I’m in the process of designing a permanent layout for the first time in about 20 yrs and have a few questions. I know that there is an insulating track section available from MTH. On their website in the pic it looks like all three rails are insulated, will this pose a problem with TMCC? I believe I remember reading something about making sure the outer rail has a continuous signal. Or rather than the insulating section am I better off to just dremel away on the center rail on some of the track I already have? Also, is there a general rule on the amount of power you need i.e. so many watts for so many feet of track or is it as in cars you can never have too much horsepower.
The insulating section is divided in half. If you look underneath, there is a pair of fahnstock clips and a wire jumper for each of the three rails. You can insulate any of the three rails, or any two, as you please.
You need one insulated section at each end of a block. I use them to create blocks for DCS operation.
By the way, the outer rails on all Realtrax are insulated from each other. This does not affect TMCC operation (at least, it hasn’t for me).
The power needed depends on the train, not on the length of the track.