Hello im new here but i have a PH 10-R Dcc system that a freind gave to me but im in HO scale the 10 AMP is to big and my question is if i used a 5 AMP booster in place of the 10 AMP would that work or if fry my trains and would i have to sale mine and buy a 5 AMP system with raidio? i would show you some pictures but i dont know how to put them on here.
10 amps is a lot for an HO system.
The thing about amps is the engine sucks only the amps it needs from the booster, the booster doesn’t force amps down the engines’ throat. However a short will suck up everything the booster has to offer letting magic smoke out of the command station and decoders.
Will a circuit breaker solve the problem? I would definitely use one on the 5 amp system. I’ll let the electrical cognicenti opine on that one.
Where are my manners? [#welcome] to the forum.
Posting pictures is a pain, but not insurmountable if you are willing to follow the directions in the Sticky post in the General Forum. If you try to reinvent the wheel, we will never see them.
The best and smartest advice is to call NCE and describe your issue. They can best advise you. Not only are 10 amps too much for an HO layout, but a bigger power supply is required for a 10 amp system. So, in my estimation, the PH-10r is not appropriate for HO scale.
Rich
I second the circuit breaker. That will let you subdivide the layout into power districts if you wish, while providing a safety mechanism should something go wrong.
Ten amps is a lot of potential current, should you have an issue a lot of current can flow and do damage before you notice something is wrong. All you need is something that allows a significant amount of current to flow, and bypasses the boosters ability to detect that event. Most use “rate of change” to detect a sudden change in current, so a sudden spike and it will cut off. It it doesn’t see that, it will happily melt something…
Did you mean to say on the 10 amp system?
Rich
I’ve seen Youtube videos addressing boosters overheating. I don’t know how common that is, but it would be worse with 10 amps.
Hello All,
[#welcome]
Think of it this way…
If you plug a 5 Amp, 110 Volt drill into a 20 Amp, 110 Volt outlet you won’t burn out the drill’s motor or damage the circuit, if wired correctly.
With this example, you will have enough “headroom” for 15 Amps more before you exceed the Amperage rating of the circuit.
That could be in the form of a 10 Amp saw and a 5 Amp work light.
Adding an additional 5 Amp work light will exceed the rating of the breaker and it will trip.
Most breakers are designed to trip at a certain amperage threshold.
If you try to plug that same 5 Amp, 110 Volt drill into a 20 Amp, 220 Volt outlet you will fry the motor in the drill.
Not because of the amperage, but because of the over-voltage.
There are breakers that are designed to trip measuring voltage, but that’s another subject.
As long as the voltage of the DCC system is within specification you’ll be fine.
NCE boosters, no matter the Amperage, are factory set to 14 Volts (can be adjusted by the user from 9.5 to 18 Volts). (Check with your friend to see if they changed the voltage before hooking it up to your pike.)
With NCE systems the amperage of the power supply needs to match or exceed the amperage of the booster.
If you have a 2 Amp system you need a power supply with equal or greater amperage.
An NCE 5 Amp system powers my pike.
If I tried to use a 2 Amp power supply, there would not be enough amperage to run the system, despite producing 18 Volts.
A 10 Amp power booster could be safely used, but that would be overkill and an unnecessary expense for the size of my pike and how many locomotives I run.
of course there’s no harm using a high power booster regardless of the size of the layout. but an unprotected short can cause more damage.
of course
but a cheaper solution would be to just put an automobile lamp in series with the track. an 1156 incandescent bulb limits the current to 2A and it shines brightly when there’s a short. might be hard to find a lamp socket that can be screwed to a panel
Call NCE and ask what they think.
Rich
thank you
Thank you i will
wow thank you for the lesson tech. alot to read but alot to learn thank you for the infomation
Hi and welcome to the forums. [#welcome]
I also suggest using circuit breakers to limit the current going to the track. Modern breakers are adjustable, so you can limit the current to numbers like 2 or 3 amps, plenty for most HO railroads. Consider wiring your layout to divide it into smaller districts. This will allow you to use less power per district, and it makes it easier to diagnose problems.
I am not familiar with the NCE systems. Are you talking about a 10 amp booster (between the base station and the track, or a 10 amp power supply, between the wall and the base station?
If our OP decides to use a 10 amp system to power his HO scale layout, he should definitely use larger bus wires. I use 14 gauge bus wires on my layout, controlled by a 5 amp booster. If I used a 10 amp system, which I wouldn’t, I would use at least 12 gauge wires.
Rich
Could a 5 amp power supply work with a 10 amp booster if you did not draw more than 5 amps from the system?
Good question, and one that I have sometimes wondered about. My understanding is that the power supply should closely match the power requirements of the booster. The power supply can be more, but never less.
I will leave it to the electronics gurus to accept or reject my understanding, but that is why I recommend that the OP call NCE for advice before hooking up a 10 amp system to his HO scale layout.
Rich
i believe so. but you can’t rely on the booster to shut down if there is a short because the short will be < 10 A.
you can use an external circuit breaker, or just put an automotive lamp (not LED) in between the booster and track. an 1156 bulb will limit the current to ~2A
it’s common to divide a layout into power districts delineated by gaps in both rails and powering each district with it’s own circuit breaker or bulb. so even with a 5A booster, you might have 5 districts each limited to 2A.
so with a 5A booster, 2 districts might have shorts with bulbs lit and operation continues on the other districts. but is 3 lamps were to start lighting, the 5A booster’s internal circuitry would cause it to shut do