I have started building my layout’s control panel. All turnout DPDT switches are to be fed from a common source. Rather than using terminal strips and jumpers for this, I am considering a different solution:
With solder-less ring terminals on the one end of all of the wires, could I simply attach a bunch of them to two long, mounted, power-fed, machine screws? This strikes me as being more compact and less costly. Does this make sense? If so, what should the screws be made out of? Nickel-plated steel?
Sounds like what your describing is a terminal buss bar like you’d find in an electrical breaker box. They sell them separate at places like Home Depot. I guess it would work for your common wires. Just have to make sure it’s insulated/isolated from your other wiring. We used to use buss bars like that in control boxes I built. I think we got them from Mouser Electronics.
What you seem to want is what I have been doing, or close to it.
I assemble my own terminal blocks, using #8 machine screws, nuts and washers. I have stacked as many as seven wires on a single terminal without problem. My wires are all solid, so I separate them with washers. Using stake-ons as you describe, you can dispense with the washers. The only limitation to the number you can put on a single terminal is the length of the available threaded end of the screw - and you can always change to a longer screw.
One caveat - DOCUMENT EVERYTHING:
Mark the wires so you can quickly determine which one goes where.
Draw a schematic, label it and keep it where it can be found when needed. (Hard copy, not a computer file. Hard discs die, paper doesn’t.)
There is no reason why this will not work. The only drawback I could think of, and it’s minor, is the fact that to disconnect one wire you have to take off the nut and remove other wires then put those wires back on etc. A small price to pay when you consider the savings over using buss bars/terminal joiners. I think any machine screw should be fine as long as it conducts well. The machine screw is really the mechanical connection maintaining the solderless ring terminals in good electrical contact. If you are concerned about corrosion or wear apply some synthetic dielectric grease to the rings and the screw when assembling, but unless you have concerns about corrosion etc. I wouldn’t bother.
Older telco junction blocks used this method. Basically a bunch of long 10-32 machine screws with a stack of washers and nuts on each end. Wires went between pairs of washers.
I was thinking double nuts or the addition of a locknut might be wise. I had forgotten about the old telco junction blocks, thanks for the reminder Karl.
Yet another discussion for the proposed Electrical/Electronics froum. Look for the discussion thread in the General forum and cast your vote for progress! [tup] [:)]
As some of the others have stated, you could make your own quite easily. I have made several using wood paneling, pine etc. with strips of copper (cut from bulk sheets) screwed onto the board.
Your method would work but as stated previously it would be a real pain disconnecting them to replace, add, or fix a problem.
“Pain,” is relative. Unstacking stake-ons from a single post terminal is only a minor discomfort compared to trying to troubleshoot a soldered-together spiderweb without benefit of the schematic the original builder never made! [banghead]
Actually, if, instead of circular hole stake-ons, the builder were to go to fork-end stakeons separated by washers, disconnecting a single wire from the stud would be no more difficult than disconnecting a single wire from an otherwise unoccupied terminal. (It’s reconnecting it, between the proper two washers, that could generate some interesting language.[(-D])
Since all my wiring between fixed termini is solid, I get satisfactory results from bending a hook in the conductor - and can disconnect a single wire at any time without problems.[^]
Forked lugs are OK, if you only have 1 or 2 in the stack. Any more, and they will tend to rotate a bit and come loose or splay the legs out. I don’t like them for that reason.
