A dead rail installation, where the battery is located in a wagon.
A first gen. LocoFi board is used here.
There is a small contact between the wagon and locomotive, it also functions as a power switch in the same time. The contacts can of course be painted black to not be so visible as they are now in white.
More than one locomotive or wagon can of course have the same type of contacts, so different trainsets can be composed. It's also possible to link together more locomotives if they have contacts in the front too. There is for sure possible to hide the contacts on the underside and mask with painting, just the imagination limits.
The small board on the side of the locomotive is a voltage step up module, to get the 7.2V battery to about 10-11V.
Excuse the "Z" on the box, it was just there without thinking when taking the photo. It have nothing to do with certain events in the world, I promiseā¦.
Charging the battery in the wagon with a short extender cable between the charger and battery.
This cables can be found cheep on Ebay too.
I'm very interested in your installation. Our HO layout is under construction and no wiring has been installed. Going "dead rail" would save an enormous amount of time & expense. Would you be able to share the manufacturers and models of the the battery and the voltage step up board? I have been searching Google without any luck.
Thank you!
Looking great! Neatly done! Do you plan on custom sounds for this as well?
Thanks for sharing!