on each side around the opening I think that is going to be fairly hidden. Sounds like a good plan. There is no dome interior?

No, no interior at all.  These cars are new-old stock. Just the shadow figures in the windows. 

Here's a post where I lit a Williams dome car with LED's, it turned out quite well.  I turned the lights up for the picture, but you can turn them down as much as you like pretty simply.

https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/t...03#60698708009069703

GRJ, Ya know thats a neat idea.  I might do that at some point. Right now just the lighting of the car. Does ebay have that 30 guage wire?  I need some of that in black n red. The smallest I currently have is 22 and thats a little clunky for this type work. 

Ted, a few years ago I ordered the dome interior parts for LIONEL 15" domes from the secondary source listed in L's parts website--North Lima X X.

You get the molded interior seating and two hangers that attach the interior to the car via the extruded channel that runs the length of the car.  Might be worth a look.

Look for wire-wrap wire, it's 30ga solid Kynar insulated wire.  I also have the very slick No-Nik strippers made for the wire.

I'm waiting on a bunch of #28 stranded wire as well, but that's considerably larger than the #30 with the thin insulation.

Of course, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the LED Lighting Regulator that I make and sell through Henning's Trains.

It gives you constant intensity flicker-free lighting that you can adjust to your liking with the intensity control on the board.

Tee Hee, slow yur roll, John. I'm already using your kits, with four more on the way!!   Pingman, just went to L's parts website and entered dome interiors and other wording with no search results found. Must be doing something wrong

TedW posted:

Tee Hee, slow yur roll, John. I'm already using your kits, with four more on the way!!  

Just checking.

TedW posted:

Tee Hee, slow yur roll, John. I'm already using your kits, with four more on the way!!   Pingman, just went to L's parts website and entered dome interiors and other wording with no search results found. Must be doing something wrong

Ted, pick a 15" passenger set that came with interiors and use that set for the search.  That will take you to the page where the individual cars are listed.  Go to the vista dome car and you should see a photo with individual parts identified with a number that corresponds to the parts listed below the photo.

Gotcha, Carl. I'll try that.

Found this using "aluminum" as the search term.  Had to scroll down and chased down some false leads.

But, eventually found this page.  Unfortunately, the base for the vista dome floor is not available; the hangers and seats are.

It's not that hard to make a floor, I did the Williams I linked with thick black cardboard stock.  The seats were some pieces of Mahogany trim I had, I just cut them to size.

Isnt that the case when dealing with 15" cars. Thx for trying. Always have GRJ's solution which should be doable at some point.  I'll proceed with the plan I guess. John, thx for the help on the wire and stripper.

Even if you don't build up a dome floor (as GRJ did), adding a strip to the dome ceiling will help light up silhouette windows in the center of the car.  Note the dome is indented so the thin strip is essentially invisible.  Otherwise you get the same "hot spots" of the stock incandescent bulbs.  Then run thin red and black wires to re-join the severed strip.

AWG 30 wire-wrap is readily available on eBay in small lengths though you probably need less than 1 foot each.

OTOH it seems the simplest solution is to run an LED strip on the floor facing upwards.  Then you don't have the wire connection problem when sliding the shell off the chassis.  With silhouette style I'd think the LED strip lighting would be smooth enough to look OK; it's relative - if you peer down the dome right now you can see the bright bulbs.

Stan, yup. I did that on a Super Chief Vista dome, but w/ the 22ga previously mentioned I couldn't get it hidden properly, so gave up the ghost. Have the wire wrap on order now. Found some at R S online, 50 ft for $3.84.  I will try again with the smaller wire.  Should be much better. 

gunrunnerjohn posted:

Look for wire-wrap wire, it's 30ga solid Kynar insulated wire.  I also have the very slick No-Nik strippers made for the wire.

I'm waiting on a bunch of #28 stranded wire as well, but that's considerably larger than the #30 with the thin insulation.

Of course, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the LED Lighting Regulator that I make and sell through Henning's Trains.

It gives you constant intensity flicker-free lighting that you can adjust to your liking with the intensity control on the board.

John which strippers do you recommend? I see several versions on the bay..

Pingman posted:

Found this using "aluminum" as the search term.  Had to scroll down and chased down some false leads.

But, eventually found this page.  Unfortunately, the base for the vista dome floor is not available; the hangers and seats are.

That's okay, get the hangers and make the floor from styrene. All you have to do is make a hole for the hanger to go thru the floor, you can even add partial steps down for the effect. I have a car and can take it apart to trace the sizes if you like.

Like I said, the floor is a piece of cake.  You're not trying to do anything fancy, almost any material will get the job done.  I've done floors and cabs with 1/8" really thick poster board with a black side.  I use CA adhesive to put it together and hot glue to hold it in place so I can remove it if necessary.

Woodson posted:

John which strippers do you recommend? I see several versions on the bay..

Well, I have the original NoNik model from 20 years or more ago, but the ones I previously pictured look like exact clones.  Here's one that is probably like mine,  mine were also made by Clauss.  Clauss NN016 NO-NIK

^^^ Thanks, John!!

For MacGyver wannabes, a discussion of how-to strip wire-wrap wire would not be complete without the soldering-iron and paper towel method.  This really does work.  Here's the first video I pulled up on youtube...

Stan, it's oh so much easier with the proper tool.

    John, don'tcha think Stan kinda fancies himself MacGyver?   TW

TedW posted:

    John, don'tcha think Stan kinda fancies himself MacGyver?   TW

Yep, on steroids!

Gunrunner,

I just received your 20110 led lighting regulators and installed them into two of my MTH Amtrak passenger cars.  A job that is a major PIA, but the regulators work great and provide for a simple installation.  I just tried to order more and the Henning's website says they are out of stock.  Do you have any info as to when I can get more? 

Also, my passenger train is a PS3 Amtrak, and includes four superliners running with six normal sized passenger cars.  My objective is to reduce the power draw on that track.   It's my overhead layout and includes another MTH PS3 train running on the same track.  I understand that redoing the superliners may be problematic because of all the lights in them.   Any advice would help me decide what to buy when the converters become available.

Jerry

Henning's will have more on Tuesday, I'll make sure of it.

If you're talking about this type of car, it's not an issue.  I just put a full LED strip upstairs and then wire down to a smaller piece below, one regulator does the job fine.  I've done a number of these for people.  Obviously, it's more work than a single car, I kinda' equate them to dome cars in complexity. 

Woodson posted:

gunrunnerjohn posted:

Look for wire-wrap wire, it's 30ga solid Kynar insulated wire.  I also have the very slick No-Nik strippers made for the wire.

I'm waiting on a bunch of #28 stranded wire as well, but that's considerably larger than the #30 with the thin insulation.

Of course, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the LED Lighting Regulator that I make and sell through Henning's Trains.

It gives you constant intensity flicker-free lighting that you can adjust to your liking with the intensity control on the board.

John which strippers do you recommend? I see several versions on the bay..

GRJ,  With your LED Regulating Module..do you have to solder at all? The only additional parts needed are the LED light strips? thank you..

Thanks John.  I will check on Tuesday.  Looking forward to doing my first superliner.

Also, yes, those are exactly the cars I have, including the observation car.  Have you ever had problems with those coupler tabs that hang so low to the center rail?  I have one Gargraves switch that has that big, flat, center piece.  It is powered and I can see some of the cars flicker when they cross it.  I am trying trimmed scotch tape on the bottoms of those tabs.  Any advice on this problem? 

Jerry

Gerry posted:

GRJ,  With your LED Regulating Module..do you have to solder at all? The only additional parts needed are the LED light strips? thank you..

You have to solder the four wires to the module, two for the LED strips and two for the track power. The only thing you need is indeed the LED strips with the regulators.  Of course, you'll need some wire...

The full lighting kit is a solderless kit, obviously for more money per car.

JerryG posted:

Thanks John.  I will check on Tuesday.  Looking forward to doing my first superliner.

Also, yes, those are exactly the cars I have, including the observation car.  Have you ever had problems with those coupler tabs that hang so low to the center rail?  I have one Gargraves switch that has that big, flat, center piece.  It is powered and I can see some of the cars flicker when they cross it.  I am trying trimmed scotch tape on the bottoms of those tabs.  Any advice on this problem? 

Jerry

When I did those cars, they were for a customer, so I didn't actually operate them.  However, I've seen a few cars that that style coupler did short to the track.

My fix?  I chop off the thumbtack and forget about it.  How often are you really going to want to run these over a decoupling track anyway?

Yeah, there isn't one on the overhead layout.  No need.  Still, hate to do it, but it may come to that.

Thanks for your help.

Jerry

Coupler parts are cheap if you really think you'd miss those someday.  One fix is to take the coupler arm and grind the pad thinner, it's got way more "meat" on it than it needs.  Taking 1/16" off would make a significant difference as a rule.