OK, I built my bench work today(thats what a vacation is for). My question is what is the mometum button for and how would you use it? I have a Spectrum power pack. I will stain my bench work tomorrow and will begin to lay my track. shortly in the next few days or weeks. Then I can begin my first layout quest… As you can tell I am a newbie from the past. A lot as come out since I was doing it 25 years ago. Thanks
Since physics don’t scale down easily, the momentum button is to simulate mass and mass-in-motion or “momentum”. It works by taking the throttle position and delaying the time it takes for the electricity to reach that level. So normally when you put the train on the track and throw the throttle to full, normally the train would immediately get all the electricity and zoom off at full speed. With the momentum “on” that won’t happen. The electricity will slowly build and the train will start slowly and accelerate until it reaches full speed. This simulates starting of a very heavy train.
The reall trick is slowing down. When one slams the throttle to zero, the train doesn’t halt. It will keep going as the electricity slowly drains off. Depending on the momentum settings a train could make a normal “trainboard” type loop several times before coming to a stop.