Stay alive caps and CBUS wiring

[Anthony-358949]

If I use stay alive caps with my locomotives which are fitted with Bluetooth HM7000 decoders for control and sound, do I need to still wire up all the track and points as a c-BUS?

[P-Henny]

Not too sure why you are mentioning C-Bus. C-Bus is a communication protocol (see link below). The HM7000 Decoders do not communicate using a wired C-Bus.

Any Bus you install to your track to support HM7000 decoders will be basic power, whether that be DC or DCC.

Stay alives are used to cater for short breaks in power. For example whilst transiting dirty track sections and/or Insulfrog points. A power Bus is not really relevant to this, but installing one does generally make the overall power distribution more reliable thereby making less use of the stay alive function. But note that a power Bus will not resolve power breaks due to dirty track and other similar issues, thus a stay alive can still be beneficial when used in conjunction with a Bus. Stay alives, in general, are more effective with locos that only have a minimal number of wheel pickups. A regular and robust effective track & wheel cleaning regime can in many cases be just as effective as a stay alive.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/C-Bus_(protocol)