Your Guide to Easy Model Railroad Wiring
The best instructional/reference books to help you get started with model railway electrics.
I get a lot of emails from visitors asking for a good guide to model train electrics and specifically for a beginners guide.
For many interests and hobbies , the Wiley book series 'For Dummies' are the "go to" reference aid for beginners with around 200 million books in print and around 2,500 titles.
Sadly, there isn't a 'Model train wiring for Dummies' guide yet. Instead I recommend one of the following.
Model Railway Wiring
The oldest book in this round up and undoubtedly a must have for any for DC – analogue wiring – railway modellers shelf. It covers pretty much every aspect of track wiring from the very basic, starting with wiring a plug to points, reverse loops, track detection and control panels in a simple, easy to understand manner. It's my bible when it comes to planning track connections.
This shouldn't be a surprise given it was authored by arguably one of the most famous UK railway modellers, C. J. Freezer. A pioneer of model railways, a prolific designer of model railway layouts, editor of Railway Modeller from 1950 to 1978 and author of several books on the hobby.
However, things have moved on a lot since it was originally written over 30 years ago. The sections on computer control and DCC are just two pages each and little more than a description, there's no mention of servos or slow motion point motors, and many of the techniques explained rely on manually intensive solutions that while appropriate then are now more easily achieved with low cost off-the-shelf products that weren't even dreamed of in 1989.
In summary, a solid, must have book that provides a solid foundation – particularly for analogue layout construction – but read afterwards for the modern take and products.
A good all-round guide and ideal for those building a DC layout, however it's now dated with hardly any information on DCC / digital layouts. If you're not planning on going DCC this is one of the best books on the electrics side of model railways.
Although not specifically about railway electrics, Brian Lambert's book is highly recommended and contains more than enough info on the wiring aspects of the hobby to get beginners off to a good start.
It also one of the few books here that covers wiring LED lights around a layout with a good summary of how to reduce the voltage and where to put the resistors.
In tone and content, this is probably the closest equivalent to a Dummies guide for model railway electrics and what should be and is the natural follow up to Model Railway Wiring.
Easily understandable, Lots of tips, easy to digest and read and covers all the main areas you'll need to know. The only downside is that it's written for an American audience so some of the names and terms used aren't applicable in the UK but the concepts remain the same and a quick Google of the words will turn up the equivalent for this side of the pond.
Deserves a place in the library of any model train enthusiast.
Basic DCC Wiring for Your Model Railroad
A good, albeit slim, introduction to DCC for those familiar with analog model layouts of old and wanting an update and how to upgrade their trains. Slightly dated now and really only suitable for OO or larger scales – it desperately needs a refresh and references for N gauge, but a useful book for those returning to the hobby.
Like it's written for an US audience and uses American English and component names but the concepts are easy to understand.
I couldn't really leave this out. While obviously not specific to model train electronics, I recommend it if if just starting out with electronics and need a easy to read walk-through of the fundamentals – what capacitors, diodes, resistors do, how to read a multi-meter and schematics, series and parallel circuits etc. It provides a foundation that the other books build on and assume and it makes a great companion alongside the other titles.
Affiliate notice: Some links on this page will take you to carefully selected businesses, including Hornby, B&Q, Rapid Online, Amazon, eBay, Scale Model Scenery and Element Games, through which you can buy products mentioned. These links are made under their affiliate schemes which means that although the price to you doesn't change I get a small commission on the orders you place. Please see the disclaimer for more details.
Source: https://modelrailwayengineer.com/model-train-wiring-for-dummies/
Post a Comment for "Your Guide to Easy Model Railroad Wiring"