DCC Impulses Column - 3
and cool operation. Some manufacturers, such as Kato (2), offer
lighting kits with LEDs for their cars.
LED lighting kits don’t use a lot of DCC power or generate a lot
of heat. Since they have long (thousands of hours) life, they
can be left on all the time, reducing the cost by not needing a
decoder per car.
Miniatronics makes a couple of kits which include LEDs, a
power supply and a large storage capacitor (more on this later).
The longer one (475-100ICL01) is aimed at HO- scale passenger
cars and the shorter (3) version (475-100CB201) is aimed at
HO-scale cabeese and N-scale passenger cars. These kits also
include the metal to make power pick-ups for your cars. This
total kit costs about what you’d spend on all the parts, if you
set out to make your own. A real value, for sure.
Power Pick-up
The car that I show outfitted with lights in figure 1 was
purchased for $10 or $15 at a local swap meet. Even though
Bachmann didn’t have lights in it, it had carbon wipers on the
back side of one set of wheels on one truck (4). Notice that
they are spring loaded against the wheels on opposite sides of
the same axle. That keeps the wheels centered in the bolster.
3: Miniatronics generic LED lighting kit
3
4: Carbon wipers on the wheels of a Bachmann 1:24
passenger combine
If you apply force against one side of one axle and the other
side of a different axle, the wheels will tend to track poorly and
may become a running nightmare.
Unless the car you are converting already has trucks with
power pick-ups, your first task will be to add them. So, let’s talk
about that process.
Copper doesn’t make for good power wipers. Why not? While
it is very conductive, it is soft and hard to keep in good contact
with rotating wheels. I prefer a spring alloy of copper and
beryllium. Tichy Train Group sells it in wire with sizes from 0.01
inches to 0.032 inches. It is also sometimes available in sheets.
If not beryllium copper (BeCu), then I like stainless steel.
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MRH-Sep 2013
