Wiring point motors, and track.

[Guest]

Moggie,

With modelling skills you can make a Hornby R8014 point motor fit a PECO point. Similarly you can make a PECO PL-10 motor fit a Hornby point. But they are not totally 100% interchangeable straight out of the packaging. The mounting pins on the two brands are in slightly different locations. However, it is easier to use a PECO PL-10E motor on a Hornby point if you use a PECO PL-9 mounting plate. For which you need the PL-10E (Extended pin) point motor version. Thus if you want to standardise on one particular point motor I would suggest the PECO PL-10E with PL-9 Mounting plate. Of course, that does not stop you considering SEEP PM motors from GaugeMaster or indeed other brands. They can all be used with PECO and/or Hornby points.

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PL-10E

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PL-9 Mounting Plate

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Hornby R8014

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How difficult is it in doing the wiring.

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If you mean how difficult is it to wire up the point motors, then that depends upon what switch types you want to use to control them. I suggest that you do not use Hornby R044 switches as these are not 100% compatible with a CDU. Using a CDU (Capacitor Discharge Unit) is highly beneficial and complements the AUX output of your HM2000 controller perfectly. Hornby do not make or sell CDU's which is why there is no incentive for Hornby to change the design of their R044 switches. You can either use PECO PL-26 switches or Momentary action sprung loaded to centre-off toggles.

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This previous thread describes in detail the various switch types with further links to wiring information.

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https://www.hornby.com/uk-en/forum/points-25203/?p=1

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And will I need to add extra wiring of the track to the controller.

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If your PECO points have a part number that starts with ST. Then no, you will not need (in most situations) any additional wiring. If your PECO points part numbers start with SL, then some additional wiring might possibly be needed.

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It's mentioned by other members about using Bus wires. Is that for DC set ups as well as DCC.

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In general, you would normally use a full BUS wiring system on DCC. In DC, there is still a requirement for separate circuits from each controller and isolation for the sidings etc. These additional requirements do not make a full BUS implementation very practicable.

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But it is near impossible to advise about your track wiring with any accuracy without seeing a sketch of your track plan. The plan should show which points are PECO (suggest they are marked on the plan with a P) and which are Hornby (suggest marked with a H). The plan should also show where on the track in the plan the two controller outputs are connected from your HM2000. Plus any other wiring links that might have been added.

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If any of the PECO points are SL types, then include full PECO product part codes on the plan.

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To upload a sketch with your post. The sketch must be in either JPG, JPEG, GIF (possibly PNG) format. To upload the sketch use the B&W Hill icon to the left of the Smiley face in the post 'tools' selection box. Failing that, upload the sketch to an image hosting site and post a link to the image in the forum reply instead using the 'chain link' tool icon. This icon will be greyed out until you highlight something in the reply to assign the internet link to.

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More information on posting images and links are documented as TIPs 8 & 13 in my TIPs page

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What is a CDU?

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Check out the 3rd & 4th posts down in this previous thread.

https://www.hornby.com/uk-en/forum/post/view/topic_id/14472/?p=2

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[moggie]

Hi  community moderator and fellow members.As I have stated in an earlier forum I have set up a double oval  with two side Spurs also sidings. Layout size  6ftx4ft. I have a Hornby 2000 controller.i have installed 10 points mainly curved. Some are Hornby some are peck. Can I use a standard point motors for all  of the points.How difficult is it in doing the wiring. And will I need to add extra wiring of the track to the controller. It's mentioned by other members about using bus wires.Is that for  dc set ups as well as DCC.  Moggie

[moggie]

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• Thank you Chrissaf for you reply all the information is very helpful. The peco points are st 244 & at 245.I have taken a photo and drawn a sketch of my layout showing where all the points are placed. I apologise now for the scrapy drawing. It's not to scale. There are two points on the outside oval to the inside oval have not any holes for the point motors. Will I have to drill holes. Or replace them.I have noticed a flaw in my plan, I had planned to be able to move any of my trains from the out side track to the inside, and vice versa. But once the train goes from the out side to the inside it cannot get back to the out side with out reversing the train through the various points. Any ideas to to sort out my problem. If it can be done.? I hope I have sent you my photos . Moggie/media/tinymce_upload/b66b62c939602dfaad0ab0822f11b1cb.jpg/media/tinymce_upload/82be2a16d0184935d5a117eb74cb2fb5.jpg

[Chrissaf]

All your points are 'Insulfrogs', and do not require any special power considerations.

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Insulfrog points act as electrical switches. The points have two ends the common end, termed the 'TOE' end and the other end which provides the divergent routes. The main thing to understand when powering the layout (any layout) is that all the points should have power fed into the 'TOE' end of the point. If you try to feed power into only one of the other ends then only one route in and out of the point is powered.

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The Brown and Blue arrows just represent the routes that power can flow, they do not represent the direction of trains. These colours represent the use of the two controller outputs of your HM2000. I have marked each point with a T to denote the 'TOE' end of the point.

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Notice how all the point 'TOEs' have either a Blue or a Brown power arrow pointing into them.

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The 'Insulated Rail Joiners' are optional, but in my view desirable and beneficial.

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The Brown and Blue circle discs represent the optimum controller connection locations for this particular power plan**. As you can see each and every point 'TOE' has the potential to have power fed into it. But note this. Points act as electrical switches to route power into the physical route that they are set to. So, if a point that is nearer to the controller connection point is set away from the route that you want to control then the downstream track from that point will lose power if there is no other alternative route the power can take.

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Note** be sure to get the controller wires to these track connections the same way round, else you will get short circuits when points are in certain positions.

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Sure you can perform additional wiring modifications to connect additional wired power feeds (from the controller) to provide additional power feeds to these routes, but you would then need to include isolation switches in those feeds so that you can leave locos parked unpowered in those routes (and or sidings) when needed.

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This power plan is just a suggestion. It is not the only plan that could be implemented. It will cover the majority of train movements throughout the layout, but only you know what your train movement play strategy is going to be, hence the plan may need tweaking to fit in with how you want to use the layout.

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