Water and Electronics


D&J RailRoad

D&J RailRoad

Professor of HO
Well, I screwed this one up.
I recently finished installing the grade crossing system for three tracks on the empire.
Yesterday, I was working on the road planking that goes between the tracks of the crossing. I filled the gap with ballast then used wet water then glue mix to create a base for the planks. Later in the evening the crossing signals triggered and stay triggered. In checking it out, I discovered that the circuit board for the center track, (center board in picture) was triggered on three inputs but there was nothing on the track covering the sensors. It occurred to me that the wet water had dripped through a gap in the plywood and dripped on the circuit board. I unplugged the power supply and let it sit to dry out. I'll check it later this morning to see if allowing it to dry was good enough.


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letting it dry would be the safe bet ... water is okay if it's distilled [no impurities to conduct], but not so good if it's mixed or had some impurities / minerals added.
 
Smudge617 said:
Ah! please tell my you not someone who believes in the myth that Rice will dry out you phone, it really doesn't work, Silica on the other, hand is an ideal medium.
Click to expand...
It's not a myth. Rice does work - not as well as silica, but most average individuals don't have access to sufficient quantities of silica to do the job.
Not trying to create a thread-hijacking argument here, so, the point is to remove the moisture from the circuitry as soon as possible and hope that no damage was done.

As a former cell phone company employee, I can tell you from first hand experience that water damage with electronics is a wonky thing. I have had people had me a phone that was literally dripping wet (and not the figurative literalness, but, like, this thing was dripping on my desk) that still worked perfectly fine. And I've seen phones that had one drop of water hit the one right spot at the right time, fry out a circuit and completely kill the whole thing.

To Smudge617's point, though, Ken, if you've been saving up those little silica packets that say "Do Not Eat" from food, clothing and other purchases instead of throwing them away like everyone else, you might have enough laying around and it would certainly be more effective than rice.

Either way, my fingers are crossed for you.
 
Finally ran out of things to delay the possible bad news. I went to the empire room and turned on the power to the command stations. I had just finished rewiring the command station and boosters which I covered in another thread.
Now it was time to plug in the power supply for the grade crossing boards.
I went to where the wall wart was hanging by the power strip.
I took ahold of it and checked the blades to be sure they weren't dirty or bent.
I ran my fingers over the top to be sure I had the right wall wart and I could read the white marking that said, "grade crossing".
I bent down lower to see the remaining bottom blade sockets.
I aligned the wall wart blades to the power strip.
I paused for a moment. Do I really want to do this?
Yeah!
I pushed the wall wart blades into the power strip then looked over at the crossing boards and gates.
Seconds seemed like minutes.
Previous electronic failures dashed through my mind's eye while I was waiting for the report.
One time in particular stood out..... ah never mind.
The lights on the cross bucks flickered as they are supposed to do on powering up.
Now, to run a train over the sensors.
I dialed up the cab number of a Santa Fe 4-8-4 that was sitting a couple hundred yards east of the far crossing sensor.
I depressed the whistle button and the loco responded.
I increased the throttle to 15 and the loco started a slow crawl forward with cylinders chuffing and exhaust banging.
Slowly it moved toward the far east sensor and I turned my attention to the circuit boards to watch for their trigger when the loco covered the sensors.
Inches to go and the anticipation was growing.
Suddenly the lights ignited, and the bells chimed then the gates began their slow bow to the ground at the presence of a train.
The bells ceased as the gates reached their low point and the lights continued to warn motorists of the oncoming owner of the right of way. The loco cleared the intersection and the near west sensor. The bells woke up again briefly until the gates came back to their full attention. The lights extinguished themselves and the system went back into it's poised but alert status.
The system was restored, undamaged by the water leak.

This is a second run of the loco through the sensors going west to east.

 
D&J RailRoad said:
Finally ran out of things to delay the possible bad news. I went to the empire room and turned on the power to the command stations. I had just finished rewiring the command station and boosters which I covered in another thread.
Now it was time to plug in the power supply for the grade crossing boards.
I went to where the wall wart was hanging by the power strip.
I took ahold of it and checked the blades to be sure they weren't dirty or bent.
I ran my fingers over the top to be sure I had the right wall wart and I could read the white marking that said, "grade crossing".
I bent down lower to see the remaining bottom blade sockets.
I aligned the wall wart blades to the power strip.
I paused for a moment. Do I really want to do this?
Yeah!
I pushed the wall wart blades into the power strip then looked over at the crossing boards and gates.
Seconds seemed like minutes.
Previous electronic failures dashed through my mind's eye while I was waiting for the report.
One time in particular stood out..... ah never mind.
The lights on the cross bucks flickered as they are supposed to do on powering up.
Now, to run a train over the sensors.
I dialed up the cab number of a Santa Fe 4-8-4 that was sitting a couple hundred yards east of the far crossing sensor.
I depressed the whistle button and the loco responded.
I increased the throttle to 15 and the loco started a slow crawl forward with cylinders chuffing and exhaust banging.
Slowly it moved toward the far east sensor and I turned my attention to the circuit boards to watch for their trigger when the loco covered the sensors.
Inches to go and the anticipation was growing.
Suddenly the lights ignited, and the bells chimed then the gates began their slow bow to the ground at the presence of a train.
The bells ceased as the gates reached their low point and the lights continued to warn motorists of the oncoming owner of the right of way. The loco cleared the intersection and the near west sensor. The bells woke up again briefly until the gates came back to their full attention. The lights extinguished themselves and the system went back into it's poised but alert status.
The system was restored, undamaged by the water leak.

This is a second run of the loco through the sensors going west to east.

Click to expand...
There for a moment I thought I was reading a part of a novel..."After entering the "Empire Room" I began..................."
A timid start, building up to the grand finale, then SUCCESS !
Glad all worked out well.

John
 
Glad to hear everything is okay! Should not the bells continue until the lights stop and the gates come up? I use Azatrax IR sensors, and boards. Using four sensors spaced two on each side of the crossing will keep the bells and lights going until the train clears the crossing sensors on the far side. Oh, (tongue in cheek), your locomotive is running backwards!
 
The control of the bell is a feature. I can toggle it to ring the whole time but that would get annoying.
Another feature is when the train clears the near sensor just past the crossing it begins raising the gates instead of waiting till the train clears the far sensor.
 
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