Hi
Does anone have any info on “Pre wired rail joiners”
Many thanks
Pavariangoo
What sort of info are you looking for? I just make my own by soldering wire to regular rail joiners, it’s a lot less expensive than buying the already made ones.
–Randy
Hey as Randy stated it is cheaper to just solder the track and wires than get that prewired ones at $2.25 Each When I first started doing my layout I started buying lots of those but realized that they were way too much for how many I wanted. I just began Soldering it myself for connections./ However they are pretty cool and easy if you want to not have to solder track. Just slide them on and no soldering is needed. So it has positives but the price is a big negative thats all
I have use 'em in the past as power feed wires from my power pack to the track.I still use a set on my test track.I found it better and cheaper to solder the wire to the tracks for the Atlas selector then using the pre made ones.To my mind this gives me more freedom in block size.
Guys, I’m not an electronics expert, so I asked a friend of mine about this who is an electronics guru and owns a computer consulting company.
He still recommends soldering jumper wires directly on the sides of the rails themselves rather than on rail joiners especially if you’re going DCC.
Articles have appeared in MRR issues from time to time demonstrating the technique. Best to practice on a scrap piece of nickel silver track.
Peace and High Greens!
The ones I use are from Atlas, work very well. $2.25 for a pair.
It is definitly better to solder to the rails. You must remember, the rail joiners “slide” onto the rails. As such, every single rail joiner is a potential bad connection. If they are even slightly loose fitting, they represent a high resistance to current flow, and you will drop voltage at that point. Think of it as a resistor is series with the rail.
If you want to be SURE of your connections being trouble free…by all means SOLDER them. One bad connection in a spot where it is very hard for you to reach, will be your best convincer.
BTW, jamison1, at $225 a pair, I wan t your job and salary please.[:D][(-D][(-D][;)]
Oops!! I made the change Grayfox! Thanks, MY job wouldn’t pay for that so I thought I’d better get closer to reality![:D]
Interesting, I had the EXACT same problem on my test track. On the actual layout, still using terminal joiners - not one stutter even with only 1 feed hooked up for testing. No matter HOW lso I run things around it.
I finally got one real #12 bus wire pair hooked up tonight, covering half of the outer main. Now there are 6 sets of feeds hooked in. Since it ran fine with the bad bad practice of one feeder, there has been no improvement, it still runs great.
I do not anticipate any crazy problems - number one, I have terminal joiners at EVERY track joint (this is why I make them myself, at $2.25 a pair, I’d go broke buying premade ones), except where I need an insulated joint between power districts. Yes, EVERY turnout has a power feed on all three legs. Every piece of flex track has TWO sources of power, at each end. Flex track on curves has the joints between section soldered as well, more for structural purposes than electrical, but of course that helps too.
Sounds like a lot of work - but I have one of those automatic wire stripper tools, I don;t know why I didn’t get one YEARS ago. Pop the wire in, squeeze, instant strip, no wire damage. Also peels back the insulation on the #12 bus wire, right in the middle, anywhere I need to connect a feeder - also soldered, I do NOT trust crimp on connections. An hour at my bench and I cna make a dozen pair of terminal joiners for the next batch of tracklaying.
–Randy
Hi Randy, those wire strippers you talk about brought back memories of long ago. I was 16 and bought my 1st automatic wire stripper. That was in 1955. We used teflon coated wire when I worked on jobs for the government, and without automatic wire strippers, we would have had a real tough time, as we needed to strip about 1000 wires a day.
As for rail connectors, we have a Christmas Village display that we set up each year, and it has about 75 feet of track in a large loop. This year, after 4 years of running this large setup loop, the first run of the 2-8-0 stopped at about the 50 foot line. I could see no apparent reason. If I pushed the loco beyond that point, it completed the run, but stopped at the same point every time. A quick check with a voltmeter told me that I had a bad connector. A quick pinch with the needle nose pliers and all was Ok for the rest of the season…I have no choice in this case but to use connectors, because I have to tear down the setup each year. More convincing reasons to solder for permanent layouts.
There are always alot of guys who always say you have to have a feeder exactly every 2 or 3 feet and they need to be soldered. Well that is not true. You do not need to solder the track if you do it right and you do not have to worry about that Voltage drop and all. That is way to litteral. As one guy stated you can litterally have two or three feeders through out a layout about the size 10x15 and that will be just fine.
Biggie,
Try painting, ballasting and weathering rails and add 10 years. I think the guys with two feeders on his layout will be disappointed…It all runs great until you start weathering and painting. I 'm going every other joint (flextrack) with feeders and soldering everything. I had to retro fit feeders on painted, ballasted track on my last layout and I can tell you it is no fun.
Trainnut brings up a good point.
When a layout is indeed “fresh”, those electrical dead spots can be far and few in between. Let 1 or 2 years slip by on a layout with many rail joiners. Those “spots” will start to creep in here and there.
