Wiring Dual 153IR's to operate one signal light. Can it be done without relays?

Exactly which dwarf signal do you have?

@stan2004 posted:

Exactly which dwarf signal do you have?

Stan,

I have some Lionel #148 Dwarf Signals 6-12883 laying around. I'm open to changing to something that may work better.

Right.  This is a classic conundrum.  The 148 has two inputs - green and red.  The 153IR has two outputs - green and red.  If you have two 153IR's what happens if they send conflicting commands.

How are you powering the 153IRs and 148s?

Do you have some spare 148 bulbs lying around?

I plan on using track power. I have some universal Evans bulbs laying around.

I may be getting ahead of myself.  Which version of the 148 do you have?

I don't have a 148.  As contrasted above using the miracle of cut-and-paste, Lionel has (at least) 2 versions of the 148.  The -250 version is older (2011) and has incandescent bulbs for the lamps.  The -251 version is newer (2014) and has LEDs for the lamps.  Presumably you've turned them on and might recognize an incandescent bulb vs. an LED...or it appears from the manuals that you can distinguish by whether there are 4 wires or 3 wires coming out the signal.

I have the older version with the incandescent bulbs. If I can find the newer (or another "LED" brand) ones I will order them since they are cooler and draw less power.

I like your thinking.

So if you have the newer LED version, life becomes so much simpler.  That is, the LED version has only a single input to flip the signal to red (whereas the bulb version has dual inputs).

With a single input, you can simply tie together the two "N.O." outputs of your two 153IR's and the signal will flip to red when either OR both of the 153IR's is triggered.  The "N.C." outputs of the 153IR's are not used.  There is NO electrical "conflict" if the 2 153IR's disagree on occupancy.

For background, where I was going if you had the incandescent bulb version is as follows.  There is a "trick" where you can use some spare incandescent bulbs (but not the Evans universal bulbs) to convert the 2-input signal into a 1-input signal.  It has its limitations but does work and has been around for decades.

I am happy that you see the wisdom of going to the low-power LED version even if not realizing how this makes it so much easier to apply with dual 153IR's.

Stan is correct, i have 4 that control two crossing gates.  Just a word of caution, there are two of the 153s out there, not including the new one. They need to be wired differently.  Stan helped me with a diagram of the difference.

Stan,

I was searching for a diagram of the newer LED version but I can't seem to find one. The older incandescent version that I have has 4 wires. Does the newer version have only 2 wires?

@Tony H posted:

Stan is correct, i have 4 that control two crossing gates.  Just a word of caution, there are two of the 153s out there, not including the new one. They need to be wired differently.  Stan helped me with a diagram of the difference.

Tony,

What is the difference between the 3 models?

I can’t speak of the new one, but here is a post that shows the difference on the two older ones.

https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/...7#152899748574623667

Tony,

I will have to see what version I have. I do know they are more than 5 years old, probably closer to 10 years old not positive though.

@R Whitley posted:

Stan,

I was searching for a diagram of the newer LED version but I can't seem to find one. The older incandescent version that I have has 4 wires. Does the newer version have only 2 wires?

From what I can tell, the LED version has 3 wires.  See the right side of the most recent diagram above.  On the Lionel website for the same SKU/model # there are 2 different "reference numbers".  Of course you order an item by the SKU number and I don't think you can specify the reference number.

I don't know how the following photo is rendered on your screen but the following is an LED version which is what you want (it has the 3 wire connection).  From what I can tell, the LED version will have a yellowish tint to the green lamp.  It appears Lionel did not use a pure/deep green as you might be familiar with from a traditional green bulb. Yeah, it's nit-picking on my part and OK I need to "get a life" but the pure/deep green LEDs are just a couple pennies more.

So I guess if ordering from a distributor you can ask how many wires are there...or if the Reference number with the -251 suffix is on the box or whatever.

What Tony is referring to is a separate rabbit hole!  Lionel did the same thing with the 153IR.  There are (at least) two versions of the 153IR that have different wiring instructions!  Yet, the different versions have the same SKU/model number...and most confusingly the same reference number!  OK, I get this is a first-world-problem but still....

I was figuring we can solve the 148 "problem" first.  The 148 variations on a theme are new to me and I'm learning along with all you guys!  OTOH I've been to the 153IR rodeo so I figure I can deal with that when the time comes.

Stan,

I really thank you for all your help (and Tony) that's what I love about this forum, the kind folks, the knowledgeable folks and the willingness to help one another.

I do have one more question, that is where do the 3 wires land on the 153IR? I tried to open the manual on Lionel's site but could not for some reason.

I attached 3 PDF files of 3 "different" 153IR versions I just pulled off the Lionel site...from 2002, 2014, and 2015.  IIRC the best way to determine which version of the 153IR you have is to look at the power input terminals on the left and note the orientation of U and A.

OTOH it appears the best way to determine which version of the 148 you have is to see if there are 3 or 4 wires (?) 

I just ordered some from Charles Ro and made a note in the comments to make sure mine are 3 wire and LED's just in case there is some old stock laying around.

I assume I could daisy chain more than (2) 153IR's?

Correct.  If you have the 3-wire version of the 148 with the single-wire trigger, you can have an unlimited number of 153IRs.  If just one, any combination, or all of the 153IR's are triggered it will flip the dwarf to red. 

Reading between the lines, it might take an experiment or two but even if you have a mix of different 153IR versions I believe it is still possible.

I will let you know how it turns out after my order comes in.

Thanks again!

Well in case it helps the attached .pdf circuit shows how I wired a pair of 153IR's back in 2008. This has worked flawlessly ever since. I apologize that it's hand drawn, but I think its easy enough to follow. This setup services two road crossings that are several feet apart on the same mainline track. One 135IR is to the left of the crossings; the other to the right. You will note there is a pair of ROWI 4 light cantilever signals, and a pair of RK 4 light crossbuck signals. Many other signal variations are possible.

The key thing to note is the 153IR's are wired parallel with respect to the relay Gnd, NC and NO connections. So they operate as two separate SPDT switches. When either one triggers, the NO contacts are grounded, and all signals at both crossings operate in unison. This same idea could be extended to one or two more 153IR's (connected the same way) on converging switch tracks say, or whatever. A key thing to know about the 153IR is that the relay is only rated at 2 amps. This is fine for any number of led devices, or a few incandescents, but no good for something like the gateman for instance. For any heavy load accessories you would want to use the 153IR's to activate a relay, which in turn operates the accessory.

Rod