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Reply to "Blackwater Canyon Line - May 17, 2024 - Thinking About a Downtown Structure"

Mike, Rick, Steve, Jeff, Alan, Lew, Thank you for all the great comments, observations, and questions!

Steve, thank you.  After seeing folks post photographs of connectors that have mounting holes, I started to question my use of these slightly hanging in mid air.  While a couple of installations closest to the wall underneath the layout were a bit awkward to make, I still think I won't snag any of the ones closer to the aisle when storing items.

Jeff, I have used the Scotch Lock kind in the past and agree these are so much easier to use.  They hold well even as I tugged as hard as I could to pull the wire and even the TVS leads out.  Your use of just printing the track plan on paper that can be printed again for changes does have merit.  If you placed a clear plastic sheet over it before drilling, it would be a similar end result to Mike's panel.  So many ways of doing things.

Alan and Lew, you are both right there is a problem if a TVS shorts out or opens up.  Periodic replacement is a good point I hadn't thought of. 

As to the suggestion to not place any that will be in an inaccessible area, that is something I already thought of.  I posted once on this topic way back (Next month will mark 4 years since I started the topic) that I plan to build scenery sections on the workbench, then place them on the layout.  Anything that covers something up, will be removable much like Bruce G. and others have shown.  Where is the workbench, you may ask?  Well, for now it is one of the shelves under the layout that works well with my padded stool as long as it is a project that has little height and I won't sit very long.  I can set up the narrow folding table that I used building a couple kits last winter and slide it in and out from a section of the layout that doesn't have a shelf.  I have no room for a permanent workbench in this house.    I setup horses on the patio and now in bad weather in the garage stall if I pull my wife's car out.

Troubleshooting a shorted TVS or any other short circuit got me thinking.  I have the toggle switches that I am going to wire into the feeds to all the sidings to shut off power when I want to park an engine.  I already wired in the mainline sections without power switches.  Alan and Lew, you got me thinking this morning (Smell the smoke??) that I should add toggle switches to all the track feeds.   It would be so much easier to throw toggle switches to find a short circuit than lifting wires on the terminal block on the board I showed a couple weeks ago.

Thank you again, one and all!! 

OGR Publishing, Inc., 1310 Eastside Centre Ct, Suite 6, Mountain Home, AR 72653
800-980-OGRR (6477)
www.ogaugerr.com

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