RailPro > RailPro Specific Help & Discussion

Cannot get lights to work

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Blueleader:
Thanks for the help! I reworked the wiring and tested the factory board the head, # boards, and cab lights were mounted to and found a faulty connection on the # boards. So I bypassed the board and all lights work great. I can even strobe the cab light  :D

Carter:
The BLUE is positive and the Green and Violet are grounds. What are or is the LM-3 voltage output on the Blue wire? AND which wire Green and Violet are for the Front light and the rear light? Wiring diagram needs more detail.

G8B4Life:
Carter,

Technically the front and rear headlights would be wired to the white and yellow wires on the 9 pin harness. This follows the DCC standard for 9 pin plugs, and if you use the auto reverse headlights feature it only works on those two wires. You could wire up your headlights to other wires if you wished, that's your choice but most people stick with the standard white and yellow.

The voltage on the outputs is about half a volt less than the track voltage so if your using a PWR-56 which put's out 14v to the track then the outputs in the LM will put out roughly 13.5v.

- Tim

Carter:
Tim thank you. I assumed  (I know the saying) that the Green and Violet where the head - stern lights. And that the "common" was the ground.

Goes to show that relying on standard terminology can get you in trouble. The difference between hard wire engineers (me) and electronic engineering Ring. Same as the Mars Explorer one group used metric and the other group used feet and inches.

Carter

Alan:

--- Quote from: Carter on March 21, 2018, 09:40:38 PM ---... The difference between hard wire engineers (me) and electronic engineering Ring.
Carter

--- End quote ---

So true. It has confused more than one person.

Residential, commercial, and industrial wiring normally switch everything (contactors, controls, lamps, etcetera) to the positive rail. Electronic devices switch everything to the ground rail. There are sound reasons for this difference. In the former it is safer for people to be isolated from the positive rail. Electronics have no such people safety concerns and so are optimized for operational speed, cost, and size. NPN semiconductor devices (switch to ground rail) are faster than PNP semiconductor devices (switch to positive rail). NPN devices are also physically smaller than PNP and as such take up less space and are less expensive to manufacture.

Your fun fact for the day!

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