I remember well my friend Eddie’s DC layout in the early 1990s. Nice 5 x 12. Designed for "Watching long trains roll. He used several “prewired” rail joiners. After about 2 years, locomotives were hitting “dead spots” left and right! He was pretty irritated! [:(!]
Eddie cleaned the rails and locomotive trucks repeatedly, yet when I visited and would see a train stall, I’d reach over and push down or tap the track------train would take off! It amazed me because those rails always looked clean and polished.
It was after reading an MRR magazine article about trackwork that I learned about what a pain rail joints actually can be! As trains roll rail joints “slowly” expand and loosen.
I have to agree that the best preventive medicen is soldering feeders. It is quite a bit of work, it’s worth the effort.
Cheers and 10-4!
Just food for thought:
Next time you put a new battery (or do this test with your present one for that matter) in your car; slip the battery cables over the posts and leave them loose. There’s really no need to go to the bother of tightening them, the car will start and run perfectly well. It will no doubt continue to start reliably for some time but you know it will be the dead of winter; snow blowing at 35mph; only your car left in the lot outside your last and most remote stop for the night when the connection finally punks out and you’re stuck. Naturally the loose cables will be the last thing you’ll consider as the source of the problem.
We used to say when you’re wrong you apologize and then forget about it. When you’re right you skip the apology. Don’t spend the time it takes to do it right initially, invest it!!
Dave (dwRavenstar)
I used the Atlas pre-wired rail joiners for my HO nickel-silver track. Lots and lots of them, especially for my sidings where I use insulated rail joiners to enable me to turn on/off the power through my toggles.
I have found that over time, jumpers had to be installed, “here and there,” for dead spots, especially around my Bachmann #6 crossovers - but NOT where the pre-wired rail joiners are (last count is around 4 dozen of them on my pike).
My recommendation would be to go with soldering - but - if you are not into that aspect, the Atlas product worked (and works) fine for me.
For what it’s worth …
Grayfox,
Thanks for confirming my friend’s recommendation. He’s stated similar facts. [4:-)]
On my current “test track shelf” I use those rail joiners with the wire already attached to them, and I still get some “dead spots” on the tracks. This is why I’m definetly soldering jumper wires on my new layout. [:D][;)]
pavariangoo
The subject on soldering and wiring has been discussed to death.It boils down to ‘believers’ and ‘non-believers’ - a near-‘faith’ decision. (The Dictionary definition of ‘faith’ is “belief without proof” - so do what you wish.
- CONTINUITY is electrical transfer or continuance.
RAIL JOINERS (wired or not) SLIDE onto the rail, and the electrical continuity is dependent on a metal/metal friction fit.
-
CONNECTING A WIRE to the rail joiner bottom is an improvement - in that one rail is not feeding another - but continuity is still dependent on the friction fit of the joiner to the rail, or in this case 2 rails.
-
WELDING is bonding one metal to another primarily for physical strength.
4.SOLDERING (melting one metal onto another primarily for electrical performance.
- CRIMPING involves physical displacement of the metals to form a solderless electrical connection. (It was developed in WWII for field servicing).
THOSE espousing ‘slde-on’ rail joiners for electrical continuity havent experinced joint contamination - yet… They will, with time - or as Frank Lloyd Wright once described buildings with riveted construction as having ''Aging Artharitic Joints".
-
WIRING TO a 'slide-on piece of metal doesn’t guarantee permanent connection to any rail.
-
SOLDERING RAIL JOINERS prohibits rail ‘breathing’ and can cause tearing out whole sections of track withe rails popped out ot the ties or roadbed.
GREYFOX, DWR, and Trainut are right on. AS was said before, “Do what you wish”. (It’s your RR).
Cheers!
Don,
Good job on listing the above information!
In the past I was “one of those” teens that thought that electrical butt connectors were as good as soldering. I’m glad that I eventually learned the facts from a technician.
Hope this info is helpful to our newbies as well.
High Greens on the Main. [4:-)][tup]
I’ve found that the Atlas terminal joiners are a bit too fragile. I’ve broken a couple while feeding the wire through the roadbed. I’ve made quite a few myself, on a piece of sectional track fastened upside-down to a 2x4 block. The whole process is made easier by tinning the wire and the joiner first (slide the joiner onto the upside-down track before tinning) and then connecting the two. I solder a length equal to about half the length of the joiner, centered on the underside of the joiner, using 20g solid copper (dorbell/thermostat wire) with at least 12" tails.
RAIL JOINERS do conduct electricity when new, and are 100% sure for ‘newbies’ when their layouts are also new -
- 'but as GREYFOX said,Joiners become ‘resitors’ with age. Worse, one has to hunt for ‘Which one is the problem’?.
Biggie Small, alias Alfred Mayo, alias ‘The Parker Legend’, - call us back in 10 - years.
An old German saying goes- in part - ''Too late ve get schmardt"!
OK, if you say so.