A quiz for what i am doing wrong. HELP

[collectors]

Hope you can help as i think i have created a bad circuit when i switch on my Hornby Elite i get error, which is normally a short. All of the 3 tracks are all working fine until the points where fitted. At the moment, none of the points are connected except for track joiners & 2 IJ on the frogs. I think i have inadvertently created somthing like a turn around loop with no protection but i am not quite sure. If i remember, it was also all working until i connected points 567 & 8. Any suggestions would be a help?

[Stese]

Hi

How is your layout wired? are you using a single looped bus, or feeding in 'star' pattern?

It stands to reason that the problem is in those two crossovers... have you put IRJ's between both rails of each point, separating the two circuits, or just on the frog rails? my uneducated guess is thats where the short is coming from... however if that is the case, then i'd expect crossover 3/4 would be giving the same issue.

I'm not a DCC expert, so i'm not 100% how it works in situations like this.

Regards,

Steve.

[Walkingthedog]

Are you sure that all the power feed wires are connected the same way round.

[RogerB]

Looking at how you have marked the "+" and "-" rails it does look like there is a reverse loop on the right hand side. That is why the error occurred when you connected points 5-8 up. Do you know how to resolve that? R-

[Rog (RJ)]

I think you r problem is a reverse loop, as you suspect. You need a RLM to feed the right hand inner section and two sets of IRJs to isolate the reverse loop section from the rest of the layout, as shown in green.

[collectors]

Hi

How is your layout wired? are you using a single looped bus, or feeding in 'star' pattern?

It stands to reason that the problem is in those two crossovers... have you put IRJ's between both rails of each point, separating the two circuits, or just on the frog rails? my uneducated guess is thats where the short is coming from... however if that is the case, then i'd expect crossover 3/4 would be giving the same issue.

I'm not a DCC expert, so i'm not 100% how it works in situations like this.

Regards,

Steve.

The blue/move/yellow are the areas & fed in a star pattern

[Brian]

Before doing anything else try reversing the rail feeds to the loop lines marked as 'Track 3'. I feel you have accidentally reversed the polarity to this loop. By reversing loop 3 wiring you effectively remove any short and there is no reverse loop!
Dont forget and when using Electrofrog points, you need two IRJs per point end fitted onto the Vee rail ends. So cross-overs like 3-4, 5-6 and 7-8 you need four IRJs in all two in the straight ahead and two in the crossover directions from the frogs.

[collectors]

I think you r problem is a reverse loop, as you suspect. You need a RLM to feed the right hand inner section and two sets of IRJs to isolate the reverse loop section from the rest of the layout, as shown in green.

Ah! Well done Rog, this will keep me busy. Will have to reconfigure the star feeds a bit & thankfully its all on Wago connectors & not soldered, so this wont be to bad. I notice the Hornby are quite a bit more cheaper than others. Any recommendations on reliable RML's. Thanks again.

[collectors]

Before doing anything else try reversing the rail feeds to the loop lines marked as 'Track 3'. I feel you have accidentally reversed the polarity to this loop. By reversing loop 3 wiring you effectively remove any short and there is no reverse loop!
Dont forget and when using Electrofrog points, you need two IRJs per point end fitted onto the Vee rail ends. So cross-overs like 3-4, 5-6 and 7-8 you need four IRJs in all two in the straight ahead and two in the crossover directions from the frogs.

Funnily enough it was the other way around before, so i reversed the polarity on this area thinking that will do it. Switched on & the the dreaded ERROR come up again. Think what i will do first is isolate that part of the track from the two points just to check & if the fault has gone, its then got to be rog's idea with an RLM to solve it.

[Brian]

It should be wired as per this drawing... (you can swap all red lines to the opposite side but you must follow the example). Note rail polarity between the loops.

Track.jpg

Dont forget all points MUST HAVE IRJS on there Vee rails if Electrofrog points