If the motor in the railtruck can draw more current than an LM-3S can provide (for example, 4 Amps), then you couldn't use an LM-3S to drive the motor directly. What can be done (in theory) is to use the LM-3 to drive a transistor designed for delivering a lot of power, or a pair of them in a configuration called a darlington pair and the transistor(s) then provides the power to the motor, easily supplying more than the LM-3 can deliver on it's own. Something very similar is already happening inside the LM, there is no way the microcontroller inside the LM can deliver 1A by itself.

Unfortunately I don't have a good drawing to post to explain it, nor do I have an explanation of how to handle forward and reverse. Our resident electronics guru would have been able to but sadly Alan has not been here for quite a long time for some reason.

- Tim

It should be the same as the LM-2 series of modules, 2 amp stall, 1 amp continuous.

If your railtruck will never MU (load share ) with another module you should also be able to use the LM-3S to drive a power transistor instead of driving the motor directly (same theory as how transistor throttles could pass high current without passing it through the potentiometer itself).  Idea not tested of course.

- Tim

Locomotive Airhorn Usage

Ok, thanks Tim.

Bill

Hi all,
Does anyone know if RailPro Assistant will run on a chromebook, or does it need to be a windows based computer?

Thanks,
Bill