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Hi everyone just wanted to say hi as I just joined up today. I'm just starting/getting back into model railroading. When I was a kid my dad and I started on a layout, we got the track down, some landscaping and then the project just kind of lost interest. I have always been interested in the hobby and have always wanted to finish that project my dad and I started. My wife and I just bought a house last year so I figure now would be the time do to it since I have the space to put it in my house. I have attached a few pictures of the layout as it sits in my parents house.
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I'm not sure if I should change it, or leave it as it is. I'd like to have a town/factory area which I think is possible but might have to get rid of some track. I have a few other idea's as well. Let me know what you guys think.
I'm sitting here at work reading over the forums and i'm thinking a Bachmann EZ Command control center might be the way to go. I know i'm going to have to re-wire the layout and from the video i've seen the EZ center would eliminate sone if that wiring. The only downfall is that i'm going to have to upgrade to DCC locomotives since all the locomotivesI have are 15-20 years old.
You end up swapping time, money, or effort no matter what you do in the hobby. If it were me, I would check out the tracks to see if they actually support what you have. If what you have runs okay, then you can play and learn a bit about the electricals as you go along.
The alternative, if the whole thing is losing its luster for you, is to just start over. There are many advantages, all of them costly if you do abandon this. But you get to design something you know will work, that has appeal to you, that you will have wired yourself and will know and understand intimately, and you can run modern DCC engines and control systems for a vastly simplified track wiring process.
I guess I won't know for sure until I get here and hooked up. I'm kind of planning for the worst because if its anything better than that its a good day. I like the layout so I want to keep that but I have a feeling getting more than one locomotive to run is going to quite the chore. I think my dad when he wired it had that in mind but I can only remember one train at a time running on it. Quick question about the EZ Command, does it require different track or could I hook it into my existing track assuming all the connections were good.
I've never installed one but I can tell from the photos that two of them will be necessary.
If you don't want to install them, then you may want to isolate the inside figure-8 track from the rest of the layout and don't hook the figure-8 to any power source.
The problem with the inside figure-8 is that if you put your finger on the outside rail, and start tracing it with your finger, and then go over one of the switches in the middle, your finger would end up on the inside rail. Electrically, one rail is positive, and the other rail is negative, and when you have a reverse loop like this, it becomes a short circuit since both rails are technically the same rail.
Do you remember if the layout ever had any locomotives operating on it? If the locomotives operated fine, then chances are that reversing modules have already been wired into the loops.
I remember having one train on it and i'm pretty sure it covered all the tracks. I don't remember ever having more than one train at once going though.
If there weren't any reversing modules, the power pack would have either gotten hot, shut off, or the train would enter the loop, then suddenly start running backwards. Without a reversing module, you wouldn't even be able to run one train.
Thanks, thats good news. Like I said, I have no idea how my dad setup the wireing but he knows it stuff. The only question is i'm not sure if everything is still connected or what. I guess I should have looked under it as well.
You have a good foundation. I'd spend some time making it function reliably, add some scenery, and then decide what you want to do from there. No sense scrapping all that hard work right away before you've even figured out what it is you like about the hobby.
________ Voyeur Vid
Thanks, my plan is to get it all set up and go though the wiring, I'm going to keep to layout and add to it. The more I look at it the more I really like the layout and want to make it work.
Welcome to the forums. Nice layout as a starting point, looks like your Dad knew what he was doing. My suggestion would be to rip up that double reverse loop, it doesn't appear to me to add alot to the layout to go through the trouble to get it to work. I just hooked up EZ Command (Christmas gift from my son) and it couldn't be easier. You can run one DC loco but they don't run very well. Mine came with a DCC locomotive so now I can run it and one other. That might be the way to go. By the way, I have the same old transformer you have on yours.
Just remember, it about having fun and post pictures when you get thinks together.
I'll have to see what kind of shape its in if it works great, if not maybe I'll replace it or spend some time trying to get it to work. I'll be keeping you all updated for sure. Thanks for all the advice so far and kind welcomes!
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