Someone gave us an old Marx rotary beacon last summer. It’s still in its box and looks as though it’s never been touched. There are no wiring directions with it however. This beacon has a single bulb whose heat makes a red and green lense spin. Does anyone know how to wire one of these?
I’d wager it’s the same as a Lionel beacon, so if anyone knows how that wiring goes, let me know. I’ll try it.
Jim
Doesn’t it only have two contacts for the wires?[%-)]
Yes, Buckeye. My question is, what do I hook them to? I have absolutely no experience with the accessory side of a transformer. One to each post? Does it matter what wire goes where?
Jim
Jim (jaabat)
What transformer are you using and what are the options? That is, what posts does the transformer have? If they are not marked, it may be necessary to look them up to see which combinations produce an appropriate voltage.
Appropriate voltage depends on what lamp (bulb) is used. It would be most helpful to know that too. Lionel made at least two models of rotary beacon. The original (394) used the heat of the bulb to rotate the beacon and was considered unreliable at best. Later versions (494) used a “Vibrotor” motor to turn the lens and apparently turned it a lot better. Evidently Marx used the “heat-powered” method.
The number on the bulb should provide enough info to look it up and determine its operating range. You can, of course, just hook it up to the terminals that provide power to the track and try it out. I suspect (but do not know) that it is designed to run between 10 and 14 volts.
Lastly, is the base of your beacon plastic or metal? I just rewired a Marx floodlight tower that I bought used and the “factory” wiring made no sense at all so I had to customize it.
From the sounds of it, I asked a stupid question. If it only has 2 wires, one must go to each accessory post. Duh! I’m using a CW-80 for a holiday carpet layout. I didn’t want to fry anything so I thought I’d ask how to do it right the first time is all. The base of the beacon tower is metal.
Jim
Jim,
Because the base of your beacon is metal, and you are using a CW-80, your question is not at all stupid – in fact it is vital! Doing this incorrectly could not only blow the lamp, it could easily blow the transformer.
Under no circumstances allow the metal parts of the beacon to contact the track or any other item that is connected to the transformer. (This is due to the wacko “lack of a common ground” design flaw in the CW-80.) If you keep the beacon electrically isolated you should have no problem.
You still need to determine the correct operating voltage. Once you do that, you can program the accessory output on the CW-80 to maximize performance. (Perhaps the CW-80’s best feature.)
Can you provide the bulb number? Or experiment with the accessory hooked up ALL BY ITSELF to the throttle posts (A and U-under-A) and figure out what voltage works. Be careful, too much voltage will blow the lamp in a hurry! When you get it working properly, measure the voltage across the terminals on the beacon and you should get a sufficiently accurate reading of what works. Then program the output on the accessory posts (B and U-under-B). NEVER connect the two U posts together on a CW-80.
I will walk you through this by phone if that would be helpful.
Thanks, wolverine49.
I’ll hook it up and program the accessory posts to a voltage just enough to make the beacon spin. That shouldn’t blow the bulb, but I’ll see if there is a voltage rating on it first.
Jim
Jim,
If the CW-80 has not been re-programmed, the accessory posts should be at the factory setting of 12 volts, but in order to confirm this with an ordinary voltmeter you need to have a small load on the output when taking the measurments.
Similarly, when re-programming the accessory posts, you MUST have a load (the accessory itself) on connected to the B and U-under-B posts. (The manual is NOT clear about that.)
I think that many (not all) of the problems that folks have had with CW-80’s ae due to errors the operators made when connecting accessories and/or reprogramming the accessory outputs.
A cold basement and/or air currents could make the operation of the beacon “iffy” at best. It is not the ideal accessory to use to learn programming the CW-80. You’ll need to be patient with it.
Please post your results or further questions.
So it doesn’t matter what wire goes to what accessory terminal? That was really my main concern.
Jim
It shouldn’t matter but personally I like to maintain the convention that the U-under-B terminal should go to the metal part of the accessory (ultimately to the outer brass portion of the bulb) and the B terminal should go to the tip of the bulb.
I label all of the terminals on my various accessories with a red dot (for “hot”, “supply,” “A”) and leave the other unmarked (for “return”, “ground”, “common” “U”). None of these terms is really correct, but the wiring will be – for the most part.
The CW-80, as well as the ZW, KW, etc (but NOT the 1033 and some others) uses this convention, although the CW screws it up internally. That’s a whole 'nother story.
Just hook the U-under-B post to whichever terminal is attached to the metal frame, and the other wire to the B post. Just don’t let the metal portion of the beacon contact the the outer rails and ties of the track, or any other metal object that serves as the return side of the transformer circuit. I can’t stress that enough.
Thank you!
The voltage that the lamp is specified for is the root-mean-square (RMS) voltage, which is the usual way of measuring AC voltages. Any AC voltmeter you are likely to have will measure the correct RMS voltage only if the waveform is sinusoidal. Unfortunately, the CW80’s waveform is not sinusoidal. So its voltage can be measured accurately only with a rather special voltmeter. (This problem is apart from the one mentioned by Wolverine above, of needing a load before you can make any kind of measurement.)
