Lighting upthe RailroadKITS Depot Station

[Bntrainmaster]

Slim,
Good info,  Keep going.................
I'll be watching closely.................
Thanks for your wonderful tutorial..............

[ranny9]

Then I draw out my connections...



-slim

I'm sure I should be able to figure this out, but what is "c l" on the above markup?

[Slim Jerkins]

CL is for current limiter. It's that thing I use instead of resistors.

I need to get back to the 'splainin now that the model is pretty much done. Going from the wiring diagram to the card with the copper on it probably won't be easy for a lot of people so that might be one of the drawbacks Jaime was asking about.

Essentially, you're laying out a printed circuit board. Some might like that kind of puzzle. Others might prefer getting a colonoscopy instead.

Doing the card and copper tape thing does make for a neat installation and you won't have to worry about a spaghetti bowl of wires cluttering up the innards of your model.

-slim

[ranny9]

CL is for current limiter. It's that thing I use instead of resistors.
-slim

As The Fonz would say, "I knew that!"

[S&S RR]

Great thread! Thanks Slim

[BandOGuy]

Staples website does not recognize the term illustration board. Any other names you know for the same material?

[ReadingBob]

Others might prefer getting a colonoscopy instead.

Did that.  Got me a ticket to the every three year plan.   

Doing the card and copper tape thing does make for a neat installation and you won't have to worry about a spaghetti bowl of wires cluttering up the innards of your model.

What, me worry?  I like my spaghetti bowl of wires.  Besides, it works and it belongs to Tom when I turn the keys to the station over to him.   

[Slim Jerkins]

OK. Time to get back to this. I got a red warning message saying that it's been over 120 days since anything has been added to this thread so my advice is to go back to page one, get back up to speed and avoid the guacamole that's been set out all that while.

In our last episode I showed how I drew a little electronic "map" onto a piece of illustration board. I covered my paths with copper tape like this







There are gaps where the LEDs and Current Limiters will go and I marked where the negative leads of the components will get connected with a black dot. It also helps to mark the negative lead of the component itself if you're new to this kind of stuff. In this picture I'm marking the negative lead of the current limiter




That picture at the top shows me poking a hole into the copper tape and the illustration board with a dissecting probe. The hole is for the leads of the  Current Limiters and for some of the LEDs to poke through.  Those probes come in real handy for a lot of things so go and Google on them and "go getcha some" as Jaime would say. They're good for making holes, picking up things, applying glue, enlarging gooseneck light tubing, an of course, dissecting frogs.

More to come. Let me know if the map thing is a head scratcher. 

-slim

[Slim Jerkins]

One thing about buildings that have big overhanging eaves is that it's easy to tuck a 3mm LED up under the eave. That's what we're doing with this kit. Here's a picture of one of the "eave" LEDs soldered into position:



I let the LED stick out a little bit and will bend it down later so that it hugs the underside of the roof.




Here is a shot of all the components soldered into place:


There are three under eave LEDs on the back (road) side of the station, two under eave LEDs on the front (track) side, and three LEDs lighting up the interior of the station. For the interior LEDs you only see the leads sticking up since they were installed from underneath. You can also see the four black Current Limiters sticking up as well.

-slim

[Pops]

Thank you for the info

[GPdemayo]

Hi Slim,
 
Glad you got this thread going again, you seem to have been slacking as much as I.
 
Now that I have all the stuff from you, I'll be ale to understand what you're doing with this build. And, after Bobs' clinic on Saturday, I might be able to light up something.
 
Oh, don't egg Tom into doing something bad during the clinic or we'll have to head up to PA and adjust your attitude! 

[Slim Jerkins]

Now I want you to study this picture real carefully:


See the copper path that runs down the middle of the ceiling card with all four Current Limiters connected to it? That's the positive "bus" -or- the positive side of the diagram that I posted awhile ago. If you follow the path from that positive bus to any Current Limiter you'll see that the power goes from the bus to a Current Limiter, to an LED, and then to another LED. The confusing thing here is that  right now there are two separate negative buses - one at each end of the ceiling card. I have two little arrows drawn in pencil pointing out from those negative buses.

I'm going to connect the two negative buses with a piece of copper tape but the tape is going to cross over two existing paths and I don't want anything to short out. I added a couple little squares of paper over the copper paths that I'm going to cross. You can see them in the photo above.

Here is a picture showing the two negative buses connected:


Another thing to notice is that besides soldering the components to the foil tape, I solder certain lengths of foil together at junction points or where it turns 90 degrees. The tape has a nonconductive adhesive so overlapping the tape won't make an electrical connection. That being said, I really didn't need the two little insulating pieces of paper when adding that last connector strip but I just wanted to be sure.

A battery connector was added to the underside of the ceiling card and the leads were soldered to the positive and negative buses:


almost done! 


-slim

[Slim Jerkins]

When bending the LEDs over the edge of the wall, hold the soldered end of the LED in place since the wall will act as a fulcrum and cause the copper tape to lift off of the card if you don't hold the soldered end down. Here's a picture of the bending process:


And finally, a picture of the completed model:


In this picture I just set the structure onto the sidewalk piece without gluing it into place. Consequently, there's a light leak coming out from under the wall to the right of the office. I intentionally left the light leak there to make a point of it. Corners and around window frames are other potential light leak sources. Using the ceiling card method for installing LEDs usually takes care of any light leaks from around eaves or roof peaks.

Well that about wraps that project up.

Questions?

-slim

[GPdemayo]

That looks great Bill. I hope we can rise to your level with our lighting projects.


Thanks!

[jrmueller]

Thanks a lo. Can we see a picture of the battery connector ?  Where would I get one?  Thanks. Jim