I recently bought one of Marklin’s Z gauge starter sets, and it’s one of the types that uses a 9V battery for power. Could I hook up a regular throttle (like the Railpower 1300) instead? Or would I need to only use the 9V battery?
I’m not overly familiar with Marklin’s products, so any help would be appreciated. Thanks!
Standard power packs are not good for Z. Z scale locos are designed to handle a maximum of 8V, normal power packs produce up to 12V. You’ll need a proper power unit intended for Z - Marklin offer these I know. You don’t mention which of the sets you have, but Marklin have offered add-on packs for both their battery sets (pack 81950 for set 81520, and pack 81951 for set 81521), which include extra track and cars, and also power packs - unfortunately it would appear these are only available for 230V mains power, rather than the 110V used in the USA. Marklin will be able to sell you a suitable power pack though - their reference number for a 120V power pack is 67271.
My mistake…I’ve got the 81520 set. Sorry for not mentioning that.
Thanks for the info! My local shop is an authorized Marklin dealer, so they might have something there, too…
Also, I’ve heard that Micro-Trains has “modified” Railpower 1300 units so that they’re usable with MTL and Marklin Z scale trains. However, it seems that this modification is just a sticker slapped over the top of the unit, showing you the max voltages on the dial, so you don’t fry your locos.
Does anyone else know anything about this?
Why not? Dc is Dc and both a battery and a power pack produce it. as long as you don’t run it above eight volts it should be ok. that means adding a volt meter to be safe but that is only $5.00 or so ata Radio Shack. Just becasue a car will do 100mph doesn’t mean most people drive that way. The fact that you can crank the power pack to higher voltage shouldn’t affect running.
I agree and disagree with some of the responders so far.
Let me state up front that I am in HO and not familiar with anything peculiar about “Z” motors. That said, I can offer the following:
As a general rule, the voltage rating of a DC motor is a guide only – you can run a 12v. motor on 24 volts; just expect it to spin so fast that it probably will fly apart.
But, the electricity won’t hurt it. The only thing that can go wrong electrically is if you place such a load on the motor that it overdraws its “windings” capacity. That would be an amperage problem, not a voltage one. An overdrawing motor would get so hot, either internally in the windings or externally in e.g. plastic parts that it would burn out or melt.
Now for the tricky part:
The fundamental characteristic of a battery is that it gives “pure” DC at the stated voltage, no matter the load. This is because, in the final analysis, a battery is a chemical reaction, and the voltage is determined by the chemicals used and the number and arrangement of chemical cells. The voltage does not waver or fluctuate in any way until some of it is “wasted” with a rheostat or potentiometer or some other load (including the motor).
Such is not true with a power pack.
Power packs run off of line voltage which is transformed to a safe level inside the pack. Because the line voltage is AC, it is turning on and off however number of times per second is standard for your country (60 Hertz in the U.S.), and it is this very feature which allows the transformation to take place – when the AC goes to zero, the electricity momentarily is off, and the electric field this generates in the transformer collapses. The collapsing electric field generates a magnetic field in the transformer’s core but itself is turned off when the AC goes back on in the opposite direction. This collapsing magnetic field now generates a second electric field in the secondary coil, and so you get 12 or 16
The size of the locomotives(every thing in Z Scale is small) requires small motors. too much power into these small motors will cause problems. I have found that if I run the Z scale layout with a standard transformer I only used about half throttle to keep the speeds to a reasonable level and prevent overheating of the motors. The shells of all my Z scale locos are cast in metal to provide weight, this restricts the disapation of heat .