There is however a way to set a CW80 to a particular RMS voltage, using another, sinewave, transformer: Connect the sinewave transformer to the light. Then adjust it until the voltage as measured with an ordinary voltmeter is what you want. Then transfer the light quickly to the CW80 (for example, with a toggle switch). Adjust the CW80 so that the lamp’s brightness does not change as it is switched back and forth. The CW80 is then putting out the RMS voltage that you wanted.
Or just adjust the CW80 until the light is as bright or hot as you want, without knowing what the voltage is.
I disagree that the beacon’s frame should be wired to U. If you are using A and B as the common, wired to the outside rails, I recommend that the frame be wired to that common also.
Jim,
One “last” thing. According to my Service Manual, the original LIONEL 394 Rotary Beacon, (the one powered by heat from the bulb) used the following:
L461 (aka 461-300 aka 394-10), 14 volt, 0.25 amp, clear, INDENTED globe, screw-base
Your Marx may or may not have used the same lamp.
Bob (lionelsoni)
You are correct in your facts as (almost[;)]) always, but I disagree with your conclusions.
As you know, hooking up the CW-80 with posts A and B as “common” will reverse the functions of the whistle/horn and bell buttons. You can do it if you want, but why would you when you don’t have to?
If you try to wire the CW-80 in a circuit where the “common ground problem” is unavoidable, such as to power the fixed voltage plugs on a switch (turnout) your point has real merit; but where the accessory can be isolated from the track simply by making sure it does not touch the outside rail or ties, why bother? Who would mount the accessory right next to the rails anyway?
Second, with even a small load on the transformer, my ordinary household-grade AC voltmeter will read the AC output of the CW-80 sufficiently accurately “for government work.” I’ve done it dozens of times, and tested it against a ZW transformer using the method you suggest, except that I think that the ideal accessory to calibrate the CW-80 is a 397 rubber-belt coal-loader, where you don’t have to try to compare brightnesses but rather can count coal-scatter…
I am trying to keep things as simple and straightforward for jaabat as possible. Otherwise I would have suggested cracking open the CW-80 and re-wiring the internals according to methods posted by Dale Manquen and others on the OGR forum. JAs I understand it, jaabat is trying to set up a simple Christmas outfit and probably (I’m assuming here) doesn’t need all that complexity this morning.
If Lionel had just built the infernal thing right in the first place this would all be a piece of cake.
I did qualify this advice: “If you are using A and B as the common, wired to the outside rails, I recommend that the frame be wired to that common also.” And I would be the one to put the accessory right next to the rails, since there is nowhere on MY layout that is NOT right next to the rails…
I believe that there is a significant error in measuring the voltage with an ordinary meter. I calculate that when the voltmeter shows 12 volts, the actual RMS voltage is 15.1 volts, for the 18-volt CW80. An accessory with a motor does not provide a good basis for comparing sinewave and phase-control voltages, since the motor’s response to the voltage waveform is rather complicated. An incandescent lamp, on the other hand, responds reliably to the RMS voltage, since it behaves just as a resistor in the short term, and its brightness is very sensitive to that RMS voltage, varying as the 3.5th power of voltage. Not getting the voltage too high is very important, since the lamp’s lifetime is even more exquisitely sensitive to voltage, varying inversely as the 12th power. For example, running a 12-volt lamp from a CW80 set to 12 volts by the voltmeter reduces its lifetime by about 94 percent.
Jim can ignore these complexities if he wants. As I said, “…just adjust the CW80 until the light is as bright or hot as you want, without knowing what the voltage is.”
This sounds like a plan to me. Either that or cover it in model glue and light it on fire in the driveway.
Thanks everyone.
Jim
jaabat wrote “…cover it in model glue and light it on fire in the driveway…” thereby creating the 7the Seventh Wonder of the Modern World, the Pharos at Massachusetts.
Meanwhile, indoors, friends and neighbors, filled with Christmas Spirit will gather around the tree and exclaim “Behold! A toy train. I will blow the whistle.”
And Lo! They will press the Whistle Button, and the train will go Ding! Ding! Ding! and everyone will laugh. But 'tis the season for laughter, so all will be well.
And one wise man will say, “I didn’t know they still made Lionel trains;” and the second will say, “I had one as a kid;” and a third will add ruefully, “What is this CW-80 thing anyhow? It sure looks nice but…”
And a Heavenly Chorus will ring out, “They don’t make 'em like they used to.”
And the wise men will pray, “Will someone please add a bit more “nog” to this egg?”
Happy Holidays, Jim, Bob and everyone. Don’t eat too much of this dead horse. And to all a good night.
When you are finished wiring, let us know if the beacon really spins because the Lionels sure don’t. Nice idea but it never seemed to work.
That has been my experience also. I had the Marx one as a child & have one again. I think someone a long time ago said they will work good on a plywood top, with vibration helping them go around. I wanted someday to try & put a tiny fan in a tube somewhere nearby & have the air help it go around, but I have since gotten a Lionel one with the vibrotor motor in it & It works flawlwessly !!
Thanks, John
Hmm. Didn’t know about the motors. Sounds good.