I have an Echo Toys 2-6-0, which I have had since I was a kid. The trouble with it is that it’s very hard on batteries. I recently converted it to run of 9-Volt NIMH recharble batteries to reduce wieght.
To corect this problem I was thinking about hooking a solar panal into the locomotives power supply with a diode to keep power from flowing back into the battery. The solar panal could either be wired driectly to the motor to provide a continuos power source or used to charge a capacitor. This capacitor would be wired to a reed switch, which would be activated by a track magnit at the base of long up-hill grades; thus providing a short burst of energy to assist the locomotive’s climb.
Down the line I would also like to try building a fully solar powered locomotive. Any thoughts?
cool idea.
but solar panals have an extreamly low amp rating and they have a low amount of voltage. i don’t know if it could provide enough juce to the motor to make it turn.
PS. Hope you Live In Florida.
A capacitor would not store enough energy to run your loco. The solar panels would need to charge your onboard battery. If left out all the time, you will need some kind of charge controller.
An idea that I had(might use it myself) is to have a stub end track with the solar panels mounted near the end. Say the roof of the engine house or a warehouse. Install contacts on the front pilot and on the sides of the stub end. Drive the loco onto the stub end till the contacts on the pilot contact the contacts on the stub end. If it wasn’t such a pain to post pics here, I’d include a drawing or what I mean.
If you are willing to spend the money, modern solar panels will do a pretty good job of charging batteries. I lived on a sailboat for years where the only electrical power was generated by solar panels.