passenger car lighting

[en4cer]

This would be a question for DC layouts. Would it be possible to add a capacitor to a passenger car's lighting circuit to help keep the lights from flickering while going over breaks in the track circuitry? Another advantage could be to allow the car's lights to remain lit when the train is stopped.

[Joe Satnik]

Dear en4cer,

You would need a diode in each car to prevent discharge when backing up. (One end of car always towards front of train.) 

You would need a diode bridge (or 4 individual diodes in a bridge configuration) if you wanted to charge the cap while backing up, or wanted to be able to run the car in either direction.   

Hope this helps.

Sincerely,

Joe Satnik 

[Jim Banner]

Whether you add a capacitor to prevent flickering or switch to batteries to keep the lights on during station stops, consider installing LED (Light Emitting Diode) lights.  They use about 1/10 the power of regular incandescent light bulbs, making your batteries last 10 times as long or with capacitors, require capacitors only 1/10 as big. 

With the capacitor anti-flicker circuit, it is normal to  see some change in brightness as you speed the train up or slow it down.  Slowing from 8volt (a reasonable freight speed) down to 4 volts (barely enough to move,) incandescent bulbs will be only about 1/500 as bright.  The same speed change with LED lights will dim them only by 1/2.   This is absolute brightness, measured with a light meter.  To your eye, the incandescent bulbs will appear only 16% as bright while the LED's will appear 81% as bright.  That means the incandescent bulbs will appear to dim 5 times as much as the LED's as you slow the train down.

Jim

[Len]

You could aso use one of the LED passenger car lighting kits from Miniatronics. They have a circuit on the PC board that keeps the lights on at half brightness for up to 3 minutes for station stops, and generally stops flicker if the pick up is installed correctly.

Out of the box the circuit board fits 85ft cars, but can easily be cut down with a razor saw for shorter cars. I've used them in Con-Cor, Athearn, and Rounhouse 'Old Timer' cars.

There are two part numbers. PN 100-ICL-01 is labeled 'flouresent' on the box, and the LEDs produce a white light that I guess is supposed to represent lighting on modern cars. Personally, I prefer the PN 100-YCL-01 kit, which uses YellowGlo LEDs that produce a warmer light.

Len

[en4cer]

Wow, thats a lot of information to take in. I really appreciate all the responses to my question. All have good advice and I will study up on each of these ideas. Thank you.

[Doneldon]

en4cer-

The prefab LED lighting kits tend to be pretty pricey but they operate very well. You can do the same thing yourself. I suggest using batteries and LEDs, with a magnetic reed switch so you can conveniently turn the lights on and off and so you don't have to deal with the complications and current draw of track power.

                                                                                                                     -- D

[Jack from Star, Idaho]

Hi Jack Strong here.  Go to the web site "Train Aids" and check out their electrical products I think you will find everything you need...