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Reply to "The best gauge of wire to use ?"

Just saw this today, so apologies if I am answering an already solved question.  Like Walt, I'm no where near the expert on wiring, Gunrunner John can tell you that.  He helped me with my switch issue where I had to run the power through the track, not power them through external source.  All I do know is that the way I have my layout wired currently appears to be working with no drop in power anywhere, no signal issues that I can see, and I can run three trains with 12 cars on three different tracks without blowing a circuit breaker neither on the TIU or the breaker box.  So I am going to guess that I have sufficient power supplied to the track as well as no hiccups in the system that cause DCS signal issues.

20x20, give or take an inch or so, room with a big oval, a smaller oval inside that one, and a smaller oval inside that one.  Inner most oval has five off shoot tracks that run the length of the oval back to it on the opposite end and act as parking tracks.  All three ovals and parking tracks are connected as one unit, no separation of power supplies.  18 fastrack switches, all connected to a set of two AIU units because MTH saw fit to create them with only 10 switch ports and 10 accessory ports.  So I had to buy two AIU's for 18 switches.  I used 24 gauge telephone pair wires to connect the IN, OUT, and GND to the AIU 1, 2, and IN.  Don't quote me on the Identifiers but you get the picture.  All 18 switches, providing my remote batteries aren't weak, react immediately to any arrow choice as quickly as it is pressed.  I love to use the ALL feature when I want to close the open switches.  As for the 278 individual pieces of track that make up the layout, most are powered by virtue of being connected to the one in front of it and the one behind it.

However, following the advice of fellow O gauge forum members, I made it a point to run booster wires to 17 different location, one location of course being the terminal track piece that started it all.  I used 16 gauge wire to come out of the Fixed IN1 port on the TIU and ran it to a 12 screw terminal board.  I used said 16 gauge wire to hook the board to the TIU.  Now using the 12 open screws, I knew I would need more than 12 to run my 17 drops.  So I doubled up on 5 of the screws, and ran the last 7 to the remaining screws.  I know, they make a 24 screw board, but i'd already bought the 12 and didn't want to send it back.  It cost less to just double up where needed.  I used 16 gauge wire to prep my screws.  I put a pigtail wire under each screw, one red for the hot screw and one black for the ground screw.  5 screws had two reds and two blacks.

I ran 18 gauge wire from the connection points on the track to the 16 gauge wires under each screw.  Why 18?  Because anyone who has used Fastrack knows that the connection blocks under the straight pieces are tiny little sheet metal paddles.  I call them "spatula" connectors.  Yes, like a hamburger flipper.  These spatula heads are barely an 1/8 inch wide.  So the female equivalent that you have to use to connect a wire to these tiny little sheet metal pieces has to be small as well.  The ones I bought are the bare back type, ones with no plastic sheath, just a bare stem that has two places to connect the wire.  You connect your bare stripped wire strands under the clips closest to the female head, and you connect your still sheathed wire under the little clips at the back of the stem.  Once you get used to it, a good set of needle nosed pliers works fine.  Once I had them attached, I heat shrunk some heat shrink tube over the whole thing to help keep it all tucked in and tight.  This is why I used 18 gauge wire instead of 16.  It was easier to stuff 18 gauge stranded wire under those itty bitty prongs.

Once I had it all wired, I covered up all the ugliness using a false bottom shelf on my cabinet, turned on the TIU, added my engines to the remote, set an engine on the very back part of the largest oval to test distance issues, pushed button 3, engine cranked up like it owned the place.  Rolled the whiz wheel up a few notches, engine immediately rolled off the starting block and before I knew it was doing 60 SMPH with no problems.

Before I did all of this, I had so many signal issues I was about to throw the thing in the trash.  I had lionel engines starting up for no apparent reason.  MTH engines were firing up spontaneously the moment I turned on the power switch.  I got all sorts of engine not on track messages.  But the tip from Gunrunner John seemed to eliminate any switch issues I might have had.

My question has been this all along.  Best friend says it would not have mattered.  Retired Professional Electrician said the same thing.  Would using 12 gauge stranded wire from the TIU to the terminal board, and using that as my pigtail wires, would that have helped my voltage strength, or would using the 18 gauge wire have eliminated any improvements the 12 might have given me.  Brett said no, Tommy said no.  It's distance from the source that causes voltage drop, not wire size.  Wires size is key to making sure you have large enough wire to handle the voltage pulsing through it.  Otherwise you'd have a ton of breaker issues.

Thoughts?

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