Garden Railway Forum

Johnnie2sheds wrote: ↑Mon Jan 15, 2018 6:41 pm 10(ish) battery "diesels"
1 Battery steam outline
2 Live steam
1 Solar powered

Solar powered? That sounds intriguing.

Rik

Intriguing? I prefer Frustrating OK Its on my little web blog thing, but I saw, on youtube this little fella.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfmT8yMpHNc

And I thought, If I copied the idea but made it a boxcab.....Have a look Rik. Its fairly simple stuff, most of the roof is a solar panel
but I did not account for the fact that we in England live in perpetual darkness so charging isnt brilliant to be honest.

THis is about as far as Ive got with it, it works elecrically but need finishing off. Soon.

I like the look of that. Be interested in seeing a video when you get it finished.

Just a thought, could you incorporate rechargeable batteries to change over if it runs into a shady patch - rather like solar powered garden lights?

Yass Phil, there are 8 x AA NiMh batteries. The panel charges the batteries (on two days a year)
I don't have a railway at the moment, I'm trying to flog a house and settle into something smaller.
I'd love to bore everyone with a construction thread at some point. So you might have to wait for the video

Presumably, if you leave it in the sun between running sessions, then it should get topped-up without needing to be connected to a charger. It depends on how long you leave it between sessions, maybe?

Rik

It's odd to see that track power is far less common in the UK then battery or live steam. I guess if asked on the continent, the analogue and digital track powered users would outnumber battery or live steamers any time.

On my railway 2 live steamlocomotives and 3 battery diesel locomotives, one of them is mainly sucking the life out of 24 batteries at once, transferring it into a little bit of movement, so is not used very much..

daan wrote: ↑Wed Jan 17, 2018 11:01 pm It's odd to see that track power is far less common in the UK then battery or live steam. I guess if asked on the continent, the analogue and digital track powered users would outnumber battery or live steamers any time.

On my railway 2 live steamlocomotives and 3 battery diesel locomotives, one of them is mainly sucking the life out of 24 batteries at once, transferring it into a little bit of movement, so is not used very much..

24 batteries?? Are they 1.2v each? That's a really hungry loco. None of my locos is powered by more than 12v and I run quite heavy trains.

Rik

I wouldn’t have track power, it’s bad enough indoors without all the hassle of trying to keep the rails clean thank you...

I'd love to bore everyone with a construction thread at some point. So you might have to wait for the video

I would love to see a construction thread about this.

Jim I was referring to a new railway. Theres a bit of a write up on the bloggy thing ( link below), with circuit diagrams and stuff

Live diesel. It's the next big thing!