BOB WALKER posted:Frank: I've done a number of battery powered locos. Your idea of feeding the battery voltage back down to the track is clever and has merit. It avoids the issue of trying to fit the battery into an engine chassis that is already crowded with electronics. As pointed out, the track you are running on must be entirely free for its whole length of any other power consuming devices to avoid needlessly draining the battery. I have several setups with the battery in a trailing car with power fed to the engine just ahead via a small cable and this works well. Will look very carefully into this new idea.
Doesn't feeding battery power from a trailing car to the track defeat the purpose? How does that become different that feeding the rails power from a transformer or power supply? You'll still have reverse loop/wye issues with two-rail.
You'll also still have contact issues with dirty track except the contact problem can be with the locomotive or the battery car.
Rusty
