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Reply to "Need Help with MTH DCS TIU"

Take a look at this contemporaneous thread about powering the TIU.

Summarizing.  You have a 50 Watt power source (Z-500 brick).  Obviously this was enough to run one engine as per the Starter Set.  For budgeting purposes, the TIU itself "steals" 5-10 Watts from the Fixed 1 input leaving that much less power to your track/engine(s).  As an aside, the DCS Remote Commander from the Starter Set "steals" about 1-2 Watts from the Z-500.

I don't know if you plan to simultaneously run both engines on your son's layout but 50 Watts would be pushing it...obviously depends on how many cars being pulled, speed, etc. albeit a 4x8 layout.  Anyway, the point in the linked thread is you may already have a wall-wart power adapter to supply the 5-10 Watts of TIU power. That way, all 50 Watts of the Z-500 is available to run your engine(s).

Another idea.  Since you apparently have PS3 engines, in a pinch you can run the engines and the TIU (or even the DCS Remote Commander) on DC.  Point being, you might already have an unused DC-output laptop charger with more than 50 Watts capability.  That is, 90 Watt "universal" DC-output laptop chargers go for about $10...a lot more economical and compact than AC output train transformer bricks with similar wattage.  I have written about this in previous OGR threads and can re-visit if there's interest.

Last edited by stan2004